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Mickey Sharp #2
Sharp Shot
Mikey Sharp is a private eye for teenagers. He figures that if adults have all these problems then teenagers must have them too. Loads of them. With a number of cases solved he's feeling pretty confident. Until the manager of The Amazons football team employs him to find their missing trophy. She's very demanding, and she's also drop-dead gorgeous. Getting the right result on this case is going to call for all Mickey's expertise.
Paperback
Published July 8, 2009
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About the author
Dominic Barker
32 books15 followersDominic Barker was born in Southport in 1966. He graduated from the University of Birmingham with a degree in English and then spent two years as part of a comedy double act before deciding to become a teacher. He currently lives in Barcelona.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
May 14, 2024
I read the first book in the series a year or two ago, by randomly selecting it from a shelf at the library (rather, it was the first interesting book I came across on the 11+ shelf). It turned out to be the best book that I borrowed that day, so I was interested in reading more.
This is the second book of four. Again, the story is told by 14-year-old Mickey Sharp, who works out of his garden shed as a private detective. He's an amusing narrator, with enough sarcastic asides about school and adults to feel authentic. I'm certain I would have enjoyed these books when I was a kid.
However, it is very short and I feel there could be a lot more depth considering it isn't aimed at that young an audience. Mickey references the fact that his dad is unemployed and as a result has anger issues and does seem to unfairly pick on Mickey, but this never actually goes anywhere, it's just background flavour. And then there are a couple references to Mickey's sister being bulimic, but our narrator himself doesn't notice. It feels very odd that this goes nowhere at all.
Meanwhile, he gets in a lot of trouble in this book, getting and skipping multiple detentions and even gets arrested at one point. It just feels like there would be a lot of fallout from this stuff, but it is mostly either played for laughs or glossed over because it isn't relevant to the case.
As for the case, Mickey is actually a pretty poor detective. Granted, he does put the foot work in, but he really does feel very much like a child playing at detectives rather than having an aptitude for it. I used to play at being a detective when I was a kid, and I would have been this useless. But he is actually charging people money for his services. In this book, he fails to discover a clue at the crime scene, having it handed to him by someone else, then runs around in circles for the majority of the word count, before solving what is going on but not actually cracking the case, giving up and only when it is technically too late and he is just dossing about feeling sorry for himself does the answer flash upon him. It's quite disappointing. He also has a second case in this book which he completely forgets to investigate. Also there is a random'car chase' scene put in for a weird joke, but kind of out of place with the tone of the rest of the book. It's not exactly frustrating to read, but it could have been more dynamic and it might be nice if Mickey was actually any good at his job.
So, a funny, diverting read, but lacks any depth. I just think it could do with some other emotional tones in there sometimes.
This is the second book of four. Again, the story is told by 14-year-old Mickey Sharp, who works out of his garden shed as a private detective. He's an amusing narrator, with enough sarcastic asides about school and adults to feel authentic. I'm certain I would have enjoyed these books when I was a kid.
However, it is very short and I feel there could be a lot more depth considering it isn't aimed at that young an audience. Mickey references the fact that his dad is unemployed and as a result has anger issues and does seem to unfairly pick on Mickey, but this never actually goes anywhere, it's just background flavour. And then there are a couple references to Mickey's sister being bulimic, but our narrator himself doesn't notice. It feels very odd that this goes nowhere at all.
Meanwhile, he gets in a lot of trouble in this book, getting and skipping multiple detentions and even gets arrested at one point. It just feels like there would be a lot of fallout from this stuff, but it is mostly either played for laughs or glossed over because it isn't relevant to the case.
As for the case, Mickey is actually a pretty poor detective. Granted, he does put the foot work in, but he really does feel very much like a child playing at detectives rather than having an aptitude for it. I used to play at being a detective when I was a kid, and I would have been this useless. But he is actually charging people money for his services. In this book, he fails to discover a clue at the crime scene, having it handed to him by someone else, then runs around in circles for the majority of the word count, before solving what is going on but not actually cracking the case, giving up and only when it is technically too late and he is just dossing about feeling sorry for himself does the answer flash upon him. It's quite disappointing. He also has a second case in this book which he completely forgets to investigate. Also there is a random'car chase' scene put in for a weird joke, but kind of out of place with the tone of the rest of the book. It's not exactly frustrating to read, but it could have been more dynamic and it might be nice if Mickey was actually any good at his job.
So, a funny, diverting read, but lacks any depth. I just think it could do with some other emotional tones in there sometimes.
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