Another Teen Girl Sleuth--Sherlock's Little Sister: The Enola Holmes Mysteries by Nancy Springer

Nancy Springer, author of the previously reviewed and admirable Rowan Hood series about the adventures of Robin Hood's daughter, has embarked on a new series about a famous fictional character's relative, the Enola Holmes Mysteries. For Springer, a two-time Edgar Award winner, the sister of Sherlock Holmes is a natural subject, a Victorian girl endowed with a drive for intellectual and personal independence who shares her famous brother's powers of observation and reason.

Enola, by her very name, which spelled backward is "alone," is no stranger to her mother's penchant for ciphers and hidden meanings, especially of the botanical sort, but when her mother suddenly disappears on her fourteenth birthday, Enola feels that the birthday gifts left behind for her contain the secret of her mother's whereabouts. Her much-older brothers, Mycroft and Sherlock Holmes, are, however, clueless about the disappearance until an audit of the manor's accounts shows that their mother has been embezzling funds for years, enough to provide herself with considerable "mad money" far from the restraints of Victorian widowhood.

For Enola the brothers have a safe plan for their little-known young sister--into some good stout corsetry with her and off to a reputable boarding school where she can become a proper young lady suitable for a propitious marriage as soon as possible. Enola deciphers enough of her mother's cryptic gifts to locate a goodly sum of money left behind for her and takes it on the lam as soon as she is out of her brothers' sight.

Traveling by bicycle and railway and disguised in widow's weeds, Enola conceals her money and changes of clothing inside the "bust enhancers," "hip regulators," and "dress improvers" built into Victoria female garb. Almost by accident, Enola becomes involved in the search for a kidnapped twelve-year-old marquess, presumably abducted from his estate, and in a string of chases, narrow escapes, and near death experiences at the hands of several Dickensian villains, Enola keeps the action going as she puts together the clues to the identify of the mendacious kidnappers and, incidentally, the way to trace her mother's path to personal freedom. Escaping the Victorian trap to which her brothers' good intentions will lead, Enola disguises herself again and sets herself up in business as the go-between for her alter ego, Leslie T. Ragostin, Scientific Perditorian, finder of lost objects and lost persons.

Enola Holmes' engaging adventures continue in The Case of the Left-Handed Lady and the forthcoming (January 31, 2008) The Case of the Bizarre Bouquets. With an engaging teen girl sleuth in the best tradition of Nancy Drew, et al, a fresh historical setting, and the proper literary lineage, this series looks like more than a bit of all right.

Reconciled: The Case of the Gypsy Good-bye (An Enola Holmes Mystery) by Nancy Springer

Stuffing the skytale into my bosom, "I shall send word!" I called over my shoulder as I darted out of the house and ran for all I was worth, hearing Sherlock's footfalls coming in behind me--but in the instant I reached the street, I whistled shrilly in a most unfeminine manner and a passing cab pulled up short. I leapt in and signalled the cabbie to drive on. I sat in full view of my brother as I drove away. I looked over my shoulder to see him about twenty feet behind me, breathing hard and looking fulminous.

He would be after me directly. I needed a hiding place--but also I urgently needed to reach the East End. Desperately I needed to disguise myself as I had never disguised myself before.

What's better for summertime reading that a good mystery, and Nancy Springer's latest installment in the Enola Holmes Mysteries, The Case of the Gypsy Goodbye: An Enola Holmes Mystery (Philomel, 2010) is a rip-roaring doozy of a detective tale. Enola Holmes, the runaway fourteen-year-old sister of Sherlock and Mycroft, finds herself dodging both seamy London criminals, the abductors of a beauteous and fragile noblewoman, and her two older brothers, still bent on nabbing Enola and stashing her away in a proper finishing boarding school for "young ladies." Enola, however, has other plans for her life, and since her mother Eudora abandoned her on her fourteenth birthday, she has lived by her wits in London and built a prosperous reputation herself as an investigator, disguised as the "personal assistant" of her fictional cover employer, Dr. Ragostin, Scientific Perditorian.

But when she takes on the case of the missing Blanchefleur, Duquessa Del Campo, apparently kidnapped as she assisted a beggarly old woman down into the London Underground, Enola finds herself in competition with the famous Sherlock himself, also summoned on the case. Disguised in fine clothes, expensive wig, and a fetching bonnet to begin her interrogation of the Duquessa's ladies-in-waiting, Enola barely avoids a face-to-face encounter with her brilliant brother only through her own quick wits. But when her true identity is revealed by the Holmes family's loyal collie, Reginald, for whom wigs and frippery are no impediment to recognition, Enola has to resort to a quick departure to escape what she considers capture and corseted captivity in that young ladies' academy by the well-meaning Sherlock and Mycroft.

Parallel and interwoven with the investigation of the Duquessa's disappearance, however, is another mystery--one closely involved with the strong theme of female self-realization which runs through the Enola series. Sherlock has another reason for finding Enola, to deliver an envelope addressed to her, inscribed with strange markings and Gypsy hex symbols,. This missive indeed turns out to be a cryptic and poignant message from Enola's mother, revealing to the reader that despite, and perhaps because of her mother's seemingly indifferent parenting, Enola is very much her mother's daughter, able to operate as an independent woman in what is the still repressive society for her gender.

Indeed, as she cooperates with Sherlock in the solving of the De Campo mystery and they share the decoding of the letter from their mother, there is a meeting of minds and a reconciliation between the long-separated Holmes siblings, one that gives some reviewers hope that this series, with its engaging setting in Victorian London's gas-lit cobbled streets, dark sewers, elegant drawing rooms, squalid back-streets, and its brilliant, self-reliant young heroine, will continue with more Sherlockian adventures.

As School Library Journal's reviewer says, "In this brilliantly written emotional tale, children will appreciate Enola's self-discovery on the importance of family and her determination to find her true fate."

And American Library Association's Booklist strongly concurs: "The series that features Enola Holmes, the (much) younger sister of Sherlock, continues to be flat-out among the best mysteries being written for young people today." (Starred Review)

Dash It All! The Case of the Cryptic Crinoline (An Enola Holmes Mystery) by Nancy Springer

CARRIER PIGEON. DELIVER YOUR BIRD-BRAINED MESSAGE AT ONCE OR YOU WILL BE SORRY YOU EVER LEFT SCUTARI.

Still in her deep disguise as Miss Meshle, the supposed clerk of her fictitious alter ego, Dr. Leslie Ragostin, Scientific Perditorian of missing persons, Enola Holmes comes home from her day's work of detecting to find her landlady in a state. Widowed by the Crimean War thirty-six years before, the very deaf and elderly ("She must be over fifty!" Enola remarks to herself) Mrs. Tupper has received a cryptic and threatening note and begs Enola to help her. Enola agrees reluctantly.

Enola is still in hiding from Sherlock and Mycroft Holmes, whose brotherly plans to stash her away at a finishing school, imprisoned in whaleboned corsetry, until safely ensconced in a satisfactory Victorian marriage strike fear in her independent heart. To keep her freedom, she knows she must not make herself noticed by making inquiries among the gentile social circles in which her brothers move, specifically that of the venerable Florence Nightingale, whose intervention saved Mrs. Tupper from sure death in the typhoid-ridden Crimean conflict. But before Enola can choose a strategy, Mrs. Tupper is abducted at knife-point by two men, one a ruffian, one a well-spoken gentleman, and her lowly lodgings ransacked from top to bottom.

Going through the detritus of their search for a clue to their purpose, Enola finds nothing of import, but her eye is caught by an elegant mid-century-styled blue silk gown and its enormous horsehair crinoline, strangely adorned with a hastily basted-on ribbon elaborately embroidered with a series of roses, daisies, and leaves. Soon Enola herself discovers that she is being stalked by a suspicious gentleman whom she nicknames "Classic Profile." Learning that Florence Nightingale is still alive, Enola manages to sneak herself into her bedchamber to discover the connection between Nightingale, presumably "The Bird," and "Carrier Pigeon," apparently Mrs. Tupper. Using the family talent for dissembling, disguise, and observation which she shares with Sherlock, Enola also notices that Nightingale's home is decorated with many examples of elaborate embroidery like that on on the crinoline and by many Victorian silhouettes, one of which is a perfect ringer for her pursuer, "Classic Profile."

Then everything falls into place when an overheard conversation in a stylish women's club and a quick look at Morse Code in their Encyclopaedia Britannica reveals that her transcription of the embroidered design on the crinoline is indeed in code and reveals that Mrs. Tupper was an unwitting go-between intended to transport evidence of a vast military supply fraud to Lord Whimbley, an advisor close to Queen Victoria. Now, many decades later, that coded ribbon is the key to the ruination of the rising political career of the current Lord Rodney Whimbley, and Enola realizes that Whimbley's own brother, the evil Geoffrey, is the would-be blackmailer who is holding the unwitting Mrs. Tupper as hostage.

But just as Enola dons yet another disguise to penetrate the Whimbley townhouse to free Mrs. Tupper, she learns that there is another detective on the case, none other than her brother, Sherlock Holmes, also in deep disguise and simultaneously seeking entrance to the Whimbley house. Now Enola knows she must elude two pursuers--Geoffrey, who is willing to kill both Mrs. Tupper and herself if necessary and her over-protective big brother who wants both to solve the case and resume his patriarchal role as protector and manager of her life.

Nancy Springer's latest in her Enola Holmes Mysteries, The Case of the Cryptic Crinoline is an impossible-to-put-down addition to this marvelously constructed series. The atmosphere is deliciously Sherlockian, with its late Victorian London setting and with a fourteen-year-old girl sleuth who outdoes Nancy Drew in her boldness, intelligence, and chameleon-like daring-do. A not-to-be missed new entry for mystery fans and lovers of fine storytelling alike.

My reviews of earlier books in this delightful series can be seen here.

Gumshoe Wizard: The Wizard of Dark Street by Shaun Thomas Odyssey

"Tell me, Deacon. Why should I be the least bit upset at losing my position as Uncle Alexander's apprentice?"

"Perhaps you should be upset because you've trained for the position since you were eight years old, the youngest apprentice ever. Perhaps because--despite your outright refusal to perform any magic whatsoever--you are the most competent talent to have held the position in over a hundred years. Or perhaps because your uncle is so desperate to find someone to replace you that he placed an advertisement in the New York Times," croaked Deacon.

“But, don’t you see, Deacon?” Oona said. “This is the perfect opportunity for me to start my dream.”

“I take it you are speaking of The Dark Street Detective Agency?”

Two, TWO, TWO genres in one! The first installment of the Oona Crate Mysteries offers middle readers a twofer, a talented, orphaned young wizard a la Harry Potter and a dedicated girl sleuth a la Nancy Drew, all in a quirky setting in a metaland called Dark Street, which exists as a buffer between the contemporary New York City with gates that open briefly at midnight and, separated from Dark Street by a magical truce, the malevolent mischief of the Land of Faerie. Oona is the embodiment of two lines, the wizardly one through her mother, and the craft of detection from her father. But since her one outright practice of magic malfunctioned and resulted in the death of her mother and sister, Oona has forsworn the study and practice of the dark arts.

Now Oona is preparing to sign away her rights as wizard’s apprentice to all comers responding to her uncle’s ad and to begin her career as Oona Crate, Detective. She even has a promising case, the inexplicable disappearance of Madame Iree’s enchanted ball gowns for the upcoming Dark Street Masquerade from her locked workroom as she entertained guests at tea in the next chamber.

But when a motley assortment of would-be apprentices assemble for interviews for her position and Oona signs the document releasing herself from her apprenticeship, her plans and indeed her whole world comes unhinged.

Oona’s uncle, the Wizard of Dark Street, is suddenly struck by a magical dagger which comes out of nowhere, and although the dagger piercing his robe remains, plunged into the floor, her uncle’s body has vanished. Oona knows that one of the applicants for her position must be involved in this black magic, but all are suspect–-a vapid young witch hoping for a change of vocation, a self-aggrandizing and pompous actor down on his luck, even a chubby rich kid seeking a new start away from New York society. Oona knows that without a wizard in Pendulum House to maintain the precarious balance provided by Dark Street’s existence, the evil Faeries will break through the Glass Gate and overwhelm not only Dark Street and its magical citizens but the human world as well. This task calls for both sorcery and sleuthery, and Oona knows that this is the case of a lifetime for her.

Shawn Thomas Odyssey’s The Wizard of Dark Street (An Oona Crate Mystery) (Egmont, 2011) has an engaging young detective whose task is to bring together the separate but powerful talents within her to restore balance to her world and to the human world as well.

There is a plentiful supply of weird and wacky characters--bumbling Dickensian duffoos, avaricious entrepreneurs eager to take advantage of the magic mania, magical manipulators, mean girls, and meddlesome muggles all at hand here, and our twelve-year-old heroine has only her own resources, with the help of her faithful, know-it-all raven, Deacon, master of the Encyclopedia of Arcana, to help her solve the case. Fans of Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events and Nancy Springer's Enola Holmes Mysteries will find this one right down their (Diagon) Alley.

“A wonderfully fresh fantasy-detective story,” says Publishers Weekly.