Flavia de Luce is an 11-year-old girl growing up in the country village of Bishop's Lacey in 1950's England. He mother is deceased, her father is distant, and her two older sisters torture her - the book begins with her tied up and locked in a closet.
One morning she finds a dying man (who turns out to be an old acquaintance of her father's) in the cucumber patch and when her father is arrested her snooping begins in earnest. She uses her skills as an aspiring chemist, her resourcefulness, and her Sherlock Holmes-like talent for deducing to get to the bottom of the mystery.
Flavia is our narrator in this book, and although it's in a child's voice, it is definitely not a child's book. Its a gentle mystery because of the age of the narrator and while it's intense at times, there is no real violence. The child's point of view doesn't always ring true and sometimes it seems like an older voice. And even though she's playing chemist and detective, she's a child first - as evidenced by the poison ivy in the lipstick prank she pulls on her sister. She's overburdened with spunk and you can't help but root for her and her adventures on Gladys (her bicycle.)
The family dynamic in this book is odd and completely dysfunctional, but it seems to work for them. Flavia's mother was a bit of an adventurer and was killed in a mountain climbing accident. Her father, partly from his grief, is a reclusive, eccentric who spends most of his time with his stamp collection. Her sisters Ophelia 'Feely' and Daphne 'Daffy' spend their time primping, reading, and playing piano. The girls are left to themselves a lot - which gives Flavia the freedom to investigate. The sibling rivalry is hilarious.
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