Customer Reviews

Harriet the Spy, Double Agent (Harriet the Spy Adventures (Dell Yearling Book))

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Harriet M. Welsch was recently torn apart when ole Golly left! Now she found out Ole Golly is coming back but is sad and innocent! No longer with Mr. waldenstein. Ole Golly sneaks across to Harriet's neighbors the Feigenbeins to see Dr. F. a Psychiatrist. Sprot has a girlfriend and is growing some facial hair! HArriet meets a stange girl living with the feignbeins - Rosa Rita Savage. Harriet works up a plan and the story ends with one exciting ending! They whole book is so good although they did change Harriet a bit which makes me a little upset but it does not change things too much. They also forgot her regular spy route and put a lot of Mental Health and Psychiatry into the book, other than that I could NOT PUT IT DOWN!!! Worth reading! Oh and just to let you know Harriet's parents leave for 3 months!

This new Harriet is double the fun, twice the fun of most YA books because the author Maya Gold has a real flair and literary gift. Harriet is more sparky than ever and the NYC setting is especially well defined and written. I devoured it, with suitable Harriet styled snacks! Delicious fun!

Spying is a solitary activity. No one knows that better than twelve-year-old Harriet M. Welsch. Harriet has been spying on people and taking notes since she could write. Egged on by her old caretaker, Ole Golly, she has filled dozens and dozens of notebooks over the years; and has no plans to stop her spy route anytime soon. In fact, lately she has begun to add new people to her spy route; one of those people being Annie Smith. New to the neighborhood, Annie is living with her aunt and uncle, the Drs. Feigenbaum, and she has more secrets than Harriet can even believe. For one, Annie Smith is not just Annie Smith. She is also Yolanda Montezuma, Rosarita Sauvage, Zoe Carpaccio, and, as of late, Cassandra D'Amore. And two, Sport, one of Harriet's best friends since forever, has fallen head over heels in love with Yolanda Montezuma, the victim of seeing her wearing a particularly dashing pair of green shoes the first day they met. Harriet quickly becomes obsessed with Annie, and the fact that she was booted out of Sport's school, and enrolled in the Gregory School, alongside Harriet. She also can't get Annie's penchant for creating various characters and names for herself, and decides that learning all of Annie's secrets is her new mission. Unfortunately, Annie isn't very interested in revealing secrets about herself. So Harriet decides to go where no spy has ever gone before. She takes Annie on as a partner, and together they begin spying on various people throughout the neighborhood. It is Harriet's hope that with all of this spying, Annie will begin revealing some secrets of her own. So is not the case. While Harriet loves the fact that she has a new friend, she can't help but wonder why Annie is so determined to keep so many secrets from her. While Harriet is stewing over this new predicament, she begins to realize that Annie has been untruthful regarding where she goes on weekends, and who, exactly, she has been meeting up with. Harriet knows that it's wrong to spy on friends, but she can't deny her curiosity. So, she begins to follow Annie when she leaves the house for secret outings and trysts with two older men. Unfortunately, Sport's crush; Janie's obsession with a pop star who is way out of her league; the constant kissing between Fabio and Naima - two people on her spy route; Annie's reports of being in love with an older man; and Ole Golly's sudden departure after meeting and marrying George Waldenstein; Harriet finds herself obsessed with love and crushes. She can't seem to figure out why they happen. And why, suddenly, every girl in her grade has become possessed with finding a boyfriend, and proclaiming their love to one another. Of course, she also can't quite put her finger on why, exactly, she hasn't been bitten by the crush bug. In a way, Harriet feels left out of the loop. But, at the same time, she's glad to still have her sanity. Too bad she can't say the same for Annie.

I fell in love with Louise Fitzhugh's HARRIET THE SPY over a decade ago, and I still haven't forgotten the wonderful character she created, who managed to lead me on a wild goose chase of years on my own spy route. THE LONG SECRET brought Harriet back in full-force with a new, and completely unexpected sidekick. However, after that, Harriet seemed to have disappeared from sight. Now, however, she has been revived by Maya Gold in the form of HARRIET THE SPY, DOUBLE AGENT. I never thought that someone could pick up where Fitzhugh had left off, but I was wrong. Gold manages to breathe life into Harriet M. Welsch once more, giving readers the opportunity to re-embrace the illustrious spy one more. While characters such as Beth Ellen Hansen, Janie Gibbs, and even the wonder-chef, Sport, are not nearly as prevalent as they were in Fitzhugh's additions to the series; Gold has introduced a new character in the form of Annie Smith - aka Rosarita Sauvage, Yolanda Montezuma, Cassandra D'Amore, and Zoe Carpaccio. Annie is an interesting, and extremely dimensional character, who brings quirkiness to a new level. While she is full of secrets, it's quite obvious that Annie creates different personalities to help her cope with the turmoil in her life, and her family. Each of these characters seems to embody a whole new person who garners their own likes and dislikes. Luckily, the one we see most with Harriet is just plain Annie Smith. Annie is kind, quirky, defensive, quiet, loud, and all-around interesting. It's hard to resist her personality; and the turmoil that results between her and Harriet on a fairly frequent basis brings quite a bit to the story. Harriet, of course, is her usual curious self, who poses many questions to the various adults in her life, that even make the reader think. Her interactions with Cook, and a handful of people on her spy route are humorous and thought-provoking; while the sparsely placed letters from Ole Golly that appear throughout the story give die-hard HARRIET THE SPY fans the chance to see what, exactly, Ole Golly has been up to as of late. An irresistible tale that stays true to the original.

Erika Sorocco
Freelance Reviewer

I loved the scenes in the zoo, all around NYC -- Harriet is an ideal friend, because she is up for anything! I read this without stopping...Could not put it down!

I love Harriet the Spy. I read her first book in paperback and was SO happy to see it on the Kindle when I got my Kindle.
The book is great. The price is worth it if your a Harriet the Spy fan...

Having been a fan of Harriet since I was sent away to Girl Scout camp at age 9 the year it was first published, I was apprehensive about reading Helen Ericson's follow-on, "Harriet Spies Again." But it was all right. Now I read this book, Maya Gold's "Harriet the Spy, Double Agent."

This time we not only have someone taking Louise Fitzhugh's original vision and extending it, but Ms. Gold also takes Ms. Ericson's work and incorporates that into this book. The result of this is that we have Harriet spending a lot of time with Annie Smith, the "new girl" introduced in Ms. Ericson's book. At the outset of this book I was 100% convinced that it was going to be a story about not neglecting your old friends (Janie & Sport) in favor of new ones (Annie), especially when Janie makes a pointed comment to that effect. But although Sport appears periodically and doesn't really have much to do with the story, Janie is brushed off with some references to her newfound love of boy bands, something Harriet can't relate to, and the entire rest of the book concerns Harriet and Annie. This disappointed me, since the trio of Harriet, Sport & Janie is still my favorite friend grouping from this series.

Anyway, I read this on the beach after finishing a reread of the original "Harriet the Spy" and while it was an OK beach read and did have some overtones of the Harriet we all love, I felt that more thought could have been put into it to make it a little richer. Basically Harriet's spying gets her into trouble again with a friend, and she goes through what she did in the first book. Basically.

So, if you are a fanatic to finish series, and you love Harriet, get this book from the library.

Harriet's observations about the world around her are insightful, and spawn great conversations with my eight year old. My daughter, however, is a bit disappointed that there are no real mysteries in this book. It is mostly, as she puts it, a book about a girl rudely paying attention to everyone else's business. The author creates a good balance though; the reader is well aware that Harriet is being inappropriate, but can still empathize with Harriet's feelings. I love that Harriet the Spy's adventures are clean fun, yet still entertaining and interesting.

Just an alert to readers--this novel is NOT written by the creator of Harriet the Spy. Louise Fitzhugh died many years ago. Buyer beware.