Skip to main content

The Detective's Assistant

The Detective’s Assistant
By Kate Hannigan
Little, Brown, and Company, 2015. Fiction.

When eleven-year-old Nell is orphaned, she is sent off to go live with her estranged aunt who is none too pleased to be strapped down with a child while she is busy being the first female detective for the Pinkerton’s National Detective Agency. So that she will not be sent to the Home of the Friendless, Nell comes up ways to be useful to her aunt, including helping with her cases. Along the way she meets interesting people and discovers the true history of the bad blood between her aunt and her father.

Inspired by the real life first female Pinkerton detective Kate Warne, this book gives a glimpse into life in the Eastern United States right before the outbreak of the Civil War. Author notes in the back provide information of the real life characters mentioned. The blend of mystery, adventure, and history will satisfy many readers.

Comments

Ms. Yingling said…
I loved this, and my daughter's name is Nell!

Popular posts from this blog

Dude, That's Rude! (Get Some Manners) by Pamela Espeland & Elizabeth Verdick

If there's one book today's kids need to read, it is Dude, That's Rude! (Get Some Manners) . The authors provide a fun format for teaching etiquette to children. They discuss proper behavior at home, at school, at other people's homes and in public places. The information is completely up-to-date with cellphone manners and netiquette included. Fun, cartoony illustrations are on practically every page giving the book great visual appeal. This book is perfect for boys and girls in the fourth grade or older. WARNING: Bodily functions are discussed.

Faces of the Moon by Bob Crelin

Faces of the Moon by Bob Crelin Illustrated by Leslie Evans Charlesburg; 2009; unpaged Faces of the Moon is a short nonfiction book that describes the different phases of the moon and why the moon appears like it does on certain nights. This book is short and sweet so even the youngest of moon lovers will enjoy it. The layout is simplistic and easy to follow. I don’t know much about the moon so I found it very interesting.

Review: The Factory

The Factory By Catherine Egan New York, NY : Scholastic Inc., 2025. Fiction. 306 pages.  Thirteen-year-old Asher Doyle has been invited to join the Factory, a secretive research facility in the desert which ostensibly extracts renewable energy from the electromagnetic fields of its young recruits. But Asher soon realizes something sinister is going on. Kids are getting sick. The adults who run the Factory seem to be keeping secrets. And the extraction process is not only painful and exhausting, but existentially troubling. Asher makes a handful of new friends who help him with an investigation that turns into a resistance, which turns into...a cliffhanger! The Factory is a page-turning sci-fi with multidimensional characters, an intriguing plot, and refreshingly straight-forward writing. Egan weaves in detail about climate crises and social unrest, making the story's dystopian setting feel rich and plausible. With its sophisticated themes and accessible storytelling, I would recomm...