When Jim Jones Met The Incredible Hulk....... (The Hardy Boys: The Apeman's Secret - Franklin W. Dixon)

Member Name: keeperofthematri

Product:	The Hardy Boys: The Apeman's Secret - Franklin W. Dixon
Date:	07/08/09 (41 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: I'm struggling to find any.....

Disadvantages: Poor characters & plots. Some bad dialogue

Frank & Joe Hardy are the teenage sons of famous private detective Fenton Hardy & his wife Laura. Together, (& sometimes from help with family & friends) they investigate all sorts of crimes & strange occurences....

The Apeman's Secret was published in the US in 1980 & was the sixty second in the series. The book first appeared in the UK in 1981 & was numbered 60 when it was published by Armada.


Frank & Joe, along with lots of other Americans, are viewers of the popular "Apeman" programme. However, someone is impersonating the Apeman character & turning up at random locations causing trouble & damaging property. Is it a publicity stunt? Could it be someone with a grudge against the programme or against the comic which is where the character first started out? Frank & Joe start to look into things at the request of Micky Rudd, editor & publisher of Star Comix in which the Apeman character first appeared.

Manwhile they've have also been asked to look into the disappearance of teenager Sue Linwood. Her father believes she has joined a cult, the Children Of Noah & is worried about her safety. He also can't be sure that she's actually joined the cult or has left home and gone somewhere else.

Frank & Joe work on both cases, feeling that, at many times, they're under observation or are being followed. However, events come to a head when they find themselves at the mercy of armed guards......


The usual supporting characters who appear in this book are:-

+ Fenton Hardy
+ Laura Hardy
+ Aunt Gertrude
+ Chet Morton
+ Biff Hooper
+ Tony Prito
+ Iola Morton
+ Callie Shaw
+ Jack Wayne
+ Chief Ezra Collig


After "The Pentagon Spy" this book comes as rather a let down. You can't help but wonder whether this particular ghost writer has used Jim Jones & The Peoples Temple (which came to an abrupt end with mass suicide in 1978) & "The Incredible Hulk" (which debutted in the US in the same year) as inspirations for the Children of Noah and for "The Apeman" character & show.

The Cult plot thread & the Apeman plot thread don't gel together that well & I didn't find either of them particularly that interesting. The Apeman plot just seemed to be too close to The Incredible Hulk for my liking & it comes across almost in cartoon fashion rather than anything serious.

The Cultists are treated in a stereotypical cultist fashion. They act suspiciously, get physical when verbally challenged &, on the whole, are rather faceless characters who just seem to be included to provide an alternative plot thread to the Apeman angle. The explanation of the cult's "activities" which comes at the end seems rather basic & clichéd but perhaps that's how the author thought it was best to explain things to the target audience without going into too much detail.

The language used in the book is accessible for the target age range &, as usual, the book is written in the third person. Descriptions of locations & characters are adequate but are not anything out of the ordinary. Some of the dialogue also comes across as a bit "Scooby-Doo / Dastardly & Muttley" with Aunt Gertrude coming out with "drat!" at one point in the book.

None of the "guest" characters are that memorable &, as I picked up the book to start reading it, I realised that I couldn't remember a single thing about it from reading it when I was a child. Having read it again I can now see why. It's badly plotted, poor paced & fails to engage or hold the interest of the reader. Not one to introduce kids to the series with.

At the time of writing the book is available in hardback for £4.26 from Amazon Prime. New & used paperbacks are available from 1p upwards.

Summary: Sixty Second Hardy Boys Book