Donna Parker, Special Agent

Donna Parker #2

by Marcia Martin, Jon Nielson (Illustrator)

The summer is over and it is time for Donna and Ricky to go back to Summerfield Junior High.

Donna and Ricky spend less time together as they have different responsibilities. Ricky pursues her dramatic talents whilst Donna joins the school newspaper, quickly becoming elected as assistant editor.

Soon things take a turn for the mysterious. Donna's long-lost uncle appears in Summerfield, a thinks he is being spied on, her friends begin to ignore her, and a strange character is employed at Summerfield Junior High.

Little does Donna realize that an exciting trip to New York City will reunite her with old friends and solve each of the mysteries.

Genres: Fiction, Young Adult, Mystery, Childrens

282 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1957

About the author

Pen name of Marcia Lauter Obrasky Levin.

A popular children's book author, creator of the Donna Parker series, 22 books for beginning readers, and some of the first enrichment text books in the "New Mathematics". She was born and raised in Philadelphia, and lived in Rye, New York for 56 years.

Reviews

[Erin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Re-read - 8/2008.

Re-read - 5/2012.

Re-read 12/2013.

Re-read 12/2016

[Trish · Rating 4 out of 5]

Found this book at my Mom's and brought it home to read. About half-way I began to remember the storyline with the election and newspapers, etc. I enjoyed this book. Good memories from childhood reading.

[Roberta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, my beloved Donna. I bought this series of books at Morrie's 5 & 10 when I was a young girl. I wish I still had my originals. I've been borrowing them one by one from the library's interlibrary loan system.

In this one Donna is a senior in junior high, meaning she's in 9th grade. I never heard of that, although this was published in 1957 and maybe schools were different then. Anyway, Donna and her BFF Ricky are separated by being in different classes and different clubs. They are each developing their own personalities apart from each other. Donna is involved in the school newspaper and Ricky is in dramatics. But some mysterious things are afoot in Summerfield . . . . stay tuned.

[Melodie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did so love these books when I was a kid!! I remember buying them for $.59 at Kresge's when I had money or asking for them for Christmas. Man, were things a LOT simpler then!

[Stacey Adams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Donna Parker and her best friend Ricky aren't able to see each other everyday like usual now that they're doing different things in Junior High. While Ricky is part of the drama club Donna has joined the school newspaper, even though she's been warned that Joyce Davenport may be hard to work with, and she's loving it. Donna ends up being voted in as assistant editor then has to take over as editor which brings a lot of work her way. School elections and the right to vote become the big issues the paper decides to cover and the whole school gets involved. At home Donna's uncle, who she's never met, has turned up and is staying with the Parkers. This leads Donna to wonder why, it seems strange and Donna is concerned that maybe her uncle isn't who he claims to be. Odd things happening at school in the apartment next to the domestic science class make Donna even more suspicious. A newspaper conference in New York City might be her way to find answers to all the spying and secrets going around.

[Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Oh dear oh my. Another book that made me laugh in all the wrong places, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Even Nancy Drew waited to graduate before becoming a "girl sleuth", but not our Donna! She can't even drive yet, but as a high school freshman she's soon taking over the junior high newspaper, micromanaging the town's mayoral election, and getting her name in the national papers doing it. Stir in cold war espionage (yes, really!) and a trip to the Big Apple (whose monuments get only a passing mention, making me wonder if the authoress had ever actually been there), and you have a slice of 1950s American pie. A little grownup romance is sprinkled over the top, but just enough to leave the door open for another instalment. What really made me laugh was the idea that one of the junior high boys could just call up the FBI and they'd send some one round in time to catch the baddies!
I know I read this book at least once or twice when I was in elementary but remembered nothing at all about it.

[Kristen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh My Goodness. LOVED this book. I had found it at an antique store a while back. It is always fascinating to see the daily life from long ago.
It is such good writing. It also deals with elections and how important it is to have everyone vote. It has issues of friendship, family, school, and being decent to other people. Not to mention it has a great side plot about spies during the war. It also deals with long lost relatives and how if someone moved across country back then they were for the most part estranged from their family. I am now going to buy the entire series.

[Karen Szyszko · Rating 4 out of 5]

It wasn't until a few years ago that I learned that the Donna Parker books were written in an order. No wonder . . . . Now that I'm reading them in their order they make much more sense. Doh!

Spies? In Springfield? Unheard of! Spies in Donna Parker's own family? No way! But, I do like the way Donna's and Ricky's mind works. What one doesn't think of, the other does. It's so very familiar in my growing-up days. We were forever making stories up about people we'd see in passing. Maybe that's why I enjoy these books so much. It's so much akin to my own upbringing.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Probably my favourite one of the series - totally unbelievable in the spy story sense but the rest of the book held up really well. I read it years ago and remembered a lot of it (which is definitely not the case with most of the others in the series). Donna's inner feelings are very well conveyed and I liked the way she handled her problems with her friends and her family. She seems to be a little more judgmental in later books for some reason best known to the author.

[Lynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read the Donna Parker series when I was 10 or 11. I found one in a thrift store recently that I didn't own so I decided to re-read the series this year. I am enjoying revisiting them. They are a charming nostalgic read.

[Deb Mohr · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this old volumn from my early school years in a mixed bag of books I purchased online. I look for familiar books from my childhood when in used book stores so was delighted to be able to read this one again after approx. 55 years. #1358.

[nx74defiant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Donna joins the school paper. It seems strange to me that having a school election was a new idea. I'm so use to it being normal. Donna does a great job at the paper. She is involved in mysterious things going on. Great fun.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although the part in New York is very unbelievable, I love the rest of the story - the bad home ec teacher, running the newspaper, and the delicious illustrations. A favorite book from my growing-up years.

[Carol Gleason-Rechner · Rating 5 out of 5]

When your sister gives you a blockbuster book like this for your birthday, you read it and you like it!

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was better written than the first one. The storyline was more cohesive, suspenseful, and dud a good job of incorporating characters and storylines from book one.

[Jeanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another blast from my past!

[Nancy Zubiri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun look back at the 1950s/60s. Not much of a mystery, but an enjoyable teen book.

[Eileen McCauley · Rating 3 out of 5]

A better than average teen girl book from the early 60s. I went to jr high school in the 70s and had to take cooking but at least didn't have to learn "housekeeping".

[Margaret Windsor · Rating 4 out of 5]

happy, satisfying, like life should be - simple and easy.

[Kimberly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Donna Parker faces the realities of growing up as she enters junior high and feels she’s growing apart from her friends, becomes the school newspaper editor, and meets strange people from her family’s past.

This book was mildly intriguing in plot. Obviously it was written for people much younger than me, but it was sort of nice to see another old book about female empowerment that was also a mystery! Not a particularly complex mystery (I solved it by chapter 4) but that wasn’t all there was to the plot. It was a book that telegraphed all its moves, but was still quiet and relaxing and I probably would have loved as much as my mom did growing up!

[Molly · Rating 4 out of 5]

My Mom read these as a young teen and my grandparents had all of her books at their house. Every summer I spent a lot of time at my grandparents' so I read all of my mother's books. I loved Donna Parker and her friends. I re-read one of these recently and I have to admit I found it just as charming as I did when I first read it.

[Diane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like the "Nancy Drew" books, I read every one of these books that I could find. I couldn't find many in the book lists, but I know there were bunches. The ones I liked were the "Donna Parker, Student Nurse" stories. That started my love afair with medical stories.

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this whole series as a young girl. My daddy brought home the first one for me to read when I was in about 4th grade and home sick from school. It was the first "big" book I remember reading and I was hooked on reading from that point on!

[Mikayla · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a very cute, Nancy Drew like book the only thing I didn't really like about it was the fact that the author kept stressing that eveyone needed to vote and it got rather anoying but other then that I really liked it! =)

[Megan · Rating 3 out of 5]

[June/July?]: with Mom in Florida

[Joy Gerbode · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyed the second in the series, rereading after many years, and enjoyed it enough that I guess I'll finish the series. Haven't read these for a long time.

[Alison · Rating 3 out of 5]

It beats you over the head with the moral of the story but otherwise good.

[Judy · Rating 4 out of 5]

If I read this book again, would it seem familiar? I know I liked the book, and I'd recommend it to the kids, but I don't remember the story at all.