Bus Station Mystery

The Alden children (Henry 16, Jessie 14, Violet 12 and Benny 7) decide to take a trip to a nearby town. While they were waiting to change buses along the way they met the mysterious station manager, Frank and soon found themselves involved in the local problems. A factory was destroying the nearby river and tearing the town apart. Would the Aldens and the town be able to find a way to keep the needed jobs without destroying the river? This 1974 entry into the long running Boxcar Children series of mysteries was one of the last to be written by the series originator, Gertrude Chandler Warner, who had begun the series in the 1940's with the idea of combining simple vocabulary with high interest plots aimed at beginning readers. Her idea and characters were a great success and have been enjoyed by generations of young readers since. The mysteries involved are slight, the characterizations do not go into depth and the solutions are simplistic to a sophisticated reader but to the target audience of beginning readers they are thrilling. The cliff hanging style of writing keeps them turning page after page to see what is next until they reach the end of these chapter books.