Hardy Boys Clue Book 06 – A Skateboard Cat-astrophe

A Skateboard Cat-astrophe by Franklin W Dixon is a Hardy Boys Clue Book mystery for 7 year olds, and the star of it is a cat on a skateboard.

What happens

Frank Hardy is nine. His brother Joe is eight. They're the second-best detectives in Bayport, after their dad, who does it for a living.

In two days Bayport holds a skateboard contest, and nobody can think about anything else. The winner gets mac and cheese all summer for nothing, a gift card and lessons from a professional, so the stakes are about as high as they get.

Diesel Diffendorfer is the local champion, and he nearly flattens the boys with his skateboard just to make a point. His new best friend is Adam Ackerman, the school bully.

Then Chet shows them a video. Skeeter is a cat. Skeeter skateboards. Skeeter has his own website and a great many fans, and his owner Carlos has just moved to Bayport.

Chet gets Skeeter into the contest, announces it on the local news, and suddenly Diesel's fan club are all wearing Go Skeeter T-shirts instead.

On the day, Skeeter hops onto his board, the bell rings, and something small and grey whizzes past his nose. He's off after it into the bushes, and by the time the boys bring him back he's been disqualified for running away.

The mouse is made of metal.

So somebody did it on purpose, and out comes the clue book with a fresh page for suspects. Adam's got a grudge. Diesel wanted to win. Daisy's family run the pizza place and would rather nobody ate mac and cheese at all. And there's a boy whose own pet just lost the top spot online.

This is a proper guessing book. The clues land in front of your reader at the same moment they land in front of Frank and Joe, and the brothers stop to talk through what each one means.

It moves fast, and most of the jokes belong to Chet and most of them are about food.

It's American through and through, from the mac and cheese truck to the nine-year-olds with YouTube channels, so expect a question or two about what fried mac-and-cheese balls actually are.

The only sad note is Carlos, who blames the boys and says he wishes he'd never entered his cat. It's uncomfortable for a page and then it becomes the reason Frank and Joe take the case.

What to read next

For a child who likes to get there before the detective does, Frank and Joe take another sabotage case in The Bad Luck Skate, where somebody gets at a hockey team's lucky charm the week of the championship.