pagesofjulia

Bear with me, gentle reader. I’ve only had time the last few days to read over lunch. I’m slowly enjoying The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley, which is a mystery with a young amateur detective named Flavia de Luce. She’s a youthful chemist, and her father, accused of the murder of a red-headed stranger in their cucumber patch, is a passionate philatelist (student of stamps), so there are a few frame elements for you right there. This book is cute; Flavia is our first-person narrator, which poses the usual challenge  of trying to get the voice of a eleven-year-old girl right, but Bradley does passably well. She has a charming and pretty accurate self-importance to her that I find amusing, simultaneous with despair that no one else notices how great she is (least of all her two older sisters). It reminds me of other young-girl-detective novels I’ve read, like Hotel Paradise by Martha Grimes. There are some interesting secondary characters (Dogger, the gardener, sort of, is pretty complex and sympathetic) and I’m moving right along to see whodunit. There’s an intimidating librarian figure too. 🙂 I’ll let you know what else comes down the pipeline, but for now, be assured that I’m slacking a bit but not forgetting about you.

Filed under: book reviews | Tagged: mystery |