The golden tresses of the dead

C. Alan Bradley, 1938-

Book - 2019

"Although it is autumn in the small English town of Bishop's Lacey, the chapel is decked with exotic flowers. Yes, Flavia de Luce's sister Ophelia is at last getting hitched, like a mule to a wagon. "A church is a wonderful place for a wedding," muses Flavia, "surrounded as it is by the legions of the dead, whose listening bones bear silent witness to every promise made at the altar." Flavia is not your normal twelve-year-old girl. An expert in the chemical nature of poisons, she has solved many mysteries, which has sharpened her considerable detection skills to the point where she had little choice but to turn professional. So Flavia and dependable Dogger, estate gardener and sounding board extraordinaire..., set up shop at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, eager to serve--not so simple an endeavor with her odious, little moon-faced cousin, Undine, constantly underfoot. But Flavia and Dogger persevere. Little does she know that their first case will be extremely close to home, beginning with an unwelcome discovery in Ophelia's wedding cake: a human finger"--

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Subjects
Genres
Mystery fiction
Detective and mystery fiction
Published
New York : Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House [2019]
Language
English
Main Author
C. Alan Bradley, 1938- (author)
Edition
First edition
Physical Description
327 pages ; 20 cm
ISBN
9780345540027
Contents unavailable.
Review by Booklist Review

*Starred Review* Prepare for Arthur Dogger and Associates' first official case, in which 12-year-old Flavia de Luce finally becomes a professional sleuth, with the able help of family gardener and all-around problem solver Dogger. The roller-coaster ride that transpires begins with tears at the wedding of Flavia's sister, Ophelia, prompted by a severed finger in the wedding cake, and extends to death by poisoning (Flavia's special area of expertise), even drawing in some sweet lady missionaries from Africa. Ever self-evaluating, Flavia notes her preteen mood swings, which cleverly mirror the puzzling tangles she and Dogger set out to unravel. The 1950s frame is aptly set with a wealth of period details, including the quaint village of Bishop's Lacey, with its vicarage and altar guild, and Flavia's old-fashioned bicycle named Gladys. Despite the novel's patently improbable plot, Flavia's over-the-top use of alliteration ( ghastly goings-on at the graveside") and proudly precocious, sesquipedalian vocabulary ( I delight in deliquescence ), along with the thoroughly endearing cast of characters, make this series' tenth installment a laugh-out-loud winner. Fans of the brainy Flavia, who dotes on death," will also enjoy the precocious child narrators and mysterious, twisty plots that abound in Annie Hartnett's Rabbit Cake (2017) and Maria Semple's Where'd You Go, Bernadette (2012).--Jen Baker Copyright 2018 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

A ghoulish question is at the heart of Bradley's excellent 10th Flavia de Luce novel set in 1950s England (after 2018's The Grave's a Fine and Private Place): "How had an embalmed finger found its way from the hand of a dead woman in a Surrey cemetery into the heart of a wedding cake at Buckshaw?" Though only in her early teens, chemistry prodigy Flavia has formed a private detective agency with Arthur Dogger, her late father's valet, at the family estate of Buckshaw. The discovery at her sister Ophelia's wedding of the severed digit-which turns out to have come from the corpse of a guitar impresario-presents Flavia and Dogger with her first case. Meanwhile, the sleuths get their first client when Anastasia Prill asks for their help in recovering some sensitive stolen letters relating to her father's homeopathic practice, an inquiry that turns into a homicide investigation. Bradley, who has few peers at combining fair-play clueing with humor and has fun mocking genre conventions, shows no sign of running out of ideas. Agent: Denise Bukowski, Bukowski Agency. (Jan.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review

Flavia de Luce hasn't lost a sister, she's gained a caseand what a case.Whatever tears the preteen chemist/sleuth might have shed over her dislikable sister Ophelia's wedding to Dieter Schrantz, whose career in the Luftwaffe was ended when his plane was shot down by Reggie Mould, the Royal Air Force pilot who's now his best man, are squelched by two more momentous events: the appearance of Anastasia Prill, the very first client of Flavia's professional partnership with Arthur W. Dogger, her late father's valet, and Flavia's discovery of a severed finger stuck into Ophelia's wedding cake. The shared abilities of Flavia and Dogger (The Grave's a Fine and Private Place, 2018, etc.) quickly identify the finger as that of recently deceased guitarist Mme. Adriana Castelnuovo, but the investigation of Arthur W. Dogger Associates into the theft of the threatening letters focusing on the work of Miss Prill's father, distinguished homeopathic practitioner Dr. Augustus Brocken, hits an unfortunate snag when someone feeds the client a fatal dose of physostigmine. Since Dr. Brocken, whose age-related infirmities have confined him to Gollingford Abbey, can offer no evidence as useful as a complete spoken sentence, Flavia and Dogger are very much on their ownexcept of course for Flavia's cousin Undine, who's even younger and snarkier than she is, and Doris Pursemaker and Ardella Stonebrook, two missionaries Flavia, now the Chatelaine of Buckshaw, agrees through gritted teeth to accept as guests under pressure from Cynthia Richardson, the vicar's beleaguered wife. Luckily, Flavia's inquiries also lead her to a kindred spirit: Colin Collier, the late guitarist's son, who also turns out to be the late client's nephew.Perhaps the most consistently hilarious adventure of the alarmingly precocious heroine, who's capable of confiding in her readers with a perfectly straight face: "I don't know if you've ever dissected a rat, but to me, there was only one word for it: exhilarating." Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Chapter One I'd like to remark at the outset that I'm a girl with better than an average brain. Just as some people are given the gift of a singular and often quite remarkable talent--such as Violet Cornish's uncanny ability to break wind to the tune of "Joy to the World"--I myself, in much the same way, have been blessed with the power of logical thinking. As Violet could easily confirm, it's something you're born with, and then improve by much practice. The many occasions upon which I had been consulted by the constabulary had sharpened my already considerable detection skills to the point where I had little choice but to turn professional. And so I had set up with Dogger, my late father's valet, gardener, and all-round sounding board, a small agency to which we gave the name--to signal respectability--Arthur W. Dogger & Associates. Little did we know that our very first case would be so close to home. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me begin at the beginning. My sister Ophelia's wedding was spoiled only slightly by someone calling out coarsely, as the bride floated in modest beauty up the aisle of the ancient church, "Hubba hubba, ding-ding, twenty years in Sing Sing!" The culprit was Carl Pendracka, one of Feely's former suitors. It was his Cincinnati accent that gave him away. We all of us pretended we hadn't heard, except my odious, moon-faced cousin, Undine, who let out one of her long, wet, horrible, slobbering snickers, such as might have been made by a herd of cannibal cows. More troubling, though, was when, just a few moments later--at the precise moment the vicar addressed the congregation: "If any man can show any just cause, why they may not lawfully be joined together, let him now speak, or else hereafter forever hold his peace"--one of the carved and painted angels, from its place high among the roof beams, cried out suddenly, in the zany voice of a certain cinema cartoon character, "I do! I do! Call the police!" It was Undine, of course, who, bored by lack of attention, decided to practice her ventriloquism--which she had been studying for some time from a sixpenny book. Aside from that--except for the human remains--it was a beautiful occasion. Preparations had begun far in advance. First there had been the cake. "The weddin' cake must be laid down 'least six months before the nup-chools," Mrs. Mullet had said, waving a batter-coated wooden spoon at me in the kitchen. "Else the marriage'll be poisoned." The mention of poison captured my undivided attention. "What kind of poison?" I asked. "The worst kind. The poison of leavin' things to be done on the spurt of the moment. Just look at that Lucy Havers, as was, and then talk to me about darin' the devil. Left it till the day before 'er weddin' to 'ave 'er cake baked at that Bunne Shoppe in 'Inley, if you can credit it, an' look what happened to 'er!" I raised my eyebrows in a "What happened to her?" signal. " 'Er 'usband--one o' them Simmonses, 'e was--run off with a tart from the Bunne Shoppe the day after they got 'ome from their 'oneymoon in 'Astings." "If it were me, I'd have run off with an apple pie," I said, pretending I didn't understand her meaning, a tactic I am increasingly forced to employ in order to protect my alleged innocence. Mrs. Mullet smiled at my modesty. "Like I said, a weddin' fruitcake must be laid down six months ahead o' time and left to sleep in the larder till required," she said, returning to her theme. Mrs. Mullet could be uncommonly informative when allowed to lecture uninterrupted, and I pulled up a chair to listen. "Like layin' the keel of a battleship," she went on. "You mustn't leave it till the enemy's in sight." "Who's the enemy?" I asked. "The groom?" Mrs. Mullet laid a forefinger alongside her nose in the ancient sign of secrecy. "That's for every woman to find out for 'erself," she said, tapping the finger and causing her nose to give off an alarming hollow knocking sound. She lowered her voice. "And till she does, she needs all the spells she can get to keep away the Old Ones." The Old Ones? This was becoming truly interesting. First poisons, and now malevolent supernatural spirits. And it wasn't yet ten o'clock in the morning! Mrs. Mullet was now scraping the batter out of the bowl and into a large cake pan. "Here, let me help you," I said, reaching for the oven door. "Not yet," Mrs. Mullet said, surprisingly short-tempered. "First things first. Grab an 'andful o' them sticks and toss 'em on top of the fire. "In the basket there," she added, pointing with the spoon, as if I hadn't seen them. A wicker basket beside the cooker was half filled with a tangle of twigs and branches. "Run a bit of water in the sink," she said. "We wants 'em good an' damp." I did as I was told. "To make steam?" I asked, wondering how the steam was going to find its way from the firebox to the oven chamber. "Somethin' like that," Mrs. Mullet said, as I opened the firebox and threw the wet wood on top of the fire. "An' somethin' else besides." Again, the finger beside the nose. "Protection," I guessed. "Against the enemy?" "That's right, dear," Mrs. Mullet said. " 'Azel and 'awthorn. I gathered 'em with my own 'ands in Gibbet Wood. Now, one more thing an' we're ready to pop in the cake." She pulled a sprig of needled leaves from the pocket of her apron. "Rosemary!" I exclaimed. I recognized it from the kitchen garden. "That's right, dear," Mrs. Mullet said again, as the warm spicy odor of the herb filled the kitchen. "To remind Miss Ophelia of 'er 'ome, and all them as 'ave ever loved 'er. Rosemary in the oven for the cake and rosemary in 'er bouquet. It also 'elps keep off the 'obgoblins." "I thought rosemary was for funerals," I said. I remembered that because Daffy was always quoting Shakespeare. "An' so it is, dear. Funerals and weddin's both. That's why it's such an 'andy 'erb to 'ave round the 'ouse. Which is why we grows it in the kitchen garden. If we wants it for weddin's we soaks it in scented water and braids it into the bride's veil and bouquet. For funerals, we wets it with rainwater an' tosses it into the open grave on top of the coffin. "We also tucks a bit of it into the shroud," she added. "If we 'ave one, of course, which most of us doesn't nowadays, what with it bein' charged as an extra expense by the undertakers." "And the hazel sticks?" I asked. "Guarantees descendants," she said, her face suddenly serious. Poor Feely, I thought. Alone upstairs at this very moment, innocently picking her pimples in a sterling silver hand mirror without the faintest idea that the cook was in the kitchen, already fiddling with her future. It almost made me feel sorry for my sister. "Now don't ask me no more pesky questions," Mrs. Mullet said. "I've got four more layers to bake an' dinner to get started for you lot." "What about the hawthorn?" I asked, even though I already knew the answer. It is believed by some--but not by me--that the haws, or berries, and the flowers of the hawthorn preserve in their smell the stench of the Great Plague of London, whereas I, with my scientific mind, know perfectly well that both haws and flowers of the tree contain a substantial quantity of trimethylamine, which is the chemical compound responsible for the smell of putrefaction. "Never you mind," Mrs. Mullet said. "Ask me no questions and I shall tell you no lies." It was her standard response to any question whose expected answer had to do with the birds and the bees. "Thanks, Mrs. M," I said cheerfully. "It's just as I suspected." And I skipped out of the kitchen before she could fling a piece of pastry at me. Anyway, as I was saying, the wedding was . . . ​well . . . ​interesting. Although it was autumn, St. Tancred's was decked with exotic flowers: early narcissi, show pinks, and snapdragons, all flown in for the occasion from the Isles of Scilly by Feely's godfather, Bunny Spirling, a dear old friend of our late father. Feely had asked Bunny to give her away. "If only it were for keeps," I had remarked when she told me the news. "Silence, you suppurating cyst!" Feely had shot back. "What makes you think it won't be? You may never ever see me again." "Oh, you'll be back," I told her. "There are two things in life that can be counted upon to return: a married sister and the smell of drains. Quite frankly, I'd prefer the drains." I shot Dieter a sidelong wink to let him know I bore him no hard feelings. You can't punish a basically decent chap simply for marrying the resident witch. But to get back to the wedding . . . There had been a last-minute panic when it was discovered, ten minutes before the scheduled time, that Dieter's best man had still not arrived. "He'll turn up," Dieter said. "Reggie is an honorable man." "Like Brutus?" Daffy had blurted. Daffy sometimes has the habit of putting her mouth in gear before engaging her brain. Reggie Mould was the British pilot who had shot Dieter down and was, therefore, the cause of Dieter's remaining in England after the war. They had since become fast friends and shared, like all pilots, that mystic brotherhood of the air. Dieter took Daffy and me aside. "You mustn't be surprised when you meet Reggie. He's a member of the Guinea Pig Club." We both of us looked at Dieter blankly. "After he bagged me, Reggie himself went down into the Channel in flames. He was very badly burned. He spent ages in Queen Victoria Hospital. You have probably read about it." We shook our heads. "Dr. McIndoe worked miracles with skin grafts. . . ." A shadow crossed his face. "But still . . ." he added, trailing off into some silent memory of his own. "Don't stare," I said, grasping his meaning immediately. Dieter's face lit up in a glorious grin. "Exactly," he said. "Look. Here he comes now." An ancient green MG with a blatting exhaust was looming at the lych-gate, and a young man extracted himself gingerly from the low-slung cockpit. He came slowly toward us through the churchyard. "Tallyho!" he shouted as soon as he spotted Dieter. "Horrido!" Dieter replied. Saint Horridus, I recalled Dieter telling me, was the patron saint of hunters and fighter pilots. The two men hugged and slapped each other on the back--carefully, I noticed, in Dieter's case. "I thought I'd put paid to you the first time I had you in my sights." Reggie laughed. "Now I'm back to jolly well finish off the job properly." Dieter laughed graciously, as he had learned to do since meeting my sister. "I'd like to introduce to you my sisters-in-law," he said. I was grateful that he hadn't said "future." Even though I had been forewarned, as Reggie turned, the air went out of me. His face was a ghastly blank: a grotesque mask of dry and fragile sheeting, as if someone had coated his skin with papier-mâché and painted it white and then red. His mouth was a round black hole. Only the eyes were alive, sparkling mischievous fire at me from their raggedly deep dark sockets. "Charmed," Reggie croaked. His voice was that of a man who had breathed flames. "You're the Shakespeare authority," he said, offering Daffy a handshake. "Well, not actually," she began as Reggie turned to me. "And you're the poisonous one, Flavia. We must have a chat before I leave." Then, assuming a hissing, bloodcurdling, snakelike voice, he added: "I have dark designs on several of my lesser enemies." He needed to say no more. He had won my heart. "Wizard!" I said, with a grin like the blazing sun, and trotting out the only bit of RAF slang I could remember at the moment. Dieter then introduced Reggie to Aunt Felicity, who, offering him a cigarette, launched into a questionable RAF joke, which rather shocked me, but which I realized was meant to set Reggie instantly at ease, and to make the two of them forever comrades-in-arms. Dieter's parents had flown over from Germany to attend the wedding. Although his father was a publisher and his mother an archaeologist, they stood off to one side at the church door, not forgotten, but too exotic, perhaps, to be casually chatted up by the villagers of Bishop's Lacey. I wandered over for a few words, having learned earlier that both spoke excellent English. Complimenting their son's fine singing voice seemed an appropriate and welcoming way to open the conversation. "Dieter must have learned to sing at twenty thousand feet," I said. They looked at me blankly. "From the angels," I explained, and they both laughed heartily. "We thought we had lost him to England," Dieter's mother confessed, "but it is comforting to know that someone has already found him." I wasn't quite sure that I understood completely, but we all three of us beamed at one another like fellow magistrates. "Your English weather is quite like our own in autumn," Dieter's father observed, gesturing to the beautiful day around him. "Yes," I said, not having enough international experience to form an opinion. "Have you been here before?" "Oh yes," Dieter's father replied. "My wife and I both read Greats up at Oxford." Which shut my mouth. Dieter, meanwhile, off among the tombstones, was engrossed in animated conversation with Reggie Mould, their hands tracing out zooming, swooping angles in the air. "We'd better go inside," I said. "Feely will be thinking we've abandoned her." And so it all began. A church is a wonderful place for a wedding, surrounded as it is by the legions of the dead, whose listening bones bear silent witness to every promise made--and broken--at the altar. Dead now, every last one of them, including the man who invented the rule about not putting your elbows on the dinner table. Most of these had taken their vows at this very altar, and each in his turn reduced by life and time at first to juice . . . ​and then to dust. As Daffy once pointed out to me, the Latin word carnarium can mean both "cemetery" and "larder," which shows that the Romans knew what they were talking about. The function of a churchyard--and the church itself, to some extent--is to digest the dead: There's no point in pretending otherwise. After Undine's shocking outburst of ventriloquism, the ceremony itself went relatively well. Feely, although it pains me to say so, was radiant in the wedding dress that had belonged to our mother, Harriet. Radiant or not, it gave me the shivers. When all of the proper words had been spoken, rings and vows exchanged, and the register duly signed, the vicar, Denwyn Richardson, held up a hand signaling us to remain in our seats. Excerpted from The Golden Tresses of the Dead: A Flavia de Luce Novel by Alan Bradley All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.