56 Weeks with Nancy Drew

Last year, after collecting Nancy Drew books since I was a little girl, I finally completed my set of the first 56 in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series. I never thought the day would come when I would have the full collection on my shelves. My little girl self was (and still is!) very proud.

It is through Nancy Drew that I fell in love with reading. There was nothing like curling up with one of the yellow-spined hardbacks and imagining myself as the titan-haired girl zipping from one mystery to the next in a little blue roadster. I was such a fan that I even used to style my hair with it flipped out at the ends, so I could look more like how Nancy is depicted on the Rudy Nappi covers.

A little bit about the Nancy Drew:

Nancy Drew lives in the town of River Heights with her father, prominent lawyer, Carson Drew, and their housekeeper, Hannah Gruen, who helped rear Nancy since the death of the girl's mother years before. Nancy falls into her first case when she is delivering some legal papers for her father. Frequently, Carson discusses his cases with his daughter and asks for her assistance. With the help of her friends, cousins Bess and George, Nancy goes on to solve a number of mysteries, all while looking fabulous, never forgetting to stop for luncheon, and rarely driving over the legal speed limit.

You might be wondering why I decided to collect the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories (from here on to be referred to as NDMS) when there are so many other Nancy Drew series to pick from. NDMS is the series that introduced Nancy Drew to the world back in 1930. While a lot of the various series that have been published over the years have gone out of print, this one is still available. It also happens to be the series that I first read as a child.

I didn't have a ton of books when I was little, and only a handful of Nancy Drews among them. Most often, I would read books from the library, which helped to feed my Nancy Drew obsession. Unfortunately, the library in my village leaned more towards the Nancy Drew Files series, which was newly in print at the time. The Nancy Drew Files reminded me of a less well-written Sweet Valley High, if you can imagine such a thing. While Nancy and her friends were still solving mysteries, there was more focus on boys and Nancy seemed a lot older, more like a modern teenager than the Nancy I knew.

I have never before had the opportunity to read the entire series of NDMS, so I have been very much looking forward to reading the books in order, some of them for the very first time! As I like an excuse to get myself organized, and I wanted a way of recording what (for me) is a momentous event, over 30 years in the making, I thought it would be fun to read the original 56 books in 56 weeks.

I'm using the word "original" loosely here, as in most cases I only have the revised text, 20 chapter versions of these books. Books 1-34 were originally published as 25 chapter books, but starting in 1959 they were edited down to 20 chapters. Books 35-56, which were published from 1957 onward in the 20 chapter format, were not revised. I would love to one day have all of the original text 25 chapter editions, but as yet I only have a few. 

In the instances where I have both the original text 25 chapter and revised text 20 chapter editions I plan discuss how they differ. In some cases, the plot was greatly changed in the revised text versions, so I hope to go into some depth on the changes that were made, and my general thoughts on 1960s Nancy. It wasn't just her roadster that she swapped out for a convertible. The 1960s Nancy underwent a bit of a personality change from the Nancy of the 1930s. 

I will be posting a review of one Nancy Drew book per week from now until the end of January 2025. Over on Instagram, I will be using the hashtag #56WeeksWithNancyDrew. And because I think it will be easier for people to find (and because I'm greedy), I will also be tagging my posts with #NancyDrewin56Weeks. I hope you will hop into my blue (virtual) roadster and take a ride with me and Nancy Drew over the next 56 weeks. I can't wait!