Tell Me the Truth (Nancy Drew: On Campus #4)
by: Carolyn Keene
Paperback, 192 pages
Published
December 1st 1995
by Simon Pulse
Rating:
Synopsis:
Nancy's full of questions. Her budding romance with Peter Goodwin may shrivel if he doesn't tell the truth about his past. And someone has stolen a bio exam. If Nancy doesn't find out who, it could be Bess who faces failure. Nancy has her work cut out for her, but she's not about to fail the test.
I continue to read Nancy Drew: On Campus as a guilty pleasure. I do not go into the novels with high expectations. They are really just books I pick up because:
- Nancy Drew was a big part of my adolescence.
- Therefore I still enjoy reading about Nancy solving a grand mystery.
- These books are so corny that I can't help but keep on reading them
- They are really short, quick reads.
The original Nancy Drew series is so much better than this one, which was written in the 90s, but the corniness still appeals to me, so what can I say?
Tell Me the Truth was actually the first mystery in this series so far that I was unable to solve on my own, so way to go there! Usually I have the culprit figured out way before Nancy does with these books and I left wondering if college is actually making Nancy less intuititive, and quite frankly, stupid. But this story gave me a glimpse at the Nancy that I know and love, though she was still kind of annoying.
This particular mystery revolved around a cheating scandal that somehow affected every one of the main characters, even if they were not in the class in which the cheating occurred. For instance, Bess was in the Biology class that the cheating took place in, yet of course, Nancy somehow gets involved with the case. George was not a part of the scandal, but tension occurs between her and her boyfriend Will because of Nancy announcing her suspicions that Will's roommate Andy could be the top suspect.
These books were made to appeal to older readers, college aged. But even though I am in college, I still find it hard to connect with them. For one thing, there is way too much drama, but then again, with so many characters, that is unavoidable. Another thing is, it was written in the 90s. Which isn't a problem really, I love the 90s, but reading about how they were writing a manual for how to use the internet for students that "was easy to understand because they are still intimated by computers", was a bit comical to read when nowadays, we not only have computers but laptops, tablets, cellphones, ipods, and so on.
Overall, this book, and the series itself, are still enjoyable. But if you're looking for the Nancy Drew you grew up on and don't want to get disappointed, then maybe you should skip by these books. College Nancy has boy issues...and it is painful to read...
