There is no Santa Claus and there is no Carolyn Keene

Re: “Not a Girl Detective” by Susan Kandel

This is the second book featuring female-sleuth Cece Caruso. Cece lives in Southern California - more specifically in a 1932 bungalow in West Hollywood. She is close to forty and is a divorced mother of a twenty-something daughter. Her father was a cop, her brothers are cops and she is dating a cop.

Cece is a writer and her current project is writing a biography of Carolyn Keene, the author of the famed Nancy Drew series. She has friends who own a bookstore which specializes in selling rare books. They are quick to tease Cece, telling her that she is writing a biography of a pseudonym.

Carolyn Keene does not exist - this is just a made-up name. Several people wrote the Nancy Drew books based on outlines they received from the publishers, The Stratemeyer Syndicate. The real identities of the authors were to be kept secret. Bummer.

And I suppose next they’ll be telling me there is no Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy either!