Flavia is Sherlock Holmes in the body of an 11 year old girl with two annoying older sisters, a barely present father and a love of chemistry and poison. She has an amazing laboratory, a keen eye and is the smartest person she knows.
In between torturing her sisters (she adds poison ivy to the lipstick of one of them) and being tortured by them (the story begins with her being tied up and locked in a closet by them) she finds a dying man in her yard and must solve his murder in order to clear her father's name.
The ingredients of this mystery were very interesting. Set in 1950's England the story weaves together stolen rare stamps, the death of a head master many years before Flavia is born and the murder in Flavia's yard. Being a precocious 11 year old makes it inevitable she'll get into some pretty tough situations and these allow glimpses of the child she is under all her sass and smarts.
This turns out to be the first of a series of books staring the girl detective and I look forward to seeing what Flavia gets into next.
(Finished November 16, 2013)
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