#93 The Serpent's Tooth Mystery (31st Anniversary Review)

[tomswift2002]

Published: December 1988
Published: Minstrel Books (1988-199?)
Author: Unknown as of November 2020
Reading Level: 7.3

Plot: Frank and Joe Are Drawn Into A Snakepit of Danger And Deceit!

A Poisonous Plot Endangers The Safety Of The Hardy Boys HomeTown!

Frank and Joe visit the zoo to see the deadly new Australian tiger snake: but all the find is trouble.  Herpetologist Dr. Harrod Michaels, the victim, of a snakebite, is slumped over his desk, and poisonous snakes have been stolen.  They may be loos in Bayport!

The trail of clues leads Frank and Joe to a warehouse in New Jersey where they uncover the sinister secret behind the theft.  But they'll have to be quick, as a cobra and as sharp as a serpent's tooth to catch the snake in the grass before the deadly bite is put on them!

Review:  I'm just starting my re-read, and this is one that I have vague memories on.  It's been about 20 years since I last read it, and just from looking at page 1, it appears and I remember this book had Phil Cohen play a major role in the post-Stratmeyer Syndicate Mystery Stories for the first time.  Sure he had appeared here and there and had been mentioned as developing electronics skills that made him an electronics wizard, versus just being the Hardy's friend and a good tennis player. 

[MacGyver]

It's also worth noting that Phil Cohen is Jewish, one of the few non-WASP characters in the book series.

[tomswift2002]

I finished the book last night.  As I said this book was focused on Phil Cohen, who in the first 9 Simon & Schuster Hardy Boys books had been developed into an electronics whiz.  And that's what he was doing again when some one decided to set him up.

Overall, this book didn't feel as Casefiles-ish as the previous two did.  This one felt more like the Stratemeyer Hardy Boys, although very few of those were based on an attempted murder plot, so that was a more Casefiles thing in this book. 

It's funny, but in chapter 12 it seemed as if the author was familiar with The Hardy Boys Detective Handbook since he had Joe run into the Hardy garage to get plaster and Frank get water in order to make plaster casts of some footprints they had found.  The authors don't usually have the Hardy's preserve the evidence like that.  In The Shadow Killers one of the bad guys stepped on a recently painted line in a parking lot—-and yet the author didn't have either Hardy grab a camera to take a photo of the tread!

Rating:  7.5 out of 10