The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (Flavia de Luce, #1) in Pick-a-Shelf

Oct 08, 2009 Misty rated it it was amazing

Shelves: read-in-2010, cover-appeal, own, quirky, international-multicultural, horror-mystery-suspense-thriller, excited-for

Flavia de Luce is not your average eleven year old. She lives in a decaying mansion. She has a passion for chemistry, especially poisons. And when she finds a man dying in her cucumber patch, it doesn't occur to her to be worried or scared. Instead, Flavia senses something delicious may come of it: adventure.
Thus Flavia sets out to find out just who the man is, and how he came to be dying in her cucumber patch. But what starts off as a fun, mysterious way to spend the summer of 1950 turns into s Flavia de Luce is not your average eleven year old. She lives in a decaying mansion. She has a passion for chemistry, especially poisons. And when she finds a man dying in her cucumber patch, it doesn't occur to her to be worried or scared. Instead, Flavia senses something delicious may come of it: adventure.
Thus Flavia sets out to find out just who the man is, and how he came to be dying in her cucumber patch. But what starts off as a fun, mysterious way to spend the summer of 1950 turns into something much more when Flavia's father is arrested for the crime -- and she must prove his innocence before it's too late.

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie is slightly out of the norm for me in that I tend to avoid mysteries. I figure them out too soon, so they bore me and come off as cheesy. But I'd heard good things about this one, I was completely caught by the title and, yes, the cover (you know me), and precocious Flavia sounded interesting. So not only did I decide to give it a try, but I even went ahead and bought it. I do not regret this impetuous decision.

Flavia is delightful in her little-genius antics, and though her precociousness is occasionally somewhat irritating (as with all precociousness), she remains consistently entertaining. She's bold and bright and adventurous, and like many a genius, slightly off. She occasionally reminded me of Merricat Blackwood from We Have Always Lived in the Castle, whom, if you remember, I found captivating, even if she was a loon. Flavia isn't a loon, but her obsession with poisons does make her narration slightly suspect on occasion, which adds an interesting element.

The tone throughout the book is fun and intriguing. It's like some weird love-child of We Have Always Lived in the Castle + nostalgic/atmospheric/eccentric/British coming of age lit (think I Capture the Castle) + a cozy mystery. That's some parentage, and it makes for interesting offspring. The characters are fun and quirky, and this extends beyond Flavia, though she certainly takes the cake in this regard.

And even for me, who always figures things out and then gets disgusted -- even for me the mystery was fun. It's the sort that, even if you figure it out, there's still enough suspense, still enough tension, still enough interest to keep me going. You want to know how it's going to work out; more specifically, you want to know how Flavia's going to wriggle out of this one and come out on top, because she's that type of character; you just know she will.

I think, whether you like mysteries or you typically avoid them like me, you'll like Sweetness, and you'll intend to continue on with the series, The Buckshaw Chronicles -- you just have to know what Flavia's going to get herself into next!

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Mar 13, 2010 Luann rated it really liked it

Shelves: mystery, historical-fiction, 2010, adult, gr-author

I wanted to love this! I loved the title, the cover, the first line, the main character who is a precocious 11-year-old named Flavia, and the beginning which features a mysterious dead jack snipe on the doorstep with a stamp impaled on its bill and then soon after a dead body in the cucumber patch. I loved Flavia's obsession with chemistry and poisons and how that knowledge was embedded throughout the story. I loved a lot about this book, but somewhere around a hundred pages before the end it st ...more

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Apr 26, 2010 Joanie rated it really liked it

Shelves: own, bookclub, south-shore-readers

I'm not usually a fan of mysteries but the narrator of this book, 11 year old Flavia de Luce, made this entertaining. Flavia is bright and precocious and obsessed with chemistry (most specifically poison.) When a dead bird is found on her family's step and then a dead body in their garden Flavia sets out to solve the mystery.

I can't say that I cared so much about who was the murderer but Flavia herself kept me reading. I especially loved when she seeks revenge on her older sister by melting do ...more

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May 30, 2010 Mita rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: crime-and-mystery, read-in-2010

I enjoyed it, though a little hard to start in the beginning. It's well-researched but that's as far as it went because the book didn't quite manage to capture the Englishness nor the 50's feel it supposed to. ...more

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Aug 05, 2011 Lorna rated it really liked it

Shelves: yrca, fiction-historical, mysteries

I enjoyed the book. My favorite part of course, is the character, Flavia, and the funny descriptions.

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Nov 05, 2009 Julianne rated it liked it

Had a hard time not putting this one down. Fine enough story. Not sure how Bradley's going to turn this one into a series. Great job creating a solid female character. ...more

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