I Am Half-Sick of Shadows

by Alan Bradley

Flavia de Luce (4)

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"Colonel de Luce, in desperate need of funds, rents his beloved estate of Buckshaw over to a film company. They will be shooting a movie over the Christmas holidays, filming scenes in the stately manse with a famous and reclusive star. She is widely despised, so it is to no one's surprise when she turns up murdered, strangled by a length of film from her own movies! With the snow raging outside and Buckshaw locked in, the house is full of suspects. But Flavia de Luce is more than ready to show more solve the wintry country-house murder. She'll have to be quick-witted, though, to negotiate the volatile chemicals of a cast and crew starting to crack--and locked in a house with a murderer!"-- show less

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ErisofDiscord A heroine with a very similar temperament to Flavia; Enola Holmes solves mysteries and finds missing persons, all while evading her very capable brother: Sherlock Holmes.
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BookshelfMonstrosity I Am Half-Sick of Shadows and A Fatal Grace are cozy mysteries set in small towns. In each, the victim is disliked by many; thus, many have motives to kill. It is up to the ingenious protagonists to solve the crime.

Member Reviews

182 reviews
Oh, how I adore this series. It's full of small village charm, with a dash of poison and murder--and all through the eyes of a precocious 11-year-old. It says a great deal about Flavia's depth of personality that she has such a fixation on death and the biology of toxins, yet at her age she still fervently believes in Father Christmas. Her plans to snare Santa are complicated by the arrival of movie stars with their entourage, as they have rented the estate for some holiday filming.

In other mystery books, it would be quite irksome that no one dies until 1/3 of the way through. Here, every character is so enjoyable and fascinating, that there's no rush for the corpse. It will arrive in time. I have the utmost faith in Bradley's plots. show more The ending of this one had a particular smash-bang as well. Flavia's sisters are so wretched towards her, and there's some lovely development in their relationships.

These are the ultimate cozy mysteries. The book ends and I feel sad and empty. It's like eating potato chips, and you reach the bottom of the bag. Fortunately, I won an early release copy of the next book (yippee!) so I can read on.
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My fourth visit to Flavia De Luce found her posh but impoverished family preparing for Christmas by allowing their home to be used to film a movie, starring two of Britain's brightest acting stars.

As this is a Flavia De Luce novel, it's clear that Flavia will discover at least one dead body without having to leave her isolated little village. As it's a Christmas special, it's also clear that the plot will be as plausible as "Miracle on 34th Street". As it's an Alan Bradley novel, it's clear the writing and the characterisation will ferry your imagination into a world that feels true even if it doesn't always seem real.

In this visit I got a spectacular winter snowstorm, an insight into Aunt Felicity's murky wartime activities, a scene show more from Romeo and Juliet performed in Buckshaw's shabby splendour, a gruesome murder and rooftop fight to the death as well as learning about the chemistry of fireworks and more ways of producing poisons at home.

I make these visits in order to meet Flavia, who has captured my heart, In this book her energy is only exceeded by her curiosity as she tries to solve a murder, prove whether or not Santa Claus exists, reak revenge (real and imaginary) on her sisters and garnish scraps of approval and affection from the people she loves.

The reason I visit Flavia is best demonstrated in "I Am Half-sick Of Shadows" by the way she treats Dogger, the manservant at the Flavia's palatial but decaying home. Dogger suffers from fits of the terrors, a legacy from his experiences in a Japanese-run prisoner of war camp. One of these fits overtakes him when he is alone with Flavia. Flavia, eleven-year-old Flavia, eases him out of his attack, banishing his ghosts and giving him his dignity by letting him recover while she looks out at the pre-Christmas snow, reflecting aloud on the billions of oxygen and hydrogen atoms it takes to make the "stiff water" of a snowflake, continuing her monologue until he slips into sleep.

These moments of compassion and companionship fleck the narrative of these books with bright points of poetry that make me wish I knew Flavia and that, if I did, I would be one of the people with the insight to see her for who she really is rather than dismissing her as just another precocious girl.

I know Flavia is a fictional character, but still... fictional characters like her are what make fiction worth reading.
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In banging out this quickie in time for Christmas season marketing, Bradley unwittingly highlights the limits of Flavia as an enduring character rich enough to prop up a long-running series.

A big part of Flavia's charm is the tenuous balance of her precociousness and intellect against her immaturity. But to maintain this, Bradley is starting to turn her into a flat caricature. I do not find her 11-year-old belief in Father Christmas credible, and Flavia, her family, and the residents of Bishop's Lacey are quickly turning into a stock company without the necessary charm to sustain many further episodes. Skip this one.
½
Eleven year old Flavia de Luce is looking forward to Christmas with both excitement and a bit of apprehension. Not only is her beloved home Buckshaw about to be taken over by a film crew for the duration of the holidays putting a hold on de Luce Christmas traditions, but she has also devised (in her opinion) a fiendishly clever plan to finally prove the existence of Father Christmas by trapping him in the chimney with a chemical concoction fashioned in her own private laboratory.

When the film crew arrives, it brings with it one of England’s most legendary stars of the silver screen, Phyllis Wyvern, and a host of other unconventional characters including a beleaguered assistant, a diminutive director, and most unexpectedly, an old show more friend of Flavia’s from one of her recent investigations.

In response to a request by the vicar, the renowned actress and her costar agree to perform the balcony scene of “Romeo and Juliet” as part of a benefit for the church’s dilapidated roof. With the church out of commission for various reasons, the performance is moved to Buckshaw, and after a terrific snow storm leaves the roads impassable, half the village of Bishop’s Lacy ends up trapped at the de Luce family estate two days before Christmas.

With Flavia’s tendency to discover corpses, it should come as no surprise when a fresh one turns up in the middle of the night strangled with a strip of film, and there’s certainly no shortage of suspects for Flavia to investigate with the entire film crew and half the village on hand. Using her inside knowledge of Buckshaw and all her ingenuity, Flavia is determined to assist her friend Inspector Hewitt in his inquiry, even if he thinks he doesn’t need her help.

And of course, she must do all of this while planning her capture of Father Christmas, navigating the tricky relationship with her older sisters, Ophelia and Daphne, and keeping an eye on (and a hand in) all the other goings on in the crowded house.

As a take on the traditional English country house murder, “I am Half-Sick of Shadows” is another delightful entry in the Flavia de Luce series. A mix between Kay Thompson’s Eloise and Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, the precocious young detective is just as entertaining and resourceful here as she has been in previous entries. It’s not at all necessary to have read the previous titles, “The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie,” “The Weed the Strings the Hangman’s Bag,” and “A Red Herring without Mustard” to enjoy this holiday tale of mystery and murder, but each one of Flavia’s previous adventures are sure to charm and entertain.
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Better than the previous one, this was full of twists and turns, yet always plausible and engaging.

But best of all, I am hugely impressed with Bradley's skill: his brilliant (often hilarious!) use of metaphor and simile, his style, the laugh out loud humor, and the suspense. I am intrigued by the ongoing mysteries within the family dynamic itself, too, that are slowly being disclosed over the course of the series.

I have enjoyed countless "cozies" but these are really wonderfully crafted, far above most of the cutesy, gimmicky stuff that floods the market.

Intelligent, droll, and never cliched, they are a little heady, so I don't want to gobble them down one after another. But I am definitely looking forward to the next one.
I've enjoyed getting to know budding chemist Flavia de Luce in Alan Bradley's series of mysteries set in 1950s England. This is the best book yet in the series. The de Luce family's financial worries continue. In order to bring in some needed funds, Flavia's father rents most of the manor for use as a location for a film company. The cast and crew arrive just days before Christmas. Meanwhile, Flavia's older sisters have her doubting Santa's existence, and Flavia is concocting a grand scheme to catch Santa in the act. The murder of the film's unlikeable star threatens to halt both the filming and Christmas.

Bradley captures just the right blend of humor, nostalgia, and pathos. It's apparent that Flavia, her father, and her sisters, are show more still grieving the loss of Harriet, their mother/wife. They're so focused on what they've lost that they fail to appreciate what they have left. Flavia has matured just a bit over the course of the series, and she's beginning to realize that others in her family, and particularly her father, are just as lonely as she is. I think Flavia's daydreams may be contagious. I find myself dreaming that Harriet, presumed dead for 10 years, will suddenly reappear like Doris Day in Move Over, Darling. Meanwhile, I'll keep reading the series to see what new challenges Flavia will tackle.

This review is based on an advance readers copy provided by the publisher through LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program.
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This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.
I really like it when writers take on a classic mystery setting and make it their own. In this outing Alan Bradley has given us a classic English manor house mystery. Of course the manor house is Buckshaw, home of the de Luces, and the sleuth is Flavia herself.

It is close to Christmas and the de Luce finances are at an all-time low. In an effort to keep hold of Buckshaw Flavia's father has decided to allow a film company to use it as a setting. In fact the whole company is going to be housed in Buckshaw including the leading lady, Phyllis Wyvern. The whole village of Bishop's Lacey is agog at having such a star in their midst. The vicar sees an opportunity to raise some funds for the church roof so he asks Miss Wyvern if she would do a show more short scene. She agrees to do the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet with her co-star and tickets are snapped up. Unfortunately it has been cold and snowing for days and the town hall can't be used. Mr. de Luce offers up Buckshaw as the hall and so almost everyone in the village traipses out to Buckshaw. Unfortunately everyone gets snowed in and then the murder happens. Of course, it has to be someone in the house. Flavia sets out to find out who was the perpetrator while also setting a trap for Father Christmas and organizing a fireworks show for Christmas Eve.

Flavia's chemistry abilities know no bounds. She can whip up fireworks and a tanglefoot adhesive that Father Christmas will never be able to extricate himself from. She knows all the toxins from every plant. She can even whip up a decent cup of tea in her lab. She also has astute deductive abilities; since she is stuck at Buckshaw it is lucky that the library has an extensive assortment of books.

This was a quick but delightful read. Recommended to any mystery lovers.
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ThingScore 100
The novel opens with Flavia skating past paintings of her long-dead relatives in Buckshaw’s portrait gallery. The east wing of her sprawling, ancestral home is unheated, she reminds us, so it was no trouble to flood the room and create her own private arena. As she skates she daydreams about a photographer stumbling upon her and snapping her photo, landing her in a famous magazine and show more simultaneously making her older sisters jealous and her widower father proud. The dream is burst, however, by the very real cold of her bedroom. Flavia, of course, is dreaming, and with that Bradley launches us into life at Buckshaw a few days before Christmas.

Like most 11-year-old girls, Flavia is teetering on the question of Father Christmas. Her older sisters, Daphne and Ophelia, have horridly told her there’s no such person, but Flavia can’t quite believe it. So, to prove her sisters wrong she has devised a plan to catch the jolly old elf. Being the chemical whiz that she is, Flavia eschews amateur tricks such as nets and instead decides to brew a batch of birdlime, an extra-sticky glue used to hunt songbirds. Her preparations are interrupted, however, by the arrival of a film crew.

Bradley’s novels are, ostensibly, mysteries. Certainly, each one builds up to a murder, allowing Flavia to insert herself into the investigation so she can, with Miss Marple-esque skills, solve the case either before or at just the same moment as the police. Usually, her investigations involve sly interviews with villagers and many trips on Gladys, her bicycle. This time around, though, the murder is at Buckshaw and much of her sleuthing can be done by snooping through guest bedrooms and strategically overhearing conversations.

Despite the murder and subsequent investigation, Shadows is more about the de Luce family than anything else. It’s Christmas, after all, and along with the holiday’s religious implications are its familial ones. The de Luce family is an uncomfortable one, though, and filled with more than its share of secrets and things left unsaid. As Bradley’s series progresses, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the real plot revolves around Flavia’s simultaneous desire to understand more about the de Luces and nervousness about what she might learn.

Certainly Flavia can solve a murder, but matters of love and relationships continue to puzzle her and engage us, giving Bradley’s novels a much more emotional edge than your average drawing room mystery.
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Angela Hickman, The National Post
Dec 23, 2011
added by VivienneR
I Am Half-Sick of Shadows is a delicious, lighthearted holiday read best served by a crackling fireplace with warm eggnog – but please, hold the noxious compounds.
dragana kovacevic, The Globe and Mail
Dec 7, 2011
added by lkernagh
This is a delightful read through and through. We find in Flavia an incorrigible and wholly lovable detective; from her chemical experiments in her sanctum sanctorum to her outrage at the idiocy of the adult world, she is unequaled. Charming as a stand-alone novel and a guaranteed smash with series followers.
Amy Nolan, Library Journal
Oct 15, 2011
added by Christa_Josh

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Author Information

Picture of author.
21 Works 27,953 Members

Some Editions

Aldred, Sophie (Narrator)
Bassett, Jeff (Author photo)
Entwistle, Jayne (Narrator)
Geraci, Alfonso (Translator)
Heikinheimo, Maija (Translator)
Hobbing, Diane (Designer)
Jung, Gerald (Übersetzer)
Montgomery, Joe (Cover designer)
Orgaß, Katharina (Übersetzer)
Perini, Ben (Cover artist)

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Common Knowledge

Canonical title
I Am Half-Sick of Shadows
Original title
I Am Half-Sick of Shadows
Alternate titles
Death in Camera
People/Characters
Flavia de Luce; Daphne de Luce; Ophelia de Luce; Haviland de Luce; Felicity de Luce; Arthur Wellesley Dogger (show all 33); Inspector Hewitt; Alf Mullet; Mrs. Mullet; Cynthia Richardson; Denwyn Richardson; Dieter Schrantz; Maximilian Brock; Tom Christie; Gil Crawford; Ned Cropper; Dr. Darby; Desmond Duncan; Detective Sergeant Graves; Bun Keats; Val Lampman; Ben Latshaw; Patrick McNulty; Carl Pendracka; Aurelia Puddock; Lavinia Puddock; Marion Trodd; Phyllis Wyvern; Detective Sergeant Woolmer; Mary Stoker; Bunny Spirling; Tom McGully; Miss Cool
Important places
Bishop's Lacey, England, UK (village); Buckshaw, Bishop's Lacey, England, UK (the de Luces' home)
Important events
Christmas
Dedication
For Shirley
First words
Tendrils of raw fog floated up from the ice like agonized spirits departing their bodies.
Quotations
Feely and Daffy didn't believe in Father Christmas, which, I suppose, is precisely the reason he always brought them such dud gifts: scented soap, generally, and dressing gowns and slipper sets that looked and felt as if they... (show all) had been cut from Turkey carpet.
Father Christmas, they had told me, again and again, was for children.

'He's no more than a cruel hoax perpetrated by parents who wish to shower gifts upon their icky offspring without having to actually touch them,' D... (show all)affy had insisted last year. 'He's a myth. Take my word for it. I am, after all, older than you, and I know about these things.'

Did I believe her? I wasn't sure. When I was able to get away on my own and think about it without tears springing to my eyes, I had applied my rather considerable deductive skills to the problem, and come to the conclusion that my sisters were lying. Someone, after all, had brought the glassware, hadn't they?
...To Father we were, Daffy had once said, a three-headed Hydra, each one of our faces a misty mirror of his past.

Daffy's a romantic, but I knew what she meant: We were fleeting images of Harriet.

Perhaps th... (show all)at was why Father spent his days and nights among his postage stamps: surrounded by thousands of companionable, comforting, unquestioning countenances, not one of which, like those of his daughters, mocked him from morning to night. (chapter 3)
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)"Yaroo!" I shouted, and I didn't give a beetle's bottom who heard me. "Ya-roo!"
Original language*
Inglese
Disambiguation notice
"The title of the fourth Flavia de Luce Mystery has been announced by Random House. It is … “I Am Half-Sick of Shadows”... This title supercedes the previously-announced “Death In Camera”.
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.

Classifications

Genres
Fiction and Literature, Mystery, Historical Fiction, Teen, Young Adult
DDC/MDS
813.6Literature & rhetoricAmerican literature in EnglishAmerican fiction in English2000-
LCC
PR9199.4 .B7324 .I15Language and LiteratureEnglishEnglish LiteratureEnglish literature: Provincial, local, etc.
BISAC

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ISBNs
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