A welcome addition to an addictive series.
Nothing fishy gets past the keen eyes of the Wells & Wong Detective Society and their rivals, the Junior Pinkertons.
Stevens’ mysteries—solved by English boarding school students in the 1930s—have many fans. Here, she presents six new short stories starring Daisy Wells, Hazel Wong, Alexander Arcady, and George Mukherjee that fit in and around the novels. Hazel and Daisy, who attend Deepdean School for Girls, attend the wedding of Daisy’s uncle Felix in London, go to the English seaside (which Hong Kong–born Hazel finds cold and unappealing), and travel from Hong Kong back to England on an ocean liner. Along the way, they foil one murder and solve two others. At Weston Boys’ School, Alexander and George figure out how to thwart bullies and also save a puppy in the process. The final story, told by Hazel’s 9-year-old sister, May, is set in September 1939, as war comes to Great Britain, and it hints at even more sequels. Hazel and George serve as reminders to contemporary readers that, even in this largely white society, there were people of color, and they were navigating feelings of isolation that resonate today. George astutely points out that many objects in the British Museum have indeed been stolen, contrary to Daisy’s perception that “it’s finders keepers…Anyway, we look after them properly.”
A welcome addition to an addictive series. (glossary, hieroglyphic alphabet, Morse code alphabet, author’s note, guide to the Detective Society’s cases) (Mystery. 10-14)Pub Date: July 9, 2024
ISBN: 9781665919494
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024
A rich, enthralling historical mystery that engages and educates.
Siblings decode familial and wartime secrets in 1940 England.
Headstrong 14-year-old Lizzie Novis refuses to believe that her mother, a U.S. embassy clerk who was working in Poland, is dead. After fleeing from her grandmother—who’s attempting to bring her back to America—Lizzie locates her 19-year-old brother, Jakob, a Cambridge mathematician who’s stationed at the clandestine British intelligence site called Bletchley Park. Hiding from her grandmother’s estate steward, Lizzie becomes a messenger at Bletchley Park, ferrying letters across the grounds while Jakob attempts to both break the ciphers generated by the German Enigma machines and help his sister face the reality of their mother’s likely fate. With a suspicious MI5 agent inquiring about Mum and clues and codes piling up, the siblings, whose late father was “Polish Jewish British,” eventually decipher the truth. Shared narrative duties between the siblings effectively juxtapose the measured Jakob with the spirited Lizzie. Lizzie’s directness is repeatedly attributed to her being “half American,” which proves tiresome, but Jakob’s development from reserved to risk-tolerant provides welcome nuance. The authors introduce and carefully explain a variety of decoding methodologies, inspiring readers to attempt their own. A thoughtful and entertaining historical note identifies the key figures who appear in the book, such as Alan Turing, as well as the real-life bases for the fictional characters. Interspersed photos and images of ephemera help situate the narrative’s time period.
A rich, enthralling historical mystery that engages and educates. (Historical mystery. 10-14)Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2024
ISBN: 9780593527542
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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