The Mystery of the Missing Pop Idol

The Mystery of the Missing Pop Idol, from Gertrude C. Warner's Boxcar Children series, is a gentle whodunnit for 7 year olds set backstage at a TV talent show.

What happens

The four Alden children have come to Silver City Mall for the day. Thousands of hopefuls are queuing right round the building to audition for Pop Star Sensation. Their grandfather knows the producer, so the Aldens get to go behind the scenes.

Violet is ten and the shy one. She plays the violin and she sings beautifully. She's too young to compete, but she's hoping for a go anyway, and mostly she wants to see Madlynn Rose, who is her favourite singer in the world.

Benny is six and the hungry one. Jessie is twelve and the organised one. Henry is fourteen and the one who says "let's just be patient" roughly four times.

The queue is the best bit of the opening. There's a woman in a hot pink feather boa. A cowboy in chaps twirling a lasso and singing country music. A family with five sisters and two brothers in matching grey outfits and green ties who sound genuinely wonderful together.

Then the black cars arrive. The unkind judge gets booed and rather enjoys it. The flashy one gets cheered, although Benny is sure that's booing too until Jessie explains. And Madlynn Rose steps out in purple, exactly like Violet, and sings.

Violet knows every word.

A little later Violet is standing at the microphone in front of the judges, about to sing at last, and one of the three chairs is empty.

That's the hook, and it's a good one for a seven year old. Nobody is in danger and there's no crime scene. There's a building full of people who all want something, a missing girl, and four children quietly wandering about in it while the adults panic and lock the doors.

The writing is very plain. Chapters are short, names get repeated so nobody loses track, and the clues are the sort a child can actually spot.

One thing for a parent to know. The Aldens are orphans, and the book mentions it in the first chapter, briefly and calmly, along with the bit about the four of them running away and living in an abandoned railway boxcar before their grandfather took them in. It's told as the happy part of their history rather than a sad one, but it does arrive with no warning at all.

The Aldens are also relentlessly nice to everybody, which will be either the charm or the problem depending on your child.

What to read next

Brothers and sisters working a case together is really the appeal here, and the Hardy Boys Secret Files do the same thing. Frank is nine, Joe is eight, and they get hold of a piece of a treasure map having started the morning in the middle of a dodgeball game.