#1:  THE SMUGGLER'S TREASURE by Sarah Masters Buckey
#2:  HOOFBEATS OF DANGER by Holly Hughes
#3:  THE NIGHT FLYERS by Elizabeth McDavid Jones
#4:  VOICES AT WHISPER BEND by Katherine Ayres
#5:  SECRETS ON 26TH STREET by Elizabeth McDavid Jones
#6:  MYSTERY OF THE DARK TOWER by Evelyn Coleman
#7:  TROUBLE AT FORT LA POINTE by Kathleen Ernst
#8:  UNDER COPP'S HILL by Katherine Ayres
#9:  WATCHER IN THE PINEY WOODS by Elizabeth McDavid Jones
#10: SHADOWS IN THE GLASSHOUSE by Megan McDonald
#11: THE MINSTREL'S MELODY by Eleanora E. Tate
#12: RIDDLE OF THE PRAIRIE BRIDE by Kathryn Reiss
#13: ENEMY IN THE FORT by Sarah Masters Buckey
#14: CIRCLE OF FIRE by Evelyn Coleman
#15: MYSTERY ON SKULL ISLAND by Elizabeth McDavid Jones
#16: WHISTLER IN THE DARK by Kathleen Ernst
#17: MYSTERY AT CHILKOOT PASS by Barbara Steiner
#18: THE STRANGE CASE OF BABY H by Kathryn Reiss
#19: DANGER AT THE WILD WEST SHOW by Alison Hart
#20: GANGSTERS AT THE GRAND ATLANTIC by Sarah Masters Buckey
#21: GHOST LIGHT ON GRAVEYARD SHOAL by Elizabeth McDavid Jones
#22: BETRAYAL AT CROSS CREEK by Elizabeth McDavid Jones

SECRETS ON 26TH STREET (Book #5)
(American Girl History Mysteries)
by Elizabeth McDavid Jones
Pleasant Company
ISBN: 1562477609
Ages 9-12
144 pages

Susan O' Neal's mother hires a boarder named Bea to help pay the rent. Then one night Susan's mother disappears. Susan is sure that Bea has something to do with her mother's disappearance and that Bea is not telling all she knows. Now Susan must find out the secret that Bea is hiding from her so she can find her mother.

   --- Reviewed by Ashley Hartlaub

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CIRCLE OF FIRE (Book #14)
(American Girl History Mysteries)
by Evelyn Coleman
illustrated by Jean-Paul Tibbles and Laszlo Kubinyi
Pleasant Company
ISBN: 1584853395
Ages 9-12
160 pages

The year is 1958. Mendy is 12 years old and she's kind of a loner. She likes to play in the woods near her house in rural Tennessee. Mendy has a secret clearing that she claims as all her own---she calls it "The Taj Mahal". Mendy goes there to sit in the still beauty of the mountain forest and visit her cottontail rabbit, Mr. Hare. She saved him from her father's trap when he was a baby, and she raised him until her father told her to release him to the wild. Instead, she took him to her clearing, where she can visit him often and where he's happy and safe.

Mendy's best friend is Jeffrey, who's 14. They're more than best friends, really; they're blood brother and sister forever. But Mendy is black, and Jeffrey is white. Folks think they're getting too old to be friends anymore. In 1958, the South was segregated by law. White people and black people couldn't even drink from the same water fountain, so they certainly couldn't be best friends.

At first Mendy and Jeffrey stay friends secretly, leaving notes in their hiding place when they need to meet. But Mendy's mother catches them talking one day, and she threatens to tell Jeffrey's father. He begs her not to, and he promises he won't ever see Mendy again. Mendy is outraged, and she calls him a traitor.

Losing Jeffrey as her friend, though, leaves Mendy with nobody to turn to for help when she starts having serious problems at her clearing. She sees signs of trespassers, and she tries to warn them away. But the  trap she sets causes even more trouble. Mendy learns that the trespassers are not bored teenagers, like she thought, but adults with dangerous intentions. How can Mendy and Jeffrey fight evil---especially from people they have known all their lives?

CIRCLE OF FIRE is a well-written book about life in the segregated South. It's based on a true event, and the facts of life that it presents about those days are very real. You will want to read about how things were, and the brave people who were determined to change them forever.

   -- Reviewed by Tamara Penny

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MYSTERY ON SKULL ISLAND (Book #15)
(American Girl History Mysteries)
by Elizabeth McDavid Jones
Pleasant Company
ISBN: 1584853417
Ages 9-12
192 pages

Rachel Howell, 12-years-old, has lived in New York with her grandparents ever since her mother died. Rachel hasn't seen her father in 7 years and then, finally, he sends for her to come live with him in Charles Town, South Carolina. Rachel loves and misses her father, and she badly wants to live with him, but she is anxious, too.  In 1724, sailing to the Carolinas is dangerous because of pirates. Rachel's worst fears come true when her ship, the Betsy Jo, is run down and boarded by pirates. They steal the pearl necklace that belonged to Rachel's mother!

Things don't get better when she arrives safely in Charles Town. Her father tells her that in a few weeks she will meet Miranda, the woman he's going to marry. He is very happy about it, and Rachel tries to be happy, too, but she wonders what her stepmother will be like, and she's jealous of having to share her father when she has only just been reunited with him.

Rachel makes friends with Sally, the daughter of a tavern-keeper. Rachel's father doesn't mind it until Miranda tells him that tavern-keepers are not the right kind of people for the daughter of a wealthy merchant to befriend. Mr. Howell forbids Rachel to see Sally again. He enrolls her in school, because Miranda tells him to, and he says that she will make friends there.

Rachel likes Sally, and she doesn't like Miranda. She and Sally figure out a way to stay friends and meet on an island where nobody will know that they're friends. They name it Skull Island, and it's a pretty place, but spooky, too. The island has a sinkhole full of quicksand and the girls discover strange symbols carved into rocks. Could Skull Island be a pirates' hideout? Will Rachel and Sally figure out the mysteries on Skull Island? Will they survive to tell other people if they do? Will Rachel get her mother's pearl necklace back?

You will want to read this book in the History Mysteries series by American Girl. It has charming illustrations, and a section on the history of Charles Town in 1724. If you don't already know about the History Mysteries series, you will be glad you discovered them.

   --- Reviewed by Tamara Penny

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MYSTERY AT CHILKOOT PASS (Book #17)
(American Girl History Mysteries)
by Barbara Steiner
Pleasant Company
ISBN: 1584854871
Ages 9-12
177 pages

In 1897, when Hetty and her friend Alma are 12 years old, prospectors come down from Alaska Territory to San Francisco shouting, "Gold!" The prospectors tell everyone the nuggets are so big they're the size of potatoes. After that, it seems like half the country heads north to the Yukon to find some of those golden potatoes for themselves. Hetty, her father, Alma, her mother, and Hetty's Uncle Donall join the crowd heading north to the gold fields.

The trip north is gruesome. When their steamer first arrives at Dyea, the sailors dump people's belongings into a scow headed for the shore about a mile away. Some of their possessions land in the water instead of in the boat, but the sailors don't seem to care. Some of the passengers have to turn around and head home again because all their possessions are lost at sea. Horses, goats, dogs, and other animals have to swim for their lives in the icy waters.

To reach gold country, which stretched ahead of them for 500 miles, everybody has to move part of their things forward, leave somebody there to guard them, and then go back for more. Trip after trip after trip. It's only September, but up by the Arctic Circle winter comes early and it's bitter cold. Some people discover that they packed too much and have to leave trunks and other belongings alongside the trail. Other people decide to pay haulers to cart their things for them, only to have the haulers take the money and run.

Then Hetty discovers her locket missing. It has her only picture of her dead mother in it. Hetty laid it beside her bed in the tent at night, and the next morning it's gone. Someone else misses a knife. Alma's mother loses half her money. Who is the thief? Is there more than one? Can Hetty find him? Or is it a woman?

But thieves aren't the only problem everybody faces. They also have to fight diseases like typhoid and avalanches in the mountains. People have to be strong to survive in the Yukon territory. Will Hetty's family and friends make it? What will Hetty learn on her trip to the top of the world?

   --- Reviewed by Tamara Penny

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THE STRANGE CASE OF BABY H (Book #18)
(American Girl History Mysteries)
by Kathryn Reiss
Pleasant Company
ISBN: 1584855347
Ages 9-12
176 pages

It's 1906 and San Francisco has just been hit with an earthquake that has destroyed many areas of the city. For 12-year-old Clara the earthquake is a frightening experience, but she tries to help her mother and father set up temporary living arrangements for themselves and the boarders who are sharing their home. Everyone is afraid of the fires that start after the quake and are engulfing block after block across the city. Clara's family worries that they may soon be homeless like thousands of other San Franciscans if the fireman aren't able to put them out.

Despite all their problems, nothing prepares them for the shock of what Clara discovers on their doorstep --- an abandoned baby with a mysterious message tucked into her bedding! Clara's mother becomes immediately attached to little Baby H because she's still feeling the pain from the death of Clara's brother. But Clara knows that something is strange about this orphaned baby. Her head has been shaved and she's dressed in boy's clothing, as if someone wants to hide the fact that she's a girl. But why would someone bother to hide the baby's identity if they were giving her up?

When a young woman comes to their door claiming to be Baby H's mother, Clara suspects the woman is lying and decides to investigate who this woman is and what she's after. Before long, the whole family is involved in a dangerous game of trying to outwit a pair of evil kidnappers and find out what happened to the parents of Baby H.

   --- Reviewed by Ann L. Bruns

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