K, here we go again. I have a feeling the list will be too long for just one entry, most likely I'll need two more. Gotta give it to Enid, the lady's output is beyond belief. Wiki says she regularly produced 10,000 words a day! Bear in mind that in Enid's day, no word processors with copy-paste function existed.

Imagine if blog had been around then.

The Five Find-Outers and Dog / Pasukan Mau Tahu
As a kid I had mixed feelings about this series. On the one hand, I thought the mysteries and the way they got solved weren't too bad. In the first few books, anyway. On the other hand, I wasn't crazy about how Fatty was described almost like a superkid, with lots of unbelievable talents. For the same reason, I didn't particularly care about S.T.O.P., either.

Pasukan Mau Tahu are Fatty, Larry, Daisy, Pip, and Bets. And the Dog is Buster, Fatty's terrier. Larry and Daisy are brother and sister. So are Pip and Bets. Fatty is a fat kid who has a knack for solving mysteries and is too clever for his own good. But unlike Jupe, who comes across rather all right with Pete and Bob to balance things out, Fatty just comes across as a pompous fat kid to me.

BTW, only recently did I come to know the original name, Five Find-Outers. Props to our Indonesian translators or whoever came up with Pasukan Mau Tahu.

1) The Mystery of the Burnt Cottage (1943) / Misteri Pondok Terbakar
Read this in Semarang, in quarantine for chickenpox. Finished it within a day and was rather impressed. A cottage is set on fire. Whodunnit? A real mystery with clues and suspects. Quite a change from Lima Sekawan adventures, where the kids most often just ride along with the story. Enid somehow went a little hard on Fatty, her (eventually) fav character in the series, which could be another reason I liked this book.

2) The Mystery of the Disappearing Cat (1944) / Misteri Kucing Siam
One day, my dad brought us to visit an old friend. This friend had two daughters, one of whom was an avid Pasukan Mau Tahu fan. We left the friend's house with eight books in my hands. Kucing Siam was one of them. The plot is ingenious. At least to a kid that I was. I read this before I did Pondok Terbakar, with several others in between. Now looking back, I say it's a worthy follow-up.

3) The Mystery of the Secret Room (1945) / Misteri Kamar Tersembunyi
An empty house with a fully furnished -- an ex-apartment hunter speaking here -- room. This plot is later recycled in Sapta Siaga - Rahasia Rumah Kosong. I read this late at night and the ending somehow scared me. The criminals are more menacing than the normal Blytonian thugs. Or is that another book?

4) The Mystery of the Spiteful Letters (1946) / Misteri Surat Kaleng
Don't remember much of it. I vaguely recall a big gap in the plot, something about the deduction not being very logical.

5) The Mystery of the Missing Necklace (1947) / Misteri Kalung Curian
This is where Fatty disguises himself as a wax Napoleon. I still remember that segment clearly. Fatty practises to hold still and when the night comes, Mr Goon ruins everything by sneezing very hard. Also still fresh is the ending, where Bets brilliantly figures out where the necklace is being hidden.

6) The Mystery of the Hidden House (1948) / Misteri Gedung Tua
One of the three or four Pasukan Mau Tahu books I owned -- I hope I still do. Mr Goon's nephew Ern is introduced. As a kid I kinda sympathized with this boy. Fatty and co are so mean and have fun at the poor kid's expense. They send him on some faux trail and, as predicted, he steps into a real one and gets all sorts of problem.

7) The Mystery of the Pantomime Cat (1949) / Misteri di Teater Kecil
Can't recall anything except that one of the theater characters can't write legibly, be it his own name or "aku gila." Huh?

8) The Mystery of the Invisible Thief (1950) / Misteri Pencuri Siluman
Mostly a blur to me now. I do remember the pattern on the crime scenes and proudly say that I immediately solved that one. Thank you, thank you.

9) The Mystery of the Vanished Prince (1951) / Misteri Pangeran Asing
The one with Ern again and some silly parade where the kids disguise and convince Ern that they are related to some foreign prince currently in the area. Then there's this thing about twin babies.

10) The Mystery of the Strange Bundle (1952) / Misteri Bungkusan Aneh
An old man throws a strange bundle into the river and it contains old clothes. Maybe.

11) The Mystery of Holly Lane (1953) / Misteri di Holly Lane
IIRC, it has an old man (or lady?) who hides his wealth in his house. Or is that Tally-Ho?

12) The Mystery of Tally-Ho Cottage (1954) / Misteri di Tally-Ho
Totally blank on this one.

13) The Mystery of the Missing Man (1956) / Misteri Penyamar Ulung
I owned this book. The one with Eunice and his beetle-loving dad. Enid comically described the man as "like a beetle himself." The mystery resolution is trademark Pasukan Mau Tahu and I admit I didn't see it coming then.

14) The Mystery of the Strange Messages (1957) / Misteri Berita Aneh
I also owned this one. Mr Goon receives anonymous letters telling him to chase away a house residents. In the letters, his name is spelled "goon" -- the sender cuts it from "Rangoon" and I think it's one of the moms that comes with this bit. I wonder if Enid noticed "Goon" and "Rangoon" first and developed the story from there.

15) The Mystery of Banshee Towers (1961) / Misteri Rumah Setan
Some artist makes copies of paintings in a museum and then replaces the originals with the copies. The museum itself is supposedly haunted by a banshee. Not much excitement here IIRC. In fact, I remember thinking this book had to be the weakest of the lot.

There's one book in which Fatty practises ventriloquism. I can't remember which one it is now.

All in all, Pasukan Mau Tahu gives something different from Lima Sekawan, my then-fav series. The stories are aguably stronger with real mysteries to be solved, but there's something about Lima Sekawan that hits closer to the softer part of my heart -- boy, was that a mouthful. Could it be the outdoor settings, or to be precise, the adventures away from home? Or simply because I read Lima Sekawan first?

Then, I was under the impression that interaction between the main Pasukan Mau Tahu characters is not as good as that of Lima Sekawan. Although, with me having read only the Indonesian version, it might well be down to the quality of the translators. We'll see in these few weeks if that impression will change.

The Adventure Series / Petualangan
The heaviest Blytons I read and not just for the number of pages. The settings, exotic at times, are so cool and the interaction with different people from different backgrounds makes for entertaining reading. The main characters are brother-sister Jack and Lucy-Ann, brother-sister Philip and Dinah, and Jack's parrot Kiki. All the children's parents are dead except for Philip and Dinah's mother Allie.

Kiki is good at saying random things at the 'right' time, giving people the impression that she may understand what is being said. One day I went to the zoo -- that's right, Pacarku is not the only one who can pay the zoo a visit -- and was disappointed to learn that none of the parrots 'spoke' like Kiki. What books do to children!

1) The Island of Adventure (1944) / Petualangan di Pulau Suram
An island that's full of birds, the main reason for Jack to want to go there. A strange-looking black man. And Bill Smugs. I remember that the ending was incredibly good but not the details. As with Pulau Rahasia, I am sure this was one of my favs then, I just can't recall details, how frustrating! Aaand, I just stole a quick glance at the books in front of me -- guess what, no Adventures! Oh well, life is like a basketball court...

2) The Castle of Adventure (1946) / Petualangan di Puri Rajawali
An impressive castle on a cliff. Or rather, if memory serves, built onto the cliff wall. We meet Tassie here, a local gal not unlike Lima Sekawan's Jo. There are eagles and Jack actually spends several days sleeping not far from their nest. Sinbad immediately came to mind there. Bill Smugs also makes an appearance here, in one of Enid's coincidences.

3) The Valley of Adventure (1947) / Petualangan di Lembah Maut
Another good book. Fast paced, too. The kids and Kiki board the wrong plane -- they're supposed to fly in Bill Smugs' new plane -- and find themselves in some valley with bad guys. Hmm, what is it with Petualangan, I don't recall anything else from this -- I'm 100% sure -- good story! Perhaps because the books are all very thick -- 300, sometimes 400, pages are indeed a handful for a kid to digest.

4) The Sea of Adventure (1948) / Petualangan di Laut Sunyi
Ah, I think I know why I don't remember too many details. Believe it or not, I read all eight books -- borrowed from an auntie -- in quick succession over a few days. Totally blank on this book. I think the kids are recovering from some illness and are therefore sent on a holiday by the sea. Bill Smugs is pretty much a permanent fixture by now.

5) The Mountain of Adventure (1949) / Petualangan di Gunung Bencana
The kids are lost in the mountains. There are a lot of donkeys and dogs. There's also a mad scientist. And death actually feels real here. I tell you, Petualangan is not something a boy should read alone after midnight. BTW, Lucy-Ann shines a bit -- just a tiny bit -- in this book. Man, I don't know what Enid had against her, but throughout the series Jack's sister comes across as even worse than Anne of Lima Sekawan.

6) The Ship of Adventure (1950) / Petualangan di Kapal Pesiar
I recall a treasure map and a monkey onboard. The treasure map leads the kids to a treasure island and of course they find the treasure in the end. Oh, and Bill Cunningham -- formerly known as Bill Smugs -- proposes to Philip's mom, how Love Boat!

Incidentally, I didn't get to watch Love Boat until several years after I read this book, so my imagination painted a totally different picture of what a cruise ship should look like.

7) The Circus of Adventure (1952) / Petualangan di Sirkus Asing
A foreign prince stays with the kids. The Blytonian world is full of foreign princes that can be borrowed when a story calls. Naturally, despite being spirited away to England, the prince is kidnapped anyway -- along with very much everyone else except Jack.

I like this story because Jack is my fav and he takes the center stage in this book, following the kidnappers and finding himself in the prince's home country. Not a modern place, according to the book. And he joins a circus, whoa! What follows is almost a copy-paste work from Sarjana Misterius -- or the other way around, both books were published in 1952 -- with the circus folk helping the kids escape.

8) The River of Adventure (1955) / Petualangan di Sungai Ajaib
What small things I remember from this book I keep confusing with Laut Sunyi. There's a snake charmer and a boy named Oola. There are several snakes, too, and venomous at that. Phillip -- a natural animal charmer himself -- keeps one, which he eventually uses to scare the bad guys. Which tells you that it's our normal 'bad' bad guys once again.

I still can't believe how few things stick with me from this series. This is one of the best series, if a more serious one. Enid Blyton was always at her best when she described nature. In Adventures, she was fully in her elements. Another factor that sets this series apart from the rest, I think.

What did I tell you about needing another entry to finish the list? Next: Komplotan and Sapta Siaga.

Current music: Trans-Siberian Orchestra - Christmas Canon Rock
Current mood: happy