Duncan and his two friends investigate the apparent kidnapping of famous mystery author Wallis Wallace.

This story stirs up nostalgia from my childhood, reading a few books from this series in the school library. I was in the mood to re-read this to revisit those memories. Needless to say, it did not disappoint.

Ron Roy wrote the "The Absent Author" in easy-to-understand words that won't frustrate children readers too much. While the book is written in third-person, each character is described with enough details to enhance the illustrations that are included throughout the story. The illustrations are simple, and Ron Roy did a nice job of limiting the amount of the drawings so that his book is not a picture book. His characters are clever and interesting. The book is short, yet the plot doesn't suffer cause of it. He elects to stray from cliffhangers to concentrate on character interaction and clues. Yet, the mystery is unique and well-executed.
"The Absent Author" is a nice beginning to a unique series with well-established characters. ( )

In this book, a young boy named Dink writes to his favorite author, who is a mystery writer named Wallis Wallace, and asks him to visit his town. Wallis Wallace responds saying that he will come, but he never shows up. Dink suspects something is not right, and him and his two best friends set out to find the famous author. ( )

This is the first book in the exciting A to Z Detective series. Join Dink and his friends, Josh and Ruth Rose, as they try to find the missing mystery writer Wallis Wallace before it’s too late! Each mystery features a letter of the alphabet. Enjoy all 26 mysteries!

This book is a short chapter book that tells the story of a group of three best friends on an adventure to find the missing famous author. In their adventure, they find out they've been with the author the whole time, and the author was working with them to solve a mystery she set up to help her write her next book.