Four kids and a dog investigating mysteries and catching the bad guy, who happens to be a man in a costume. Sound familiar? Well, the basic premise of the gang from Scooby-Doo inspired the storyline in Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero. But the comparisons pretty much end there.
The “meddling kids” of the title actually were kids (unlike the Scooby gang) when they formed the Blyton Summer Detective Club and started solving mysteries around the mining town of Blyton Hills (in the Zoinx River Valley). There’s a dog too! Their biggest case involved a supposedly haunted house on a small island – they captured a man (in a costume!) trying to scare people away so he could find a rumored buried treasure. Except there was more to it, things that the kids never shared with authorities or the local newspaper. So they’re back as adults to try to figure out what really happened and solve the true mystery.
The plot shifts quickly from mystery to suspense to Lovecraftian horror – and it works. The author does a good job of tying things together in a logical, engrossing way. And he definitely keeps the action going too! There are a couple of somewhat ridiculous sequences à la Scooby (like a “rollicking” escape from a mental ward), but for the most part things are taken seriously. Once the monsters show up, there’s a definite hack and slash vibe, but it’s the protagonists doing most of the slashing.
The characters are pretty well developed, considering the genre of the book (it’s not often you can say that of a horror novel). You get bits of back stories for each of them throughout the narrative. And the author never forgets about the dog either – the present day canine is the great grandson of the original member of the club and he has a realistic dog personality, including his curiosity, loyalty and protectiveness.
I was pleasantly surprised by this novel and I’m glad I came across it. Not only is the story well thought out, fun and engrossing, but I enjoyed the author’s somewhat quirky writing style. It definitely fit the atmosphere of the book.