BWW Reviews: Alan Bradley's Eleven-Year-Old Detective Charms in THE SWEETNESS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIE

With the arrival of a new Flavia de Luce mystery, THE DEAD IN THEIR VAULTED ARCHES, which we'll review here shortly, it's worth revisiting author Alan Bradley's Flavia de Luce series in order to play catch-up. Although the mysteries in general, and Flavia's unique charm, stand on their own all the time, there is a family story arc as well throughout the books, one that presents some mysteries of its own. We'll start at the beginning, with the equally uniquely titled - Bradley is the king of delightful ad obscurely found titles - THE SWEETNESS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIE (Bantam Books).

Flavia is a classic English spinster detective, in the mold of Christie's Miss Jane Marple, sharp tongue and all, but for one small detail: Flavia is eleven. No Encyclopedia Brown or Harriet the Spy, Flavia is a knowledgeable, if irksome-to-others, scientist and observer, a mostly-self-educated genus, who, living in the family manse, Buckshaw, has found the Victorian laboratory of her scientist forebear, Tarquin de Luce. In it, she studies his texts, learns his secrets, and experiments in clever attempts to poison her two annoying older sisters.

Flavia's lovably precocious, if she's not a downright pain - and she's possibly both at the same time. Her speech - she narrates her own tales - is certainly at a highly adult level (there's no clarity as to whether she's narrating immediately after the fact, or recalling events as an adult), as well as darkly and delightfully humorous. "My spine, as they say, turned to ice. For a moment I thought he was having a heart attack, as sedentary fathers often do. One minute they are crowing at you to chew every mouthful twenty-nine times and the next you are reading about them in the Daily Telegraph..." And then there's, in relation to her skulking about in the process of investigating, "I slid my feet slowly one in front of the other, like some sensuous senorita doing the tango, and stopped abruptly at the door." She's a riot of figures of speech, as well as a master of sneaking about, eavesdropping, and childish manipulation to ferret out information - and then, able to dash back to the antique laboratory at Buckwood to prove her theories.

In THE SWEETNESS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIE, Flavia has the exciting dubious privilege of stumbling across a nearly dead body in the back yard. It is, of course, the nearly dead body of a gentleman with whom her father was arguing in his study only the evening before. An eleven-year-old of lesser stuff would be horrified and shocked - Flavia, naturally, is intrigued and excited, as well as positive that the Most Likely Suspect, her father, is not at all responsible.

But who is? Why is there a dead bird on the doorstep? Why does it have a stamp in its beak? Can her father's man Dogger help, or is his medical condition from the military - we now know it as PTSD - too severe for him to assist? How can her scientific knowledge and her deep fondness for all forms of poisons possibly help her crack the case? Will Inspector Hewitt allow her to investigate or will he send her home? And will she have to murder her irritating sisters in the process of doing her self-appointed job?

The closest comparison to Bradley is Christie - Flavia's passion for poisons recalls Christie's fondness for employing them as the main method of death in her novels and short stories (few realize that the ever-popular Dame Agatha was a trained nurse who knew whereof she wrote). The local town, Bishop's Lacey, is reminiscent of the village of St. Mary Mead, where Jane Marple knitted her way into the solutions to puzzling deaths. But Miss Marple's ability to solve cases was based upon an intimate, adult knowledge of small-town psychology and viciousness, while Flavia's is a young, socially inept genius's knowledge of science and ability to snoop under the guise of running around. Neither is better - rather, both are entertaining and charming, and Bradley is one of the few great male interpreters of the English cozy mystery in the vein of Christie, Allingham, and Marsh (who somehow made cozy out of what would otherwise be classified as Scotland Yard procedurals).

For over 300 pages, it's a quick read, primarily because it's a compelling mystery, but also because the desire to find out just what Flavia will do next is almost overwhelming. Will she bribe a hotel maid? Will she turn the housekeeper's wretched cooking into her next experiment? Will she tussle with the Inspector, or will she lure the postmistress into telling tales? How will she balance her "I'm just a child" pose with her particularly precocious behavior and her vast, if erratic, knowledge of various subjects? Will she actually kill her sisters if they don't kill her first?

THE SWEETNESS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIE isn't required for picking up the series of Flavia stories, but it helps to pick it up - it's still in print and easily located on line or in book store mystery sections - if you want to see the full development of the family arc, which will become more and more important on the way to Bradley's new novel.

Alan Bradley helpfully also has a website for Flavia, www.flaviadeluce.com, that helps both old and new Flavia fans alike follow the stories and learn more about the young female Sherlock. It's highly recommended by Flavia fans, and is useful as you read through the first book - and it permits you to contact the author. After the fun you'll have, if you're a "cup of tea, a fire, and a warm cat" cozy mystery lover, you'll most likely want to do just that.

Photo credit: Shirley Bradley

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