Published By: Puffin
Pages: 464
Released On: 12/10/2023
Reading Age: 8-13
March 1941. Britain is at war, and a secret agency called the Ministry of Unladylike Activity is training up children as spies – because grown-ups always underestimate them. Enter May, Eric and Nuala: courageous, smart, and the Ministry’s newest recruits.
May’s big sister Hazel has arranged for them to stay on a quiet street close to the Ministry, home to an unlikely collection of people thrown together by the war. And it is in the basement of the bombed-out house at the end of that street that they discover something mysterious. Something that was not there when the Blitz wreckage was first combed through. Something that has been placed there recently. A body…
Could this be the missing Ministry spy that Daisy Wells is on a dangerous mission in France to find? Or could it be someone else – someone a resident of the street wanted silenced . . . ?
*****
Thanks to NetGalley and Puffin for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.
I had bought the first book of this series ages ago and just hadn’t got round to reading it. I started it a few days ago, reading a few pages here and there, and then I saw that the second one was up for review. So I zoomed through it ready for this one. Which meant the two books felt like just one big story.
As with all kids books, I’m considerably older than the target audience, but at over 450 pages long, there’s plenty for adults to get their teeth into.
I hadn’t heard of Robin Stevens before and so therefore hadn’t read any of her books before, but she’s opened my eyes on how to write such a detailed and complex story but still make it fun and entertaining for children to read.
Yes I know it’s a fictional book just for entertainment purposes. But by writing a book aimed at kids about the war, we ensure that it is not forgotten. With each generation, the memories fade, and we run the risk of forgetting altogether. So yes it is a piece of kiddy fun, but it carries an important message.
I know the ‘detectives’ are children, but there is an element of Agatha Christie about it, a bit Miss Marple, which was a nice touch.
I am sorry but I really don’t like the character of May. She is well written, and I know it’s part of her characterisation, which I suppose means Robin has done a good job here, and I know she’s only meant to be 11 but she is so annoying. So self-centered and rude and uppity. I wasn’t a fan in the first book and I’m still not. I really liked Eric. He is such a sweet character and I’m glad he gets more of a role in this book. Nuala…she grew on me. By the end of the first book, I liked her. And I think she improves in this sequel. There are other characters, adults mainly, but for once it is the children that are front and centre, they run the show and they’re important, the adults are just there prop the story.
What I will say is that you know they are children. Yes they’re the key players and they’re obviously trying to do an adult’s job, but they’re obviously kids. Robin hasn’t been afraid of showing their youth and naivety and inexperience. Yes they make mistakes, they’re innocent, they’re rough around the edges. She hasn’t made them grow up too much and compete with the adults. They provide their own merits away from the adults.
I suppose you could read this one without the first, as it does quickly explain what happened by the end of the first chapter or so, but I don’t think you’d get the same impact. I found the first one just a little slow to start with, but this one gets stuck in straight away. It has more about the actual ministry and what they do, and I really enjoyed that.
I do feel at times she has been a bit try hard, trying to shoehorn a number of topics that end up overshadowing the main story. I can’t fully explain it, but I hope that if you read this you’ll know what I mean. I felt my focus should have been more on the crimes, rather than what was happening in the background, which was a little bit of a shame.
I know it is a kids book, but I’ve read many kids books as an adult that really thrilled me. If I’m being brutally honest, I did enjoy this, I really did, it was interesting, but it doesn’t have a whole lot of depth to it. It’s very much a “telling the reader” what is happening rather than showing, but maybe that’s what children want from their books.
Having said all of that, I say this is a well written book, much like the first, and is enjoyable and thoughtful and adventurous, with just a few things (I personally think) that need to be ironed out.
Books By Your Bedside 