Under the name Nick West, Kin Platt wrote only two books in the series, and the first — see below — was so bad that I went into this second effort with rather muted expectations. How dare he, then, quit after writing one of the very best mysteries in the entire run, with the difficulties faced by a new animal park proving only the tip of the iceberg. Especially interesting is the decidedly unglamorous air given to the film industry, given that the park is being used as the location for a film which has, it must be said, a distinct reek of a B-movie about it. Solid reasoning, good mysteries, a swift and engaging plot…oh, the possibilities if Platt had stayed the course! [My review]

I can understand why Carey’s third novel for the series has its controversies, but let not that element detract from a well-crafted mystery with well-placed clues and a few clever reversals. Moving things away from Rocky Beach is a neat idea, and enables all sorts of odd characters — including the second suspicion vegetarian of the series — to be mixed in, with Carey doing strong work painting new locations that we’ll likely never see again. And, hey, if that controversial element really displeases you, at least we were saved a Scooby-Doo mask reveal…that really would have been terrible. Although, now I say it, I guess it might have been fun to justify doing that for some reason or other… [My review]

Carey’s first book in the series is disappointingly a little uneven. On the plus side, she clearly has a good grasp on the interior politics of the trio, and it feels like the experiences they’ve shared to date at least slightly inform their behaviour here. A good stab at widening the milieu of Rocky Breach, too, sees the focus shift away from odd things happening to the Investigators and instead them getting involved in oddnesses happening to other people. Alas, those eponymous footprints, however, make little sense and are barely explained…to the point that it begs the question of why they were made such a focus in the first place. Good peril escalation, but Carey would go on to do much, much better. [My review]

Nick West’s first entry in the series is baffling for all the wrong reasons: given what they’ve gone through prior to this, no way would the boys be fooled by the ‘dragon’ of the title, and once you don’t buy that the novel has little else to offer. The malefactor is obvious not through any liberal clewing, either, but rather because he’s about the only non-regular member of the cast. Frankly, it seems incredible to me that West went from this to the sheer quality of Nervous Lion — perhaps the steepest learning curve in genre fiction! Would place even lower, but the ending in which a bunch of dogs cavort down a beach warms my heart and earns this otherwise complete dud some extra consideration. [My review]

Lynds had the unenviable job picking up Robert Arthur’s creations while the great man still lived, and what he turned is in completely risk-free and perhaps the dullest of the Three investigators books thus far. Something about wind blowing through a cave? I seem to remember lots of walking around in a cave system, and then we get a sort of Destination Unknown (1954) ending where about six things happen at once…but, look, I’d checked out by then and I don’t remember a thing about any of it. Is there’s a sort of Zorro vibe to this one? Does that have anything to do with it? Hell, for being so unmemorable this deserves last place; may we never be this bored by a T3I book ever again. [My review]