The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches: A Flavia de Luce Novel by Alan Bradley

Flavia is an odd little girl.  She's 12, never knew her mother, and she loves chemistry.  She also prefers to be alone in her "den of chemistry".  She has older sisters but she's not close to them.  She's content in her life.  But now they are bringing her missing mother home and things are about to change...

Delacorte Press and Net Galley allowed me to download a copy of the ebook for review (thank you).  It will be published January 14th, so check with your local bookstore for a copy.

The whole story is based around her mother's arrival home and the mourning at their house before burial.  She died in snow and ice and her body has been transported in dry ice.  Bringing her body home brings a lot of other people around and one of them is a killer.

Flavia's chemical knowledge is daunting.  She figures out how to process old film, which she found in the attic.  On that film, she sees her mother alive and well.  It's eerie and she's amazed at how much they look alike.  For a while she contemplates trying to raise her mother to life with her chemical knowledge, but circumstances prevent that (thank goodness).  

Flavia marches along to a drummer only she hears and manages to find her mother's will, learn family secrets and to unmask the killer.  It appears she may be growing up to be just like her mother.

The story is relatively fast paced despite the funeral mourning and there are many plot strings to be tied together to figure out the plot.  Young readers should enjoy reading about this unusual and irrepressible character.  She's a holly terror on a mission!

Happy reading.