The Weed That Strings the Hangman’s Bag Date
Alan Bradley
2010, 364 pages
Setting: English country village of Bishop’s Lacey, 1950
From the author of “Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie” comes a second book featuring Flavia de Luce.
Who is Flavia de Luce? She's an engaging and intriguing 11-year-old aspiring chemist with a passion for poison and a knack for solving murders who travels the countryside on her trusty bicycle, Gladys. While waiting for the repairman to fix his vehicle, Rupert Porson, a traveling master puppeteer and celebrity, is murdered during an unscheduled performance of “Jack and the Beanstalk” in Bishop's Lacey. Why does one of the puppets have the face of a young local boy who died by hanging six years ago? Is there a connection between the two deaths? Only with Flavia's knowledge and powers of observation is the murder solved.
Flavia, her insufferable big sisters, her stamp-collecting widowed father, and the other residents of this village make for a fun read. I look forward to reading the next Flavia mystery, “A Red Herring Without Mustard,” due to be published in 2011.
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