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Nurse of Greenmeadow

by Jane Corby (1964)
Nurse of Greenmeadow

A beautiful nurse finds danger and thrilling romance in a mysterious mansion.

THE TURRETS–A vast and brooding mansion ruled by an autocratic and crippled old lady…

Lovely young Judy Jordan came her as private nurse to the aged owner and remained to become involved in a romantic and dangerous crossfire between her employer’s handsome grandson and her dashing stockbroker–rivals alike for the aged lady’s money, her house, and then for Judy herself…

A thrilling story of suspense and mystery in a ghost-ridden old house–and of breathtaking romance for a beautiful nurse.

He’s a little clingy, don’t you think? And I don’t know what he’s whispering in her ear, but she’s not buying it…

12 Comments

jenny

Boy, I remember going on a couple of dates [many moons ago] where I felt just like the gal in that picture. She’s got her neck all bent out of shape trying to escape from The Octopus’s clutches, thinking the whole time, “Ew, ew, ew, ew, ick, ick, ick…”

Pam

No, no. That’s not it. She’s a microsecond from spinning around and planting a mad, passionate kiss on his luscious mouth. It’s a picture of her mid-spin, you see. Next they’ll lose their balance, fall over, and roll together down the rest of the spooky hill…maybe into the pond at the bottom. But they won’t care. Murky water be darned.

ames

It’s the chair that’s creeping me out. It looks menacing, with earwig-like pincers.

jenny

They’d BETTER worry about the murky water. Last pond I went wading in was full ‘o crawdads, and the gunk in the water gave me a rash. We’ll see how passionate they feel after the crawdads pinch those luscious lips of his right off of his face, and she spends the next week-and-a-half covered in calamine lotion and salve…

MOAN!!!! Please don’t say salve…

That’s actually a mannequin (of JUDY JUDY JUDY). There’s this subplot in the book where she tests the loyalties of her stockbroker versus the grandson of the “crippled old lady.” Oh – and tries to catch the ghost. It’s very complex. I can’t explain it all here. Besides, I wouldn’t want to spoil the story.

Pam

You didn’t actually read this book, did you Kate?! For serious? What you described sounds suspiciously like the plot to a Scooby-Doo episode.

Jenny, I had no idea that crawdads could pinch the lips right off of people. I guess I need to move them to my metal category of “vicious, icky things in the water”: barracuda, piranha, great whites, crawdads…

jenny

Speaking from experience: the story lines of most nurse books make the plot of any episode of Scooby-Doo look like Plato’s “Republic”–in the original Greek.

I say most nurse books, because the story lines of the more sophisticated nurse books (“Cherry Ames,” “Sue Barton,” any Jane Converse) only make Scooby-Doo look like, say, “Hedda Gabler”—or maybe “The Mill on the Floss”—in comparison.

(Pam and Ames, I’m gonna give you song cooties:

“You get a line and I’ll get a pole

And we’ll go down to the crawdad hole

Honey, baby mine!”)

AND in Scooby-Doo it always ends with the ghost or rabbit or monster or whatnot being unmasked.

Communal “HUHHHHH???” (Or, in Scooby’s case, “RRRRRHUUUUUUUUUH?”)

“What the…? It’s Old Mister Furstenbergerquaddlegartnerbaumpickenpaw!

“If it weren’t for you MEDDLING KIDS my cunning [but very predictable] plan could NEVER have failed. I’ll get youuuuu……”[ranting fades as Old Mister Furstenbergerquaddlegartnerbaumpickenpaw is dragged off my two policemen].

I don’t see ANY meddling kids mentioned in the blurb or pictured on the novel.

jenny

Goodness, I hope that there aren’t any meddling kids lurking in the photo above, for their sake. Watching that sort of tasteless groping would scar them for life. Not to mention the seeping emotional wounds they’d carry from having watched frenzied crawdads pinch the lips right off of someone’s face!

ames

I’m pretty sure the random chair is a crawdad in drag (vintage Jessica McClintock).

FYI: The crayfish at Strawberry Reservoir will EAT YOUR TROUT (that you caught your very own self with your very own fishing pole and you EVEN PUT THE WORM ON THE HOOK by yourself) if you dangle it in the water while you continue fishing.

You are not, however, allowed to “fish” for crayfish in the reservoir…

Or CHUM (the prohibition of which always makes me feel like you cannot be friends with anyone while you’re fishing).

jenny

I was just “revisiting” this post (code for “laughing so hard that I actually snotted on the keyboard—don’t tell my husband”) and decided that the reason the lawn chair looks so demonic is due in part to the fact that the stupid cover-artist drew/painted/traced it straight on, kindergarten-style. There’s no angle, no slight tip, no perspective whatsoever.

I’ll need Chris, our resident art expert, to verify my theory.

(And yes, it did take me an entire month to puzzle that one out.)