Cave secrets

 Here is a few new files for you and a review of sorts. 

The secret of the caves is the thirteenth book in the Hardy boys series, at least in the UK. It has both an original text and a revised version that has about half the old text in it with a new story tacked on. Its not an entirely original story like Flickering Torch which I'm reading now, nor is it an extended edit like The Hooded Hawk Mystery, its somewhere halfway in between.

The revised story goes something like this. 

Chet Morton has a new hobby as a metal detectorist, after finding Joe's old toy Fire Engine in the front yard, he wants to go to Honeycomb caves because of some treasure about buried treasure. A girl called Mary Todd shows up and asks them to find her professor brother, Todham, as he has vanished, presumed kidnapped.

She stays with the Mortons and they head down the coast to check out the caves and find a suspicious French diner cum antique shop is the focus of much of the trouble and that there is a strange old man living down on the sea shore in a cave who could be crazy. There is also a technology angle as a telescope up on the coast is the subject of sabotage by a foreign power.

All in all its not a bad story, just typical for most of the revised output.

The original story on the other hand is much more interesting...

The basic outlines are the same except it has ties in with The Shore Road mystery, as the earliest books were considered as part of a series, with the boys growing up and graduating from high school. This time it's one of the car thieves that has escaped from jail.

The boys rescue an old lady called Evangeline Todd who asks them to look for her brother, Todham. Which leads them down to Honeycomb caves, and a strange old man called Captain Royal. Its a much more interesting story and quite modern as it deals with mental health issues and amnesiacs. I won't spoil it too much, but I found it to be quite the better story for this. Chet, as per the usual original text doesn't get any hobbies which, having read a few stories, seem to be entirely for the remakes.

Also on a final note, no one could really spell coconut back then. Its listed as cocoanut, in the text and such and have seen various variations in this from older stories and posters and the like.

You can read the remake and originals here, and here.