Speaking From Among the Bones by Alan Bradley [Review]

4.5 out of 5 Robots!

 

Speaking From Among the Bones by Alan Bradley
Series: Flavia de Luce #5
Genre: Mystery
Release: February 5, 2013
Hardcover: 378 Pages
Publisher: Delacorte Press
My Copy: Publisher (Netgalley)
Reviewer: Shannon
Buy the Book: Amazon

Book 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 they’re found among the potions in her laboratory or between the pages of her insufferable sisters’ diaries. What she is not accustomed to is digging up bodies. Upon the five-hundredth anniversary of St. Tancred’s death, the English hamlet of Bishop’s Lacey is busily preparing to open its patron saint’s 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 there’s never such thing as an open-and-shut case.

(Courtesy of the Publisher)

Shannon's Thoughts:

This is another cozy mystery series I love.  Flavia de Luce is a 12 year chemist prodigy and amateur sleuth living in the small hamlet of Bishop's Lacey in 1951.  England is still recovering from the war and the de Luce's are still recovering from the loss of Flavia's mother, Harriet.  Flavia has a tenuous relationship with her sisters and a distant relationship with her father.  She is left to her own devices, which tends to get her into a bit of trouble.  Flavia finds herself very clever, but is also very naive sometimes.  It makes her a charming, but lonely character.  She is very much a 12 year old missing her mother, but is also brilliant at solving crimes.  I love when Flavia rhapsodizing about chemical reactions and compounds.  She has a particular soft spot for poisons.  She's what I imagine Anne of Green Gable crossed with Sherlock Holmes would be like.

This is the fifth installment in the series and my personal favorite so far.  The central mystery was so twisty-turny that it kept me on my toes the entire time.  On top of a compelling mystery, we also get a lot of development within the family.  There are some truly tender and heartbreaking moments.  Flavia and her sister makes strides towards a better relationship and Flavia discovers some new things about her mother.  And for the first time, this book ends on a breathtaking cliffhanger.

Out of all the cozy mysteries out there, I think this is one of the cleverest.  If you are a mystery fan, I definitely recommend checking this series out!

Other books in this series in the order that they should be read:
1. The Sweetest at the Bottom of Pie
2. The Weed That Strings the Hangman's Bag
3. A Red Herring Without Mustard
4. I am Half Sick of Shadows
5. Speaking From Among the Bones
6. The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches (expected publication January 2014)