Synopsis: Steady yourself for a spooky mansion, high seas, low cunning and more excitement than is probably good for you…

Review: Alexandra Morningside lives with her uncle above his doorknob shop and attends the prestigious Wigpowder-Steele Academy. When new teacher Mr Underwood arrives, they hit off immediately and he soon becomes a Family Friend. But when the doorknob shop is ransacked and Mr Underwood vanishes, Alex is left alone. Determined to find both her teacher and the legendary Wigpowder Treasure, Alex fearlessly cycles off on Mr Underwood’s abandoned bicycle to solve the mysteries and find answers to her questions. But with the Daughters of the Founding Fathers’ Preservation Society hot on her trail, who can Alex trust? From a train to nowhere to the HMS Valiant, the Duke of Elbow pub to the On the Edge Hotel, some will help and some will hinder Alex in her quest. And certainly no-one would have thought a refrigerator could be so obliging…

 This is a delightfully entertaining and fast moving story, totalling 387 pages in all, so perhaps a little challenging for less confident readers. Alex’s adventures are so zany and the characters she meets so realistic, yet fantastic, it put me in mind of both Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and the Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. A caution is printed on the cover – “Contains Plots, Daring and Extreme Peril.” It certainly does – a real page turner with laughs and amusing asides throughout.

2007-10-04