Strangely enough, it wasn't as confusing as you'd think. I was able to pick up and put down the books at will and even remember the plots the minute I resumed reading. My simultaneous reading only became confusing when I was reading The Mystery at the Moss-Covered Mansion (which is a Nancy Drew book for those of you who as yet are uninitiated) and The Clue in the Embers (which is a Hardy Boys book). In TMATMCM, Nancy meets a suspicious man named Ramo, a name that keeps coming up in relation to anything mysterious. In TCITE, the Hardy Boys are continually on the lookout for a man called Ramos or Ramas, who is very entangled in their current mystery. Based on the similarities, I thought that I found one of the lost Drew/Hardy connections. Had Leslie McFarlane (the most recognized ghost writer of the Hardy Boys) been involved with TMATMCM? Both books I was reading were the original 25 chapter text (not the later, shorter, versions of the books) so it wasn't a question of revising gone awry. I quickly went to google with my very own mystery and began to search.
As it turns out, I was a little off- okay maybe a lot off... TMATMCM was actually written by Mildred Wirt Benson (the main Nancy Drew ghost writer) and TCITE, was written by John Almquist (who also wrote the Hardy Boy's mystery The Secret of Pirate's Hill). Also, as I was skimming TCITE for this post, I realized there is no character named Ramos or Ramas in the book. I remember thinking about the similarities several times as I was reading the two books, but I have no idea how I got my evidence. Right now I'm still reading two books at the same time, but I've decided that's my limit. My summer brain cannot handle more than two plots at a time!
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