2.5 stars (rounded off to 3)
Won't say much other than this: it feels like Bess is just as much a detective as Nancy and knows more than her, but she's put into side character status and relegated into "ditzy blonde" stereotypes that's mentioned borderline ad nauseam every time she says or does something that steps out of the box that the author/s have tried to put her in.
And that elements of the plot feel like they were made into twists for the sake of putting in twists.