The Sinister Sign Post by Franklin W. Dixon
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I picked this book up to read after i read a copy of The Shadow series i had found a few days before to compare the two, as both were written around the same time. There is, indeed, a similarity of style and mood of the two books. Though The Mox edition of The Shadow is surely darker while The hardy Boys is much lighter. Both do have the courtesy of the characters and the anger of the bad guys with little use of violence. Very interesting to compare the two.

This 15th outing of The Hardy Boys is the first, to my memory, that i have ever read. It’s a nice little mystery with plenty of action. The writing is very, very good as is the plotting. It’s a tricky book to write as the characters are out in the country and the setting is very important. As are the locations of things like the sign post. Dixon does an excellent job of moving the characters around from place to place with a feeling of movement and the ease and difficulty, thereof.

This book is better handled and written for an adult than most “adult” books today, which seem to me to be written for young people adding bad language and sex. I might just try more of these Hardy Boys books.

The clinker is the near non-existence of serious violence. The stakes are extremely high for the bad guys involving what they are doing. Yet, they don’t seem to mind witnesses and merely tie up those who can finger them. More likely the bad guys would make the witnesses disappear. This is the element written for younger folks. Funny hoe today the direct opposite occurs as parents willingly push very violent video games to the same age group this book is for. Seems we were much smarter in the 1930s.

Bottom line: i recommend this book. 8 out of ten points.

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