Line #24 Literature/NancyDrew


1	[[quoteright:288:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ndms2_2_9709.jpg]]
2
3	'''This page is for the book series. If you are looking for other Nancy Drew works, go [[Franchise/NancyDrew here]].'''
4
5	A young but brilliant teenage girl solves mysteries with the help of her two best friends and her understanding father. She also has a boyfriend. There are relatively few actual murders: it's more thefts, hauntings, kidnappings, and that sort of thing...
6
7	The original series lasted 34 volumes from 1930-1956, but continued from 1957-1979 with volumes 35-56 (and revised versions of the first 34 books). In 1979, the series switched publishers from Grosset & Dunlap to Simon & Schuster, and finally ended with volume 175 in 2003. It was rebooted in 2004 (under the title ''Girl Detective''), featuring more modern sensibilities, and written in first-person. It ended in 2012 after 47 volumes, and 2013 saw a new series launch with the name ''Nancy Drew Diaries''. There have also been many spin-offs.
8
9	Originally made by the Creator/StratemeyerSyndicate, and as such, written by a great many ghostwriters. The idea was conceived by Edward Stratemeyer, who also laid down the plot outlines, but most of the distinctive characteristics are due to the writer of the earliest volumes, Mildred Wirt Benson. Harriet Stratemeyer Adams, daughter of Edward, took over control of the Syndicate upon his death in 1930. Adams is primarily credited with keeping the Syndicate afloat through the Great Depression, and with revising the two most popular series, Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys, in the 1950s and 1960s, removing stereotypes and outdated ideas and language. She is credited with several books in the Nancy Drew series.
10
11	For what's basically the equivalent with dudes, see ''Literature/TheHardyBoys''. Like that series, it's very prominent for the abundance of {{Tom Swiftie}}s in the narrative.
12	----
13	!!Tropes in the books include:
14	* AbhorrentAdmirer: In the ''Girl Detective'' series, Nancy and Ned have a steady relationship, but each have another RecurringCharacter with one-sided feelings for them, who contrast with each other neatly:
15	** This is averted with Charlie Adams, who has a thing for Nancy; he's very polite, sweet, and gentlemanly to her, and respects that she's dating someone else, never acting pushy or trying to assert his feelings. Nancy, in turn, while not interested in him romantically, very much appreciates what a NiceGuy he is, considers him her friend, and is always kind to him.
16	** Meanwhile, Deirdre Shannon, who has a massive crush on Ned, plays this straight; it should be noted that this has nothing to do with her appearance (as she's quite beautiful) and is entirely thanks to her behavior and personality. Deirdre's ''very'' pushy and constantly acts flirtatious with Ned, and no matter how many times he politely turns down her offers to spend time together and makes it clear he has eyes for no one but Nancy, she refuses to take no for an answer. In books where Nancy and Ned are having an argument or there's some other issue between them, Deirdre can usually be counted on to try to worm her way into Ned's company, and while Nancy's usually not seriously worried about losing him to her, it will act as a way to create more tension between them before they inevitably work things out.
17	* ActionGirl: Nancy and George.
18	* AdaptationalAttractiveness: In the books, Bess is HollywoodPudgy. In the MadeForTVMovie, she's [[Film/{{DEBS}} Jill Ritchie]].
19	* AffectionateNickname:
20	** In the Digests and ''Files'' and their crossovers, Nancy's family and close friends will often call her "Nan" (which is also a bit of a MythologyGag, since one of the original ideas for what to name the character was "Nan Drew" before it was eventually lengthened to "Nancy").
21	** In ''Girl Detective'' and ''Diaries'', these same people will call her "Nance".
22	* AgeLift: Gus Wooton is a young boy in "The Tapping Heels" but a grown man in its reprint.
23	* AlliterativeName: Ned Nickerson
24	* AllForNothing:
25	** One of the ''Files'' stories involves a woman going to extreme lengths to find and destroy blackmail evidence she thinks will destroy her comfortable life, only for it to be revealed at the end of the book that the blackmailer fell off a roof and broke his neck during a burglary days ago and wouldn't have been able to pose a threat.
26	** The first ''Girl Detective'' book involves a character trying to steal a family heirloom that's about to be appraised to prevent a scandal coming to light if people find out that it's a copy and his father stole the real one. In fact, the one he's trying to steal is the real one and his father has a copy and lied to the family about stealing the real one (which he felt he was entitled to) as a way of assuaging his ego.
27	* AmbiguouslyGay: Between her masculine nickname ("George" was short for "Georgia"), short hair, and tomboyish interests and behavior, many readers of the original series speculated that George Fayne was a lesbian, despite the fact that she had a boyfriend. Similarly, in the ''Files'' series, she doesn't have a steady boyfriend, and although she dates fairly regularly, she isn't boy-crazy or flirtatious like Bess and is often irritated with guys who act as such. One incarnation of the comic series, as part of the SettingUpdate, made this AscendedFanon and gave her a steady girlfriend.
28	* AmbiguousInnocence: Several {{Mook}}s from the climax of "The Clue in the Crossword Cipher" claim that the villain manipulated them by posing as a police official but whether or not that's true is unconfirmed and they're at least taken in for questioning.
29	* AnchoredShip: It's clear that all the flirting and Ship Teasing between Nancy and Frank in the ''Supermysteries'' is going nowhere since they have Ned and Callie in their own respective series (and Ned even makes occasional appearances in the ''Supermysteries''). Similarly, the not-quite-as-strong attraction between Bess and Joe was similarly stuck since Joe [[spoiler:was essentially widowed after Iola was murdered.]] Well, that plus their equally flirtatious natures making them incapable of making a serious commitment to each other.
30	* AndThatsTerrible: "The Strange Message in the Parchment" had this, just in case any readers thought stealing sheep was okay.
31	-->..."No," Junie replied. "Maybe they were trying to rustle our sheep."
32	-->"That's bad," Nancy remarked.
33	* BadBoss: The villains of "Crocodile Island". One of their workers is introduced running up to Nancy's boat begging to be taken away after they stabbed him with a trash pick for not doing a good enough job cleaning.
34	* BeautyBrainsAndBrawn: Bess, Nancy, and George for the most part, although this wavers from book to book. Nancy is undeniably the "Brains" of the group; George has always been considered the most athletic of the trio, and functions as "Brawn" if Ned isn't around; Bess has always been described as a great "Beauty" and is often given "distract-the-guard-flirting" as an assignment.
35	* BestFriendsInLaw: A villainous version with several villains from "The Velvet Mask" reprint.
36	* BetaCouple: Both Bess & Dave and George & Burt in the original series, before the two boys are PutOnABus (see below).
37	* BigEater: Bess has a large appetite.
38	* BigFriendlyDog: One book from the ''Nancy Drew Files'' features a suspect named Tony, who has two pet German Shepherds named Fred and Max. The two dogs are absolutely tame and eager to make new friends. The only way he can get them to act ferocious for the climax (to intimidate the bad guys into surrendering) is by pretending that he's about to give them a bath.
39	* BoundAndGagged: An old Stratemeyer standby, in lieu of "real" violence.
40	* BlondeBrunetteRedhead: The trio of Bess, George, and Nancy.
41	* TheBusCameBack: The original series phased out Nancy's initial boyfriend, Don Cameron, pretty early on, replacing him with Ned Nickerson and not mentioning him again or why he and Nancy are no longer dating. Don reappears in "Most Likely to Die" from the ''Files'' series--which is centered around a high school reunion for the class that Nancy, Don, Bess, and George were all in--where he's Nancy's ex-boyfriend. In this incarnation, he still has feelings for her, but for her part, while she considers him a perfectly nice guy and remembers that they had a lot of fun together, she never felt truly romantic or starry-eyed towards him, and thus dumped him.
42	* TheCaseOf: The series had a few, like "The Case of the Disappearing Diamonds", and "The Case of the Vanishing Veil".
43	* CatchPhrase: "Hypers!", often uttered by George.
44	* ChainedToARock: In one of the ''Files'' books, Nancy is knocked unconscious. When she comes to, she realizes that she's been tied to a piling, left to drown when the incoming tide inevitably rises over her head. This is especially sadistic ''and'' stupid on the bad guys' part, as if they wanted to kill her, they could have easily dumped her in the ocean while she was unconscious, but chose a method that borders on torture--and is quite obviously a murder rather MakeItLookLikeAnAccident.
45	* {{Chickification}}:
46	** Both played straight and inverted in the infamous rewrites of the 60s. There was a lot more "asking nicely" and "smiling sweetly," and in general the tomboyish Nancy became much more ladylike -- but she also took to wearing jeans, rumpling her hair, and eating hamburgers in diners rather than "dainty sandwiches" in tea shops. The straight examples were deliberate (original author Mildred Wirt Benson and rewrite author Harriet Stratemeyer Adams did not like each other, so when the very ladylike Adams took to rewriting the stories, she tried to edit out as much of Benson's tomboyish characteristics as she could); the inversions were simply a product of cultural changes.
47	** Also inverted with Bess in the ''Girl Detective'' series. Though she remains as much of a girly-girl as ever in terms of her fashion sense and love of shopping, she's now also an expert WrenchWench, a trait she definitely never had in any previous series.
48	* TheClan:
49	** The many cousins and distant cousins of Josiah Crowley in the first book.
50	** Bess and George's family with its multiple branches in "The Sign of the Twisted Candles."
51	* ClearMyName: In "False Impressions", and "High Risk" from the ''Files'' (though this one is actually Clear My ''Boyfriend's'' Name). Several in the original series too--"Mystery at Lilac Inn", etc.
52	* CostumePorn: Much like FoodPorn as described on the ''Literature/HardyBoys'' page, the books devoted a decent amount of space to descriptions of the outfits the girls wore. However, unlike the FoodPorn of the Hardys, the clothing descriptions remained, and when there are books like "A Model Crime" and "Designs in Crime", which focus on modeling and the fashion industry, the descriptions sometimes went up to eleven.
53	* CoversAlwaysLie: There was an odd period during the ''Files'' series (the period surrounding issue 100) where they decided to start marketing the books almost as a romance series. They were given titles that bordered on misleading, such as "The Cheating Heart" (about stolen test answers), "Heart of Ice" (sabotage at a mountain climbing school) and "The Stolen Kiss" (about a stolen painting called "First Kiss.") The covers switched to look like [[http://covers.openlibrary.org/b/id/409722-L.jpg Harlequin]] [[http://images.betterworldbooks.com/067/The-Cheating-Heart-Nancy-Drew-Files-99-9780671794910.jpg Romances,]] with Nancy staring longingly at some handsome stud (often Ned, but not always.) The writers attempted to justify this by ratcheting up the romantic angst, both in Nancy frequently missing Ned while he was at college, and having guilt-inducing feeling for the suspect, stranger, villain of the week. It came close to GenreShift, but not quite.
54	* CrazyJealousGuy / ClingyJealousGirl: Ned and Nancy sometimes get like this in the ''Files'' whenever they see someone else showing interest in each other.
55	* CrossOver: The Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys Super Mysteries series, Spinoffs of the ''Files/Casefiles'' and ''Girl Detective/Undercover Brothers'' series.
56	* DatingCatwoman:
57	** Especially during the ''Files'' spinoff, a subplot that kept popping up would be that either George or especially Bess would develop a crush on someone that Nancy would view as a suspect, with a rift forming between them when Bess or George would vehemently defend their innocence despite evidence forming against them. They would always reconcile by the end of the book, but it varied as to whether the man was guilty, innocent, or guilty of a smaller, less severe crime (He might have committed a forgery or theft, but not the murder), or had even been strong-armed into participating by the real villain.
58	** In the book "Two Points To Murder" it was Ned who was a friend of the suspect. Much like with Bess or George's love interests, the guy turned out to be involved, but not guilty of the main crime. Only this time at the end of the book, the rift resulted in a pretty brutal, but realistic breakup.
59	* DroppedABridgeOnHim: The villain in "The Crooked Bannister" died in a car accident in a town far away from Nancy and the others, about halfway through the book. They only find out during the interrogations of his accomplice at the end.
60	* DubNameChange:
61	** In Finland, she's known as ''Paula'' Drew.
62	** Turned up to eleven in the French translation [[http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Roy#La_traduction_française as you can see on the other wiki]]: the only major character whose name is unchanged is Ned Nickerson (even River Heights is called River City). Nancy Drew herself is known as ''Alice Roy'' to make her name more euphonic (the ''Dr-'' sound is much harsher and more guttural in French) while still sounding quintessentially American. Even Carolyn Keene becomes ''Caroline Quine'' (which is pronounced the same).
63	** In Sweden, she was renamed ''Kitty'' Drew for unspecified reasons. The most common theory is that the publishing company thought that ''Nancy'' sounded like an old lady's name, while ''Kitty'' would be more more hip and appealing to Swedish teenagers in the 1950s.
64	* DeadpanSnarker: A lot of the things Nancy says come across as snarky and sarcastic.
65	* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness:
66	** In the earliest books in the series, Nancy's entourage who helps her with her sleuthing consists of her boyfriend, Don Cameron, and one main "gal pal", Helen Corning. They both only last for a few books before being phased out in favor of the classic characters everyone knows: Don is replaced by Ned Nickerson as Nancy's boyfriend, while Helen is PutOnABus and Nancy gets two "chums" instead of one--Bess Marvin and George Fayne--to form a trio of best friends.
67	** In one of the earliest books of the ''Files'', Nancy and another character talk about their love of mysteries, and mention Nancy's {{Spear Counterpart}}s, ''Literature/TheHardyBoys'', as one of their favorite series to read when they were younger, apparently indicating that the Hardys are fictional in Nancy's universe (or at least the ''Files'' continuity) as well. But within a year, the ''[=SuperMysteries=]'' {{Crossover}} began, which combined Nancy from the ''Files'' universe with the Hardy Boys from their respective ''Casefiles'' series, and Nancy and the Hardys are stated at the beginning of the first book to have known each other for years. What's more, this crossover series ended up spanning for 36 books, and Nancy's work with the Hardys is mentioned at least a couple of times in later ''Files'' books.
68	* ExtrudedBookProduct: Alongside sister series ''The Hardy Boys'' it is one of the most extreme examples of this. A rough outline:
69	** 1930 (debut of original series): Four books
70	** 1931-1933: Two books per year.
71	** 1934-1978: One book per year.
72	** 1979-1984: Published roughly somewhere between bi-annually and quarterly.
73	** 1985-1987: Back to bi-annually for the main series, plus monthly for the ''Nancy Drew Files'' spin-off series (debuted in '86).
74	** 1988-1995: '''Bi-monthly for the main series, plus monthly for "Files"; totaling 18 new books per year!!'''
75	** 1996-1997: Both main series and ''Files'' published bi-monthly. (12 books per year)
76	** 1998-2010: ''Files'' is discontinued, main series continues bi-monthly for the rest of it's run; carries over to ''Girl Detective'' series.
77	** 2010-2015: ''Girl Detective'' cut to tri-annually; carries over to ''Diaries''.
78	** 2016-2021: ''Diaries'' is reduced to bi-annually.
79	** 2022-Present: ''Diaries'' is cut to only one book per year, bringing the franchise full circle.
80	* FoolishSiblingResponsibleSibling: Though they're cousins, this is precisely Bess and George's relationship. Enough that it's a shock to everyone on the rare occasions that George dissolves into a giggly schoolgirl over a guy.
81	* {{Foreshadowing}}: The first few books of the ''Files'' series hint at the events of the eighth book "Two Points To Murder": namely, Ned getting fed up with always being second to Nancy's detective work and Bess and George getting angry when Nancy becomes suspicious of their respective boyfriends.
82	* FourPhilosophyEnsemble: Nancy and her three most trusted sleuthing companions. She's the grounded, sensible Realist; upbeat Bess, who is quick to believe the best of others, is the Optimist; sarcastic, often-distrustful George is the Cynic; and Ned, who's not around as often and not as active as his ActionGirlfriend Nancy, is the Apathetic, although he sometimes switches to the Conflicted in books where Nancy's cases cause tension between them and make him doubt their relationship.
83	* GiantWallOfWateryDoom:
84	** Nancy has to survive a flood in the original version of "The Secret of Shadow Ranch."
85	** In the original version of "The Message of the Hollow Oak" Nancy and her allies flood a contested piece of land to keep it out of the villains hands.
86	* GoneSwimmingClothesStolen: A variant appears in "The Clue in the Crumbling Wall," when George takes an inadvertent "swim" -- i.e., falls into a pond -- and lays out her outer clothing to dry while she waits in an abandoned stone house. Naturally, a small child steals her clothes. (And since this was written in 1945, chasing him [[FullyClothedNudity in her underwear]] is just not done.)
87	* HardHead: Nancy and other characters are frequently knocked out by being hit upside the head from behind. At worst, they just wake up later with a splitting headache, but no further damage. This trope is shared with her SpearCounterpart series, ''The Hardy Boys''.
88	* HeterosexualLifePartners: Nancy, George, and Bess are a trio version of this. The latter two are cousins, but all three are as close as sisters and spend most of their free time together. Bess and George are Nancy's most frequent and (along with Ned) most trusted partners in her investigations, and are very protective of each other. Whatever disagreements and temporary rifts may form between them during a case, by the climax of the book, they'll always patch things up and be as strong as ever by the end.
89	* {{Hypocrite}}:
90	** Ned spends much of the first few books of the ''Files'' series bitching about always being second best to Nancy's detective work and being upset that she prioritizes her career over him, to the point where he finally breaks up with her at the end of "Two Points to Murder". By "False Moves", the very next book after this, he himself needs those same detective skills to help his new girlfriend. His hypocrisy aside, this is also horrifically insensitive of him, not to mention the fact that said girlfriend is ''far more'' self-centered and career-oriented than Nancy ever was. He's also visibly jealous upon meeting her new boyfriend, even though ''he'' broke up with ''her'' and is dating someone else.
91	** In the ''Files'' series and their crossovers with the Hardy Boys, Nancy has, and occasionally even acts on, some serious feelings for men other than Ned, most notably Frank Hardy and Mick Devlin (both of whom she straight-up kisses multiple times); though these flings don't ever end up lasting long-term, they're still usually portrayed positively or at least as being tragically star-crossed, even though she's essentially cheating on Ned with other guys. At least with Frank, he and Nancy mutually conclude whenever this happens that they want to stick with their respective partners, but with Mick, he outright asks Nancy to marry him, and she actually considers it. And yet, when there are books that involve another girl being attracted to Ned, Nancy gets very jealous, even though Ned never displays behavior that comes across as "cheating" as blatantly as Nancy does in the same situations.[[note]]This is probably a case of ProtagonistCenteredMorality, as the same thing sometimes happens in ''The Hardy Boys Casefiles'' as well.[[/note]]
92	* IconicSequelCharacter: Bess and George didn't appear until "The Secret of Shadow Ranch" in the original series, her dog Togo didn't show up until "The Whispering Statue", and Ned doesn't appear until "The Clue In The Diary" (though later text revisions briefly and erroneously refer to him several books earlier).
93	* KidDetective: One of the most famous.
94	* KindlyHousekeeper: Hannah Gruen is portrayed this way, as well as being a ParentalSubstitute for Nancy.
95	* TheKlutz: Fred Jenkins, a waiter in "The Phantom of Pine Hill" is always dropping or spilling things.
96	* KnightOfCerebus: Gay Moreau of "The Mystery of Lilac Inn" is one of Nancy Drew's most dangerous enemies in the original series. She's a master of disguise with a personal vendetta against Nancy's father, and one of the few criminals who tries to murder the teen detective in cold blood. And what's even worse is that she comes closer to actually winning than any other antagonist.
97	* LongRunningBookSeries: The original "Mystery Stories" series ran from 1930 to 2004, comprising 175 books plus spin-offs. A canonical reboot, "Nancy Drew: Girl Detective", began immediately after and continues to the present.
98	* MeaningfulName: In "The Strange Message in the Parchment", Mr. Flockhart owns a sheep farm.
99	* MissingMom: She passed away when Nancy was three years old. (Note: In the stories before the rewrites of the 60s--see OrwellianRetcon--she passed away when Nancy was ten.)
100	* MultipleNarrativeModes: For the franchise as a whole.
101	** The originals/Digests and ''Files'' are told in third-person, almost always from Nancy's points of view, but occasionally switching to that of her family and friends as well.
102	** In the ''Girl Detective'' and ''Diaries'' series, the books are in first-person, almost always from Nancy's point of view (with one exception: the first ''Girl Detective'' Super Mystery, "Where's Nancy?", where Nancy is missing for most of the book, and George and Bess alternate first-person chapters instead).
103	* MysteryFiction: One of the most well-known examples.
104	* MysteryMagnet: Oh, so much. Nancy can't even take a vacation without stumbling upon a mystery.
105	* NotAllowedToGrowUp: Though it varies from original incarnations, Nancy Drew's age largely is stuck around 17-19 years old and as such is either a high school student or a college freshman/sophmore. Deliberate on the part of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, who had notice sharp drop-offs in readership of other series such as ''Literature/JudyBolton'' and ''Literature/CherryAmes'' when the characters grew older and matured.
106	** Averted in the MadeForTVMovie and ''Nancy Drew On Campus''. They both start out with Nancy going to college.
107	** The 1995 TV series rarely if ever mentions Nancy's age.
108	** Oddly averted in the original series, though: Nancy was sixteen in the early volumes, then suddenly advanced to eighteen so it would be legal for her to drive in every state. (Although as Bobbie Ann Mason has pointed out, she ''never'' acted as though she was under thirty.)
109	* ObfuscatingDisability: In "Captive Witness", the plot centers around a plan to rescue ten children from then-Communist Hungary. The ringleaders of the rescue mission are an elderly professor and his wheelchair bound nephew. It's soon revealed that the young man is not paralyzed and that the rescue plans were hidden in the seat of his chair, knowing that customs officials would not search it.
110	* OfficialCouple: Nancy and Ned Nickerson.
111	* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname:
112	** Elizabeth Marvin and Edward Nickerson are almost never called by these names, going by "Bess" and "Ned" respectively.
113	** Averted with George in the original books, where this is her real GenderBlenderName, but it's played straight in the reprints and all subsequent books, where her full name is Georgia Fayne, but she's near-exclusively called "George". In the most recent series--''Girl Detective'' and ''Diaries''--she actually ''hates'' being called by her full name.
114	* OrwellianRetcon: On at least one occasion, new editions of the old stories were revised to update the settings (along with other changes, in some cases to the extent that pretty much everything after the title page was new).
115	* OutdatedName: A few names have fallen out of favor since the books were written; names like "Nancy," "Bess," and "Ned" currently sound a little old-fashioned and not the kind of names you'd expect teenagers to have.
116	* PoorlyDisguisedPilot: You wouldn't think this could happen in book form, but it has. ''Nancy Drew Files'' #39: "The Suspect Next Door" focused '''heavily''' on Nancy's neighbor, a girl named Nikki Masters. Not too long after, Nikki got her own spin-off, a romance series called ''River Heights.'' It lasted about 16 issues before getting run off the face of the earth and is largely forgotten now.
117	* PowerTrio: Nancy, Bess and George.
118	* ThePrimaDonna: Tammy in "The Dancing Puppet" is described as a great actress who the theatre group ''would'' be lucky to have if not for her bossy and temperamental manner. Later on it's implied this is because her brother is one of the book's criminals and the stress of being his SecretKeeper is getting to her.
119	* ProtagonistCenteredMorality:
120	** Nancy and co. engage in a lot of behavior that would be considered rude and meddlesome if anyone else were doing it, but it's always justified as the people she's displaying this towards are usually jerks and/or suspects in her case. For example, when she demands that a man explain something that she heard while ''eavesdropping on his private phone conversation'', ''he'' is the one made to be in the wrong for screaming at her to mind her own business. Of course, he doesn't help his cause by grabbing and shaking her, but he still has every right to be upset for her butting into his personal life.
121	** The three girls are almost always supportive of each other no matter what, which is usually a good thing...but in the ''Files'', this includes not calling each other out on displaying borderline-infidelity to their respective boyfriends by flirting or even having a fling with other men, and sometimes even encouraging these relationships. But if any of their boyfriends or flings cheat on ''them'' or someone they're close to, it's unforgivable.
122	* PutOnABus:
123	** Helen Corning, at the beginning of the original series, was Nancy's gal pal who tagged along on investigations with her, but she was soon replaced in this role by Bess and George (the excuse was that she was either traveling or studying in Europe, a common way to jettison unwanted characters at the time).
124	** Likewise, Don Cameron was Nancy's boyfriend for the first few books before he was replaced with Ned Nickerson for future installments. Unlike Helen, there was no mention of what happened with Don, though he does [[TheBusCameBack reappear again]] in a ''Files'' book.
125	** Dave and Burt--the steady boyfriends of Bess and George, respectively, in the original books--are faded out by the time of the Digests, and are nowhere to be found in the subsequent ''Files'', ''Girl Detective'', and ''Diaries'' series, all of which instead portray both girls (Bess in particular) as serial daters with perpetually changing boyfriends.
126	** In the ''Files'' series, the writers sometimes had issues finding something for all four main characters (Nancy, Ned, Bess, George) to do. Usually, it was easiest to get rid of Ned, by having him busy with some major assignment for school. However, either Bess or George would often be "visiting family" or "attending a wedding" or George would be in some kind of sports tournament.
127	* {{Recurring Character}}s: Nancy's main cast includes her father, ace defense attorney Carson Drew; KindlyHousekeeper and ParentalSubstitute Hannah Gruen; [[LoveInterest boyfriend]] Ned Nickerson; and [[HeterosexualLifePartners best friends]] Bess Marvin and George Fayne. While they appear in every book of the original series, and most books of most of the others, Ned, Carson, and Hannah are relegated to this status in the ''Files'' books. Additionally, some of the various series have their own examples:
128	** Across every series, [[DaChief Police Chief McGinnis]] makes regular appearances, especially in cases that take place in River Heights, but certainly not in every book.
129	** The ''Files'' have Brenda Carlton, a journalist and self-styled rival to Nancy, who usually is there to cause additional hindrances to her and her friends, but occasionally works with them and helps them out.
130	** ''Girl Detective'' has Deirdre Shannon replace Brenda as TheRival to Nancy; she's not really an investigator, and is instead more interested in trying to cause trouble in Nancy's relationship with Ned, but otherwise plays a similar role to Brenda, including the rivalry being mostly one-sided. Another example is Charlie Adams, a NiceGuy mechanic who frequently helps Nancy with her car and has a major crush on her, though she just likes him as a friend.
131	* TheRival: Downplayed in that it's somewhat one-sided; Nancy's skills and standing are clearly superior to the other girl's in both cases, and Nancy considers them to be more thorns in her side than real rivals.
132	** Brenda Carlton, an amateur local journalist who works for her father's newspaper and fancies herself a crack investigative reporter, clashes a bit with Nancy in the ''Files'' books and often tries to beat her in solving the case, although they work together on some occasions. How cooperative and well-meaning vs. outright smug and vindictive Brenda is varies DependingOnTheWriter.
133	** Local AlphaBitch Deirdre Shannon butts heads with Nancy a lot in the ''Girl Detective'' series, and has since they were first graders. It partially seems to stem from insecurity: Deirdre's father frequently praises Nancy's detective skills and is also an attorney who is AlwaysSecondBest to Nancy's father Carson. It's also partially due to Deirdre's major unrequited crush on Ned and jealousy that he isn't interested in her because he only has eyes for Nancy.
134	* SaunaOfDeath: Appears in the ''Files'' during "Two Points to Murder"; [[GettingHotInHere Nancy sheds her footwear, sweater, shirt and jeans to keep the heat at bay]] before managing to escape.
135	* ScrewThisImOuttaHere:
136	** The revised version of "The Moss-Covered Mansion" has one of the BigBad's gang (his son) fretting about things and talking about maybe getting out of there (it's unclear if he does, as the gang is arrested very shortly afterwards but he isn't specifically mentioned among them).
137	** In "The Mystery of Crocodile Island" two minor villains attempt this in a miniature submarine during the police raid but unfortunately for them Nancy was in the back of it investigating.
138	* SensualSlavs: In ''Files'', the “Summer of Love” trilogy has handsome Russian dancer Sasha Petrov as Nancy’s TemporaryLoveInterest. He’s a NiceGuy, pretty clever, and does pretty well for himself in some action sequences, but obviously he’s no substitute for Ned in the end.
139	* ShouldntWeBeInSchoolRightNow: It's not as bad as some instances, since later books have explicitly stated Nancy's age at 18, meaning it's perfectly plausible for her to have already graduated high school. However, as society marches on, it becomes increasingly strange that she doesn't attend college or pursue some kind of employment.
140	* SpinOff: There have been several:
141	** ''The Nancy Drew Files:'' DarkerAndEdgier and HotterAndSexier series designed to appeal to teen audiences by removing the previous roadblocks of the parent series (NoHuggingNoKissing, NeverSayDie, etc.) Might qualify as a QuietlyPerformingSisterShow since it had a successful run of 12 years (1985-1997) and 124 issues.
142	** ''The Nancy Drew Notebooks'' and ''Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew:'' SpinOffBabies series which both involve 8-year-old versions of Nancy, Bess, and George solving mysteries in the vein of missing pet cats.
143	** ''Nancy Drew On Campus:'' An ill-conceived GenreShift that didn't go over well. This sent Nancy away to college, and tried to be a drama series in the vein of ''Literature/SweetValleyHigh.'' The mysteries became a minor subplot, and Nancy had to struggle with college life and the drama of roommates and student loans and partying ([[FelonyMisdemeanor and dumping Ned!]])
144	** ''Nancy Drew: Girl Detective:'' Considered a continuation of the original series by the publisher, it hovers somewhere between the Originals and the ''Files'' in terms of storytelling (while more shy about showing death than the ''Files,'' it's more liberal in ''implying'' death than the Original, using more violent crime such as arson and sabotage.)
145	** Both the ''Files'' and ''Girl Detective'' spin-off had their own spin-off, a Crossover series with the Hardy Boys. Interestingly, they were both titled ''Nancy Drew-Hardy Boys Supermysteries.'' (Fans tag them '88 and '07 for the sake of avoiding confusion.) Both shared a lot of similar traits, including hinting at Nancy/Frank and Bess/Joe relationships.
146	** ''The Nancy Drew Diaries:'' Beginning in early 2013, this series took the place of ''Nancy Drew: Girl Detective'' as the "official" canon (meaning it's not considered a spinoff like the ''Files'' or ''On Campus'').
147	* StatusQuoIsGod: Nancy and Ned break up at the end of the eighth book of the ''Files'' series. Within ''one'' book, things fall apart with their respective new partners--his is a self-centered bitch, hers a nitwit. By the next book, they're working on a reconciliation and by the book after that, they're back together.
148	* SwitchingPOV: Usually averted, as the story is mostly told from Nancy's point of view. However, there are a few examples:
149	** The originals, Digests, and ''Files'' are told in third-person, usually focusing on the thoughts and feelings of Nancy; however, if Nancy is incapacitated, the p.o.v. will sometimes switch to her friends.
150	** The ''Girl Detective'' series is generally told in first-person exclusively from Nancy's point of view; however, in its first Super Mystery, "Where's Nancy?", she's missing for almost the entire book, with her friends trying to find her. Instead, George and Bess share the narrative as they work together with Ned to investigate her disappearance, with the two of them alternating chapters for who has the first-person p.o.v.[[note]]Essentially, George and Bess do the same thing that the SpearCounterpart series, ''Literature/TheHardyBoys: Undercover Brothers'', regularly does with its two main characters, Frank and Joe.[[/note]] Once they finally find Nancy at the end of the penultimate chapter, she takes over the narrative for the final chapter.
151	* TechnoWizard: George becomes this in the ''Girl Detective'' and ''Diaries'' series. In the former, she's still as athletic as ever and has her tech savviness as an additional trait, but in the latter, being a techie becomes her primary skill, and whether or not she's still athletic varies between books.
152	* TomboyAndGirlyGirl: George and Bess, respectively. George is the most athletic of the three girls and often acts as "muscle" when there aren't any guys around, being an ActionGirl like Nancy; wears her dark hair in a BoyishShortHair style and chooses a [[TomboyishName tomboyish nickname]] for a feminine full name that she dislikes; and, while she occasionally gets love interests, she mostly prefers to focus on her own pursuits. Bess, by contrast, dresses extremely fashionably and loves clothes, makeup, and shopping; has a very feminine appearance and chose an arguably even ''more'' feminine nickname than her real name; and is by far the most boy-crazy of the three girls, frequently gaining new love interests and sometimes even falling in LoveAtFirstSight, and acts flirtatious around men in general to the point that she will often distract or get information from a relevant male character by batting her eyes at him and speaking sweetly.
153	* TomboyishName: George. In the original series, it's her real name and she's actually quite proud of it. In all later versions, it's a nickname for "Georgia", meaning it's a Tomboyish Nickname of her own choosing.
154	* TwoHalvesMakeAPlot: In "The Quest for the Missing Map", the eponymous PirateBooty map is torn and divided in two, and must be pieced together to solve the mystery.
155	* UselessBoyfriend: Ned Nickerson toes the line here. Often averted as he works as her muscle when things get really dangerous; occasionally, in less action-heavy stories or ones where Nancy TookALevelInBadass, he will end up feeling a little tacked on. A common story thread is creating conflict because of his feelings of uselessness.
156	* {{UST}}: Between Nancy and Frank Hardy in the CrossOver series. Occasionally between Joe Hardy and Bess as well, much to the annoyance of everyone else.
157	* ViewersAreGoldfish: It's a common problem with any book series, but there's always one large block of exposition that's always dropped into (usually) the first chapter of each book (Nancy's mother died when she was three, Bess and George are cousins, but couldn't be more different, Ned is studying at Emerson College, etc.)
158	* WhereTheHellIsSpringfield: The location of River Heights has always been pretty sketchy. The original ghostwriter, Mildred Wirt Benson, put it in her home state of Iowa, but it seemed to keep drifting farther and farther east, going as far as New Jersey when Harriet Adams did her rewrites in the 60s. As early as the ''Files'' series, however, it seems to have settled down and tends to stay within driving distance of Chicago (and despite that leaving four states as possibilities due to Chicago's location, it's often implied that it's in Illinois, also.)
159	* YouKilledMyFather: Well not "killed" but "The Greek Symbol Mystery" and "The Case of the Vanishing Veil" both have the brother of an arrested villain [[AvengingTheVillain attack Nancy for revenge.]]

Context Literature / NancyDrew