The Hardy Boysseries on Hulu has been cancelled after three seasons. Amazing since The Hardy Boys has been one of the longest-running series in any format. This franchise started with the novel “The Tower Treasure” in 1927!
When the series began, books were attributed to an author named Franklin W. Dixon but were actually written by a group known as The Stratemeyer Syndicate. The Syndicate was founded by children’s book entrepreneur, Edward Stratemeyer. Statemeyer was colossally prolific, having created more than 1,300 books and selling over 500 million copies. He created YA characters and book series including: The Rover Boys, The Bobbsey Twins, Tom Swift, The Hardy Boys, and Nancy Drew.
Adaptations of the series books to film began in 1956 when “The Hardy Boys: The Mystery of the Applegate Treasure” was aired as part of “The Mickey Mouse Club.” Another series ran from 1969-1971, which was an animated version where the boys were members of a rock band. From 1977-1979 “The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries” appeared, teaming The Hardy Boys with Nancy Drew, another Stratemeyer-created character. Previously there was also a 1995 television series that lasted only 13 episodes.
Launched in 2020, the Hulu adaptation of “The Hardy Boys” was, according to Variety, a production based entirely in Canada with only Canadian actors. Since then, the series has scored two Canadian Screen Awards, a Directors Guild of Canada Award, and a Daytime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Young Adult Series. The final season will consist of eight episodes, an hour in length each, and will have Bailee Madison of “Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin” joining the cast.
Sadly after three seasons on the streaming service, Hulu has chosen to cancel the show following its third season. It seems that lack of awareness about the show may have contributed to its early cancellation.
Down for now, don’t count The Hardy Boys out. They’ve been a reappearing act for 95 years!
On Monday, August 29, Driven: A Rita Mars Thriller, took the Silver Award in the Fiction, LGBTQ category. I want to thank all my readers who took the time to review my work, who sent messages of encouragement and who rolled up their sleeves to help get my book produced and promoted. I could not have asked for more caring support.
About the EVVY’s
The CIPA EVVYs™ is one of the longest-running book award competitions on the Indie publishing scene, running for nearly 28 years. This annual contest is sponsored by the Colorado Independent Publishers’ Association (CIPA).
The CIPA EVVYs™ was founded by Evelyn Kaye twenty-eight years ago. Ms. Kaye was instrumental in bringing independent aspiring authors recognition for their literary endeavors. It is open to all types of independently published books from small presses that are too often overlooked by the giant publishing houses. The contest has grown to receive entries from as far away as England, Belgium, South Africa and Dubai. This year alone, the competition drew more than 400 entrants.
There are over 50 categories eligible to compete which allows a wide range of genres. The panel of judges is comprised of teachers, business leaders, critics, editors and, of course, readers. In this competition, judges must follow strict CIPA qualification process.
Awards are given to the top three highest scorers in each category. To achieve an award is certainly an honor.
The CIPA EVVY’s continue to be a leader in providing a pathway for independent authors to gain recognition for their work.
Imagine being held against your will in a mammoth swampy area with little access or no way out. A legendary demon mule lurks behind loblolly pine and the remnants of forests long dead.
You were brought in through darkness so rich and deep that it feels more like traveling in a different space as you cannot determine sky or land. Walking the treacherous ground feels like you are entering a dangerous abyss.
You don’t know where you are, and if you try to escape, you face vast, treacherous ground, or the risk of being absorbed into a marsh hole. Even the forests have drowned here, losing their grip on the land through brackish water and changing tides.
The smell of death, and struggle is all around you, with muskrats, mosquitos, snakes and the like. This can be a hostile environment.
This is Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge, with its 28,000 acres of brackish wetlands and ghost forests holding a gloomier story of untold mystery and menacing despair.
Blackwater embodies a darkness that earns its namesake. Waters blackened with tannins, dying forests, and black marsh mud that can swallow someone in just a few unfortunate steps make this an unfortunately perfect place to go and never be found.
Blackwater’s mystery is found in a network of hiding places for those escaping the law or toward freedom. Places to hide are abundant for hunters, trappers, and criminals alike, and it’s easy to imagine entering the dark vastness to hold someone hostage, for example, or to disappear from the public eye.
This includes people living in the horrors of slavery and seeking their freedom by using the area as part of the Underground Railroad. Dressed in disguise, people who were enslaved covertly traveled at night through snaking creeks into the deep darkness of the area, careful to avoid slave hunters and their dogs.
It’s not hard to imagine a cold, stark winter here, with the blackness of night covering a ghostly stillness that envelopes the loblolly pine and cordgrass, only to be interrupted by the sound of a bat flying overhead, or the black water’s subtle movement as a muskrat swims to its burrow on the marsh’s banks.
The area’s marshy guts are also home to bald eagle, peregrine falcon, Sika deer, fox, coyote, vole, and rats. Once a great source of timber, Blackwater’s wetlands, fields, and meadows are now interrupted by hammocks of loblolly pine and salt encroached forest, with mosquitoes and fireflies abundant in the heat of summer.
Blackwater makes the perfect backdrop for my second book in the Rita Mars Thriller series, Objects of Desire, being published in late 2022.
You can learn more about release dates and more of the series’ perilous plot twists and turns at www.valeriewebster.com.
I am so pleased to announce the June Amazon gift card winner at www.valeriewebster.com. That winner of our monthly all-subscriber pool drawing is Charlotte Krasnoff.
Charlotte is an avid reader and a fan of classical music. She herself studied and played the cello for many years. Originally from the Jersey Shore, Charlotte moved to Denver, Colorado when her work in group therapy landed her a position as head of a community outreach program. In 2004 the Colorado branch of the National Association of Social Work named her Social Worker of the Year. At 92, Charlotte continues her calling in Boulder, CO; she has been practicing for over 57 years. Congratulations, Charlotte!
“Driven,” by Valerie Webster is a page-turning story. The story revolves around Rita Mars, an ex-investigative journalist. Bobby Ellis, one of her longtime friends had a piece of important information to give to Rita but when she arrived he was dead.
Later learns that her friend didn’t commit suicide rather he was murdered. She gets driven and makes it her mission to find out the man that killed her friend.
The storyline moves at a fast pace and has the potential to keep the readers hooked on the story till the very end. The book comes with many characters- Rita, Bobby, Charles, Karin… Each character is vividly portrayed.
The suspense kept me glued to the story till the very end. I will recommend this book to all thriller lovers. I can’t wait to read more Rita Mars thriller stories…
Valerie Webster and Driven: A Rita Mars Thriller in the spotlight via Author of the Day interview.
Make your next book club event an author event with a writer who’s lived the cases, developed the crime fighting technologies. Contact Valerie Webster today.
