So before I left on vacation my friend G recommended two books to me. The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley was one of them. And I have to say in the first five pages, I seriously wondered what G was smoking.

Sweetness starts off with the protagonist poisoning her oldest sister. And as much as I love serial killer novels, an 11 year old murderer was not something I wanted to read about. Turns out the poison she employs is actually poison ivy. LOL. Added to the sister’s lip stick. As punishment for telling her she was adopted. LOL.

The book is really quite good. Well written. Compelling. Amusing protagonist unlike an other I have read. Flavia de Luce doesn’t quite come across as an 11 year old girl but she is believable as a precocious chemistry obsessed child. In this book, the first in a series, she solves a murder in her cucumber patch learning a considerable amount about herself, her family, and the past that haunts them. I really can’t wait to see where this will go. Will Bradley let her grow up? Will he expand her world? Will things keep happening in her small little hamlet?

℘℘℘℘℘ – Five Pages. Loved this book. I don’t think I quite read it in one sitting but it didn’t take much and I am already on the waiting list for an ebook version of Bradley’s next book in the Flavia de Luce series.