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Thursday, June 8, 2017

I Am Half-Sick of Shadows by Alan Bradley

I Am Half-Sick of Shadows (Flavia de Luce, #4)I Am Half-Sick of Shadows by Alan Bradley
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Flavia marathon continues! Now I'm on an extended road trip with my family, and since I am in the drivers seat most of the time, I'm get to choose the book and so we are making some good progress on Flavia.

This book continues the subplots started in the last book regarding the death of Harriet and the financial woes of the family, all in the context of the post war rebuilding era. The best thing about this book isn't the sleuthing, but rather the emotional growth of our relationship with the de Luce family, which we needed if this was to be a series. We needed to understand their complex interactions better, ironically so we could be mystified by them at the same time. We needed to know that the sisters really do love each other, to be properly confounded when they mistreat each other for obtuse reasons. We need to see Colonel de Luce's love for his youngest daughter, and for his beloved wife, so he doesn't fade into the background of this story like an uncaring stamp-collecting stump. Bradley steps up to the plate and does all of this and more in this book, earning it an extra star. I'm looking forward to the next book more for the overarching emotional tension than I am to hear another whodunit, although, that is a necessary part of a mystery.


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