Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew 1 – Sleepover Sleuths

Carolyn Keene's Sleepover Sleuths is the very first Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew mystery, a cosy whodunnit for 8 year olds about a precious doll that vanishes in the night.

What happens

This Nancy Drew is only eight. She's in third grade with Bess and George, her best friends since kindergarten, who are cousins and could hardly be more different. Bess loves gadgets and builds her own. George is a computer whizz.

Nancy is just good at guessing things. She can tell what's for school lunch from a fishy smell in the corridor!

Then Deirdre Shannon invites them to her birthday sleepover. Deirdre has her own website and usually gets what she wants. The invitation says bring a sleeping bag, a toothbrush and your City Girls doll.

It's a Hollywood party, with a red carpet, pizza and a pyjama fashion show. And under a white cloth is Deirdre's big surprise. Hollywood Heather, the rarest City Girls doll of them all.

She spends the night on the windowsill. By morning she's gone.

Deirdre hasn't told her parents. So she asks Nancy to find the doll, and Nancy, Bess and George become detectives for the very first time. Bess even builds a clue-collecting mitt out of sticky tape.

There's no shortage of suspects. A little sister who won't let go of her backpack. A tall girl who could reach the windowsill and was out of the room at the wrong moment. A drama queen who wanted Hollywood Heather for herself.

What makes this lovely is how fair it is. The clues are small and real, like a bit of white fluff and an orange button, and your reader has every chance of working it out first. Can they beat Nancy to it?

It's also very kind. Nobody is a villain, and the answer is more about friendship than stealing.

One gentle note. Nancy's mum died when she was three, which the book mentions once in passing. Hannah, the Drews' housekeeper, looks after her. It's backstory rather than a sad scene, but you'll know if that's close to home.

Expect third grade and a lot of "you guys!" since it's American.

What to read next

If they're hooked, Scream for Ice Cream is the next case. A brand new ice cream factory is running a flavour contest, and a friend's secret recipe goes missing on the day everyone signs up.