"The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie" {by Alan Bradley} Book Review

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie 

Author: Alan Bradley

# of Pages: 374

Year Published: 2009

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Genre: Young Adult Mystery

Summary: 

It is the summer of 1950–and at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, young Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison, is intrigued by a series of inexplicable events: A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. Then, 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. “I wish I could say I was afraid, but I wasn’t. Quite the contrary. This was by far the most interesting thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life.”

Alan Bradley can be described as a delightful mix of Harriet the Spy and Sherlock Holmes. Though fantastical at times, we found the book well-written, amusing and entertaining with an Average Rating of 4.55 (12 participants).

"The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie" {by Alan Bradley} Book Club Ideas

{I laugh every time I read that quote!}
Our book for May was "The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie: by Alan Bradley and oh, how sweet it was to read.  I think we ALL fell in love with the curious, spunky and precocious 11 year old main character, Flavia de Luce! 
Reading this book was a real treat.

Flavia de Luce~ {Not your typical kid sleuth}

To help familiarize you with our May book club read I wanted to get you excited to meet Flavia de Luce, kid sleuth.

Picture an ancient country house somewhere in England. The year is 1950.
      Picture a girl who lives there with her most unusual family. Her name is Flavia de Luce—and she’s almost eleven.
           Picture a long-abandoned Victorian chemistry laboratory; no one ever goes there but Flavia. Put them all together and you’ll have a new kind of detective fiction . . .



I am in LOVE with all the amazing international covers!

 



Personally, I am really enjoying this book!  Bradley's writing style is unlike anything I've read before, it's funny, smart, descriptive, interesting and clever. I fully plan on reading the other books in this series as the Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie always leaves me with a smile on my face when I have to put it down to do something else.

SYNOPSIS: "Great literary crime detectives aren’t always born; they’re sometimes discovered, blindfolded and tied up in a dark closet by their nasty older sisters. Eleven-year-old Flavia de Luce’s bitter home life and vicious sibling war inspires her solitary diversions and “strange talents” tinkering with the chemistry set in the laboratory of their inherited Victorian house, plotting sleuth-like vengeance on Ophelia (17) and Daphne (13), and delving into the forbidden past of her taciturn, widowed father, Colonel de Luce. It comes as no surprise, then, that the material for her next scientific investigation will be the mysterious corpse that she uncovers in the cucumber patch.
Fearless and darkly imaginative, Flavia hurries to solve the murder and acquit her father of suspicion. Following the lead of its clever protagonist, Sweetness is entirely inventive, fast-paced, and quick-witted, with tongue-in-cheek humour that derides the macabre seriousness of subject.
Alan Bradley plants the story deep into the setting of 1950s England, with a portrait of an eccentric home life that is all too wickedly familiar. The story’s twists are supported by the time and place as well as the unusual interests of the characters which range from stamp-collecting to making poisons all of which are highly researched and ingeniously incorporated."

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie is the first in the 'Flavia de Luce series' of which is currently slated to have six books. The first three books in the series are already out in bookstores and the fourth will be coming out this November, 2011.




Books 1, 2 and 3

 



-Book four will be titled, "I Am Half-Sick of Shadows"

-Book five will be titled,  "Seeds of Antiquity"

-Book six will be titled, "The Nasty Light of Day"

We will meet on June 7th to discuss this book.

Happy Reading!

 {Remember, books 1-3 in the Flavia de Luce series are on the FTP site under the "NEW" folder}