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The Kid Detective (2020)
The Kid Detective (2020)
2020 | Comedy, Mystery
5
5.5 (2 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Did you ever wonder what happened to Encyclopedia Brown after puberty? This film tries to explain one path his life could have taken. Abe Applebaum still runs a detective agency out of an office set up for him when his treehouse office was vandalized. His life fell apart when his friend and secretary went missing, and the town did not use his skills to solve the crime. He turned to drugs and alcohol and has no concept of time. His parents still bankroll his detecting career, but are about to cut him off. Now, a teenage girl wants to hire him to solve the murder of his boyfriend even though he has never worked an actual crime before. Can Abe return to the top of his game after years of sleazy private investigating private lives?
  
Naming the Bones
Naming the Bones
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Louise Welsh knows how to intrigue her readers and, like any good mystery writer, gives them enough twists and turns to keep them interested to the last page. But instead of using a professional (like investigator or detective) to get to the bottom of this story, she puts the research in the hands of a Professor of Literature on sabbatical, trying to write the story of his favourite poet's brief life for a book. Using this as the basis of the story, the people in his life also get tangled into the strange circumstances of the poet's life and death. For people like myself, who don't care much for the mystery genre, Welsh proves once again that you don't need to be a fan to enjoy her works.
  
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The Mistletoe Murder and Other Stories
P.D. James | 2017 | Fiction & Poetry
8
8.0 (2 Ratings)
Book Rating
It's getting a bit late to post these festive reviews so I'll keep it short. It's only a short book, anyway.

This book contains four short stories, all crime/detective tales, starting with The Mistltoe Murder. My personal favourite was the final story, The Twelve Clues of Christmas. Every story was great, though, and A Very Commonplace Murder was particularly surprising.

James manages to include a fantastic little hint/twist at the end of the stories, changing your whole perception on what you've just read. This made the crimes so much more interesting and real. They were relatively simple crimes - stabbings, poisoning - but there's always a lot more going on under the surface than you'd expect.

A fantastic little collection, with a foreword by Val McDermid too. 4 stars.