A popular trend we don’t see much of anymore these days is placing beloved characters/actors in mystery series. If you were a child of the nineties, chances are you watched one of the Mary-Kate and Ashley tapes where they ran a detective agency.
This is what we have here with this 2002 book starring Barbie. It’s very short and light on the haunted house part of the title.
Cover
This is a cute cover featuring Barbie at the door of the haunted mansion featured in the book. Also using an actual Barbie doll in an A+ move in my opinion.
The Plot
Yeah, like I said the plot is extremely simple. Even compared to some of the mysteries I reviewed starring eight year old Nancy Drew and that’s saying something. On the one hand, I get that you have to consider the audience and it is written in a way for the intended audience to follow along and help Barbie solve the mystery but it’s light on scares also and young kids can handle facing their fears.
What is the plot of the book? Well, Barbie is a news reporter and is interviewing a lonely old man who lives in a decrepit old house. Barbie and her friend, Becky have volunteered to help him at his garden. Yeah, 2002 inclusion of disabled characters as Becky is in a wheelchair and the description is just not great.
Becky is based on an actual doll, so yay for inclusion? Anyways, back to the mystery at hand, the mansion is supposedly haunted by a ghost that is scaring the old man, Willow Feilding. I’m not going to beat they were after a formula that could perfect soil.
So yeah, this is less a ghost mystery and more a plant based mystery. There’s nothing wrong with that but I feel as though I was sold a different story than what the title suggested.
Not bad but just disappointing really.
My Final Thoughts
This book is okay but it’s not really a haunted mansion mystery like the title implies. If you want good Halloween Barbie material, check out the comics I reviewed last year. Well, I’m done looking at Barbie related material for Halloween but I’m not done with Barbie this month just yet. Join me as I close this out for covering a villain I’ve wanted to cover for a while as I look at…
Ken
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