On the HahaFiction shelf
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie
Flavia de Luce · Book 1 · 2009
Audiobook available · 9 hr 53 min
Eleven-year-old Flavia de Luce has a chemistry laboratory and a strong interest in poisons. At Buckshaw, her family’s English country house, summer 1950 brings a dead bird with a postage stamp on its beak, followed by a dying stranger in the cucumber patch. When suspicion reaches her father, Flavia starts investigating.
From the author’s blurb
“an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison”Read the full description at Alan Bradley’s official book description
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What makes it funny?
Flavia resents her sisters for combining their ages into thirty years against her eleven. After they tie her up and lock her in a closet, she escapes and tells her father she hasn’t seen them in ages. Her complaints have the precision of a scientific argument and the priorities of an offended child.
The comedy at work
The same exacting mind that arranges dinner peas in rows also plans chemical revenge. Flavia’s composed narration lets spiteful family behavior sound almost reasonable, while her excitement about murder gives the country-house mystery a macabre edge.
Try this if…
Chemistry enthusiasts and readers who like a caustic first-person detective have plenty to follow here. The 1950 English setting, stamp collecting and family friction give the investigation interests beyond the central puzzle.
Good to know
The young sleuth lives among adult troubles. Alongside the murder, expect cruel sibling teasing, confinement, chemical retaliation and a family still marked by her mother’s death.
A few distinguishing details
- An eleven-year-old poison enthusiast investigates
- A country-house murder in 1950
- Scientific precision applied to sibling revenge
More funny amateur sleuth
Sources & further reading
- Apple Books audiobook
Book information
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- Kirkus review
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