Cold-blooded Myrtle

Elizabeth C. Bunce

Book - 2021

Twelve-year-old Young Lady of Quality and Victorian amateur detective Myrtle Hardcastle returns, and now she is on the trail of a serial killer in her hometown of Swinburne.

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Subjects
Genres
Detective and mystery stories
Children's stories
Detective and mystery fiction
Published
Chapel Hill, North Carolina : Algonquin Young Readers [2021]
Language
English
Main Author
Elizabeth C. Bunce (author)
Edition
First edition
Physical Description
368 pages ; 20 cm
Audience
Ages 10 and up
Grades 4-6
ISBN
9781616209209
Contents unavailable.
Review by Kirkus Book Review

Morbid Myrtle to the rescue once more, solving murders in her Victorian English village. It's convenient that the Swinburne Village's murderers are every bit as over-the-top and elaborate as Myrtle is dedicated to Investigating. This time around, the murderer signs the elaborate executions by rearranging The Display: each death scene meticulously created in the scale model of the village set up each year for Christmas. Of course, Myrtle would be determined to solve the crimes under any circumstances, but these serial killings seem to have some connection to her dead Mum. Myrtle, a White 12-year-old, has excellent detecting assistants: her French Guianese governess, Miss Judson, who is almost more dedicated to Investigating than Myrtle; White Mr. Blakeney, who still calls Myrtle by the nickname "Stephen"; and Indian British Caroline, whose father was Myrtle's Mum's college friend and who is also connected to the killings. Can they unravel the killer's motives while Swinburne's worthies are all implicated? What if Caroline's and Myrtle's parents are guilty? And why won't Miss Judson and Myrtle's father just kiss, already? Classical allusions and a secret society accentuate the Victorian feel, but Myrtle explains the history as much as she explains 19th-century engineering, so readers should only be puzzled by the mystery itself. Comical footnotes pepper the text, adding wit to prose which is already dryly funny. Clues abound, giving astute readers the chance to solve the mystery along with Myrtle. Another excellent whodunit with a charming, snarky sleuth. (historical note) (Historical mystery. 9-12) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.