The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie
Summary
In his wickedly brilliant first novel, Debut Dagger Award winner Alan Bradley introduces one of the most singular and engaging heroines in recent fiction: 11-year-old Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison. It is the summer of 1950 and a series of inexplicable events has struck Buckshaw, the decaying English mansion that Flavia's family calls home. A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. Hours later, Flavia finds a man lying in the cucumber patch and watches him as he takes his dying breath. For Flavia, who is both appalled and delighted, life begins in earnest when murder comes to Buckshaw. To Flavia the investigation is the stuff of science: full of possibilities, contradictions, and connections. Soon her father, a man raising his three daughters alone, is seized, accused of murder. And in a police cell, during a violent thunderstorm, Colonel de Luce tells his daughter an astounding story, that of a schoolboy friendship turned ugly, of a priceless object that vanished in a bizarre and brazen act of thievery, of a Latin teacher who flung himself to his death from the school's tower 30 years before. Now Flavia is armed with more than enough knowledge to tie two distant deaths together, to examine new suspects, and begin a search that will lead her all the way to the King of England himself. Of this much the girl is sure: her father is innocent of murder, but protecting her and her sisters from something even worse. An enthralling mystery, a piercing depiction of class and society, The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie is a masterfully told tale of deceptions and a rich literary delight.
©2009 Alan Bradley (P)2009 Random House Audio
The Grave's a Fine and Private Place
Summary
"The world's greatest adolescent British chemist/busybody/sleuth" (The Seattle Times), Flavia de Luce, returns in a twisty new mystery novel from award-winning and New York Times best-selling author Alan Bradley. In the wake of an unthinkable family tragedy, 12-year-old Flavia de Luce is struggling to fill her empty days. For a needed escape, Dogger, the loyal family servant, suggests a boating trip for Flavia and her two older sisters. As their punt drifts past the church where a notorious vicar had recently dispatched three of his female parishioners by spiking their communion wine with cyanide, Flavia, an expert chemist with a passion for poisons, is ecstatic. Suddenly, something grazes her fingers as she dangles them in the water. She clamps down on the object, imagining herself Ernest Hemingway battling a marlin, and pulls up what she expects will be a giant fish. But in Flavia's grip is something far better: a human head, attached to a human body. If anything could take Flavia's mind off sorrow, it is solving a murder - although one that may lead the young sleuth to an early grave.
©2018 Alan Bradley (P)2018 Random House Audio
The Golden Tresses of the Dead: A Flavia de Luce Novel
Summary
New York Times Best Seller A finger in a wedding cake is only the beginning in this deliciously shocking mystery featuring Flavia de Luce, âthe worldâs greatest adolescent British chemist/busybody/sleuthâ (The Seattle Times). Although it is autumn in the small English town of Bishopâs Lacey, the chapel is decked with exotic flowers. Yes, Flavia de Luceâs sister, Ophelia, is at last getting hitched, like a mule to a wagon. âA church is a wonderful place for a weddingâ, muses Flavia, âsurrounded as it is by the legions of the dead, whose listening bones bear silent witness to every promise made at the altar.â Flavia is not your normal 12-year-old girl. An expert in the chemical nature of poisons, she has solved many mysteries, sharpening her considerable detection skills to the point where she had little choice but to turn professional. So Flavia and dependable Dogger, estate gardener and sounding board extraordinaire, set up shop at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, eager to serve - not so simple an endeavor with her odious little moon-faced cousin Undine constantly underfoot. But Flavia and Dogger persevere. Little does she know that their first case will be extremely close to home, beginning with an unwelcome discovery in Opheliaâs wedding cake: a human finger. Praise for The Golden Tresses of the Dead âDelightful.... The mysteries in Mr. Bradleyâs books are engaging, but the real lure is Ms. de Luce, the irreverent youngster.â (The Wall Street Journal) âA ghoulish question is at the heart of Bradleyâs excellent tenth Flavia de Luce novel.... Bradley, who has few peers at combining fair-play clueing with humor and has fun mocking genre conventions, shows no sign of running out of ideas.â (Publishers Weekly (starred review)
©2019 Alan Bradley (P)2019 Random House Audio
In the First Circle
Summary
Moscow, Christmas Eve, 1949. The Soviet secret police intercept a call made to the American embassy by a Russian diplomat who promises to deliver secrets about the nascent Soviet Atomic Bomb program. On that same day, a brilliant mathematician is locked away inside a Moscow prison that houses the country's brightest minds. He and his fellow prisoners are charged with using their abilities to sleuth out the caller's identity, and they must choose whether to aid Joseph Stalin's repressive state - or refuse and accept transfer to the Siberian Gulag camps...and almost certain death. First written between 1955 and 1958, In the First Circle is Solzhenitsyn's fiction masterpiece. In order to pass through Soviet censors, many essential scenes - including nine full chapters - were cut or altered before it was published in a hastily translated English edition in 1968. Now with the help of the author's most trusted translator, Harry T. Willetts, here for the first time is the complete, definitive English edition of Solzhenitsyn's powerful and magnificent classic.
©2009 Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn (P)2018 Tantor
The Weed That Strings the Hangman's Bag
Summary
From Dagger Award-winning and internationally best-selling author Alan Bradley comes this utterly beguiling mystery, starring one of fictionâs most remarkable sleuths: Flavia de Luce, a dangerously brilliant 11-year-old with a passion for chemistry and a genius for solving murders. This time, Flavia finds herself untangling two deathsâseparated by time but linked by the unlikeliest of threads. Flavia thinks that her days of crime-solving in the bucolic English hamlet of Bishopâs Lacy are overâand then Rupert Porson has an unfortunate rendezvous with electricity. The beloved puppeteer has had his own strings sizzled, but whoâd do such a thing and why? For Flavia, the questions are intriguing enough to make her put aside her chemistry experiments and schemes of vengeance against her insufferable big sisters. Astride Gladys, her trusty bicycle, Flavia sets out from the de Lucesâ crumbling family mansion in search of Bishopâs Laceyâs deadliest secrets. Does the madwoman who lives in Gibbet Wood know more than sheâs letting on? What of the vicarâs odd ministrations to the catatonic woman in the dovecote? Then thereâs a German pilot obsessed with the Brontë sisters, a reproachful spinster aunt, and even a box of poisoned chocolates. Most troubling of all is Porsonâs assistant, the charming but erratic Nialla. All clues point toward a suspicious death years earlier and a case the local constables canât solveâwithout Flaviaâs help. But in getting so close to whoâs secretly pulling the strings of this dance of death, has our precocious heroine finally gotten in way over her head?
©2010 Alan Bradley (P)2010 Random House Audio
As Chimney Sweepers Come to Dust
Summary
Flavia de Luce - "part Harriet the Spy, part Violet Baudelaire from Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events" (The New York Times Book Review) - takes her remarkable sleuthing prowess to the unexpectedly unsavory world of Canadian boarding schools in the captivating new mystery from New York Times best-selling author Alan Bradley.
©2015 Alan Bradley (P)2014 Random House Audio
A Red Herring Without Mustard
Summary
Award-winning author Alan Bradley returns with another beguiling novel starring the insidiously clever and unflappable 11-year-old sleuth Flavia de Luce. The precocious chemist with a passion for poisons uncovers a fresh slew of misdeeds in the hamlet of Bishopâs Laceyâmysteries involving a missing tot, a fortune-teller, and a corpse in Flaviaâs own backyard. Flavia had asked the old Gypsy woman to tell her fortune, but never expected to stumble across the poor soul, bludgeoned in the wee hours in her own caravan. Was this an act of retribution by those convinced that the soothsayer had abducted a local child years ago? Certainly Flavia understands the bliss of settling scores; revenge is a delightful pastime when one has two odious older sisters. But how could this crime be connected to the missing baby? Had it something to do with the weird sect who met at the river to practice their secret rites? While still pondering the possibilities, Flavia stumbles upon another corpseâthat of a notorious layabout who had been caught prowling about the de Luceâs drawing room. Pedaling Gladys, her faithful bicycle, across the countryside in search of clues to both crimes, Flavia uncovers some odd new twists. Most intriguing is her introduction to an elegant artist with a very special object in her possessionâa portrait that sheds light on the biggest mystery of all: Who is Flavia? As the red herrings pile up, Flavia must sort through clues fishy and foul to untangle dark deeds and dangerous secrets.
©2011 Alan Bradley (P)2011 Random House
I Am Half-Sick of Shadows
Summary
Itâs Christmastime, and the precocious Flavia de Luceâan eleven-year-old sleuth with a passion for chemistry and a penchant for crime-solvingâis tucked away in her laboratory, whipping up a concoction to ensnare Saint Nick. But she is soon distracted when a film crew arrives at Buckshaw, the de Lucesâ decaying English estate, to shoot a movie starring the famed Phyllis Wyvern. Amid a raging blizzard, the entire village of Bishopâs Lacey gathers at Buckshaw to watch Wyvern perform, yet nobody is prepared for the eveningâs shocking conclusion: a body found, past midnight, strangled to death with a length of film. But who among the assembled guests would stage such a chilling scene? As the storm worsens and the list of suspects grows, Flavia must use every ounce of sly wit at her disposal to ferret out a killer hidden in plain sight.
©2011 Alan Bradley (P)2011 Random House
Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd
Summary
Hailed as "a combination of Eloise and Sherlock Holmes" by The Boston Globe, Flavia de Luce returns in a much anticipated new Christmas mystery from award-winning and New York Times best-selling author Alan Bradley. In spite of being ejected from Miss Bodycote's Female Academy in Canada, 12-year-old Flavia de Luce is excited to be sailing home to England. But instead of a joyous homecoming, she is greeted on the docks with unfortunate news: Her father has fallen ill, and a hospital visit will have to wait while he rests. But with Flavia's blasted sisters and insufferable cousin underfoot, Buckshaw now seems both too empty - and not empty enough. Only too eager to run an errand for the vicar's wife, Flavia hops on her trusty bicycle, Gladys, to deliver a message to a reclusive wood-carver. Finding the front door ajar, Flavia enters and stumbles upon the poor man's body hanging upside down on the back of his bedroom door. The only living creature in the house is a feline that shows little interest in the disturbing scene. Curiosity may not kill this cat, but Flavia is energized at the prospect of a new investigation. It's amazing what the discovery of a corpse can do for one's spirits. But what awaits Flavia will shake her to the very core.
©2016 Alan Bradley (P)2016 Random House Audio
Speaking from Among the Bones
Summary
From award-winning author Alan Bradley comes the next cozy British mystery starring intrepid young sleuth Flavia de Luce, hailed by USA Today as "one of the most remarkable creations in recent literature". Eleven-year-old amateur detective and ardent chemist Flavia de Luce is used to digging up clues, whether theyâre found among the potions in her laboratory or between the pages of her insufferable sistersâ diaries. What she is not accustomed to is digging up bodies. Upon the 500th anniversary of St. Tancredâs death, the English hamlet of Bishopâs Lacey is busily preparing to open its patron saintâs tomb. Nobody is more excited to peek inside the crypt than Flavia, yet what she finds will halt the proceedings dead in their tracks: the body of Mr. Collicutt, the church organist, his face grotesquely and inexplicably masked. Who held a vendetta against Mr. Collicutt, and why would they hide him in such a sacred resting place? The irrepressible Flavia decides to find out. And what she unearths will prove thereâs never such thing as an open-and-shut case.
©2013 Bradley Page (P)2013 Random House Audio
The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches
Summary
On a spring morning in 1951, 11-year-old chemist and aspiring detective Flavia de Luce gathers with her family at the railway station, awaiting the return of her long-lost mother, Harriet. Yet upon the trainâs arrival in the English village of Bishopâs Lacey, Flavia is approached by a tall stranger who whispers a cryptic message into her ear. Moments later, he is dead, mysteriously pushed under the train by someone in the crowd. Who was this man, what did his words mean, and why were they intended for Flavia? Back home at Buckshaw, the de Lucesâ crumbling estate, Flavia puts her sleuthing skills to the test. Following a trail of clues sparked by the discovery of a reel of film stashed away in the attic, she unravels the deepest secrets of the de Luce clan, involving none other than Winston Churchill himself. Surrounded by family, friends, and a famous pathologist from the Home Office - and making spectacular use of Harrietâs beloved Gipsy Moth plane, Blithe Spirit - Flavia will do anything, even take to the skies, to land a killer.
©2013 Alan Bradley (P)2013 Random House Audio
Unleashed
Summary
She vowed to never trust another man...until she met him. A passionate new Long, Tall Texans romance from New York Times best-selling author Diana Palmer. Clancey Lang knows how to run. Sheâs been doing it since the day she fled her abusive home to save her and her younger brotherâs lives. That was the same day she decided to never let herself depend on anyone else. Especially men. Though sheâs tempted - mighty tempted - to put her faith in her boss, ruggedly handsome Texas Ranger Colter Banks. If only he would look her way.... For far too long, Colter has been distracting himself with women he knows will never fully satisfy him. But thereâs something about his pretty assistant, Clancey, that he simply canât resist. Something slowly but surely drawing every ounce of his attention. But is he falling for a woman whoâll never let herself be caught?
©2019 Diana Palmer (P)2019 Harlequin Enterprises, Limited
The Golden Tresses of the Dead
Summary
Flavia de Luce, the 12-year-old chemist and amateur detective, is eager to turn professional. She and her father's valet, Dogger, have founded a detective agency, Arthur Dogger & Associates, and unexpectedly cut into their first case during the revelry at her sister Ophelia's wedding reception. After an eventful ceremony with a missing best man and spontaneous ventriloquist act, spirits are high as Feely and her new husband head for the towering and beautifully iced wedding cake. But as Feely slices into the first piece, a scream rings out - the bridal cake contains a severed human finger. Delighted, Flavia wraps the finger in a napkin and whisks it away to her chemical laboratory. By studying the embalmed skin, the indentation of a ring, and the slope of the fingernail, she'll not only be able to determine the identity of the victim but also point a finger at a killer.
©2019 Alan Bradley (P)2019 W.F. Howes Ltd
Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd
Summary
Twelve-year-old Flavia de Luce is back at Buckshaw at last, but her homecoming is overshadowed by news of her father's illness. Forbidden from visiting him in hospital, Flavia busies herself in the village, but she soon makes a macabre discovery: the corpse of a reclusive woodcarver in an empty house, except for a curiously uncurious cat. Curiosity may not kill this cat, but Flavia is energized at the prospect of a new investigation. However, what awaits Flavia will shake her to the core.
©2016 Alan Bradley (P)2017 W F Howes Ltd
The Grave's a Fine and Private Place
Summary
Flavia is enjoying the summer, spending her days punting along the river with her reluctant family. Languishing in boredom, she drags a slack hand in the water - and catches her fingers in the open mouth of a drowned corpse. Flavia needs to put her super-sleuthing skills to the test to investigate the murder of three gossips in the local church and to keep her sisters out of danger.
©2018 Alan Bradley (P)2018 W. F. Howes Ltd
As Chimney Sweepers Come to Dust
Summary
When Flavia de Luce is banished to Miss Bodycote's Female Academy in Canada, she's soon on familiar ground when, on her first night, a mummified body is dislodged from a chimney, and she is presented with a gruesome puzzle to solve. Girls have been disappearing with alarming regularity, leading Flavia to wonder not only how and why but what exactly is the academy's true purpose? Flavia must enter a shadowy world where truth and lies seem interchangeable and no one can be trusted.
©2015 Alan Bradley (P)2017 W F Howes Ltd