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Nancy Drew Was Better Than Judy Blume
Our local public library doesn’t limit the number of books you can check out. I was deeply envious of my neighbors when they brought their laundry baskets on one summer trip to the library. Why hadn’t I thought of that? Laundry basket or not I steadily cleaned them out of Nancy Drew books — not Judy Blume.
The real intrigue was in mysteries. I was too young for Agatha Christie but I blazed through every single Nancy Drew book in our school library.
Of all the YA novels I read well into middle school no one kept me captivated like Nancy Drew. There were standalone stories that held my imagination hostage like Hatchett but no other character endured like a James Bond for preteens.
She was brave, ambitious, smart, and talented. She was shrewd with uncanny instincts other people relied on and trusted. She was admired and respected for her abilities. And being a career-driven young woman didn’t keep her from having a boyfriend. She didn’t have to choose.
Not that I was thinking in these terms in elementary school but the clever protagonist making all the decisions and doing all of the plot-driving executive functioning was female.
