2022 ONTD Reading Challenge discussion

A discussion post for those of us who are following Felicia Day's rec and reading The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, by Alan Bradley!

It is the summer of 1950–and at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, young Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison, is intrigued by a series of inexplicable events: A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. Then, hours later, Flavia finds a man lying in the cucumber patch and watches him as he takes his dying breath.

For Flavia, who is both appalled and delighted, life begins in earnest when murder comes to Buckshaw. “I wish I could say I was afraid, but I wasn’t. Quite the contrary. This was by far the most interesting thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life.”

Yay! I hope it's a fun read, I'm in need of something fun!

I'm at 33%... is it just me or is Flavia a little sociopathic? like damn sis... The stuff she does to her sisters is so extra...

Her narrative voice reminds me of Merricat from We Have Always Lived in the Castle, by Shirley Jackson.

I finished it! Joanie (joaniemaloney on ONTD) told me that she thought the book had kind of a Pushing Daisies vibe, I think she's spot on.

I wasn't a fan of Flavia, though. I dislike precocious children, and she was a bit scary at times. If I was the police involved the case, I'd probably hate her. She disrupted crime scenes, removed and destroyed evidence, and generally made the case a lot harder for them to solve and later bring to trial. She got very lucky in the end.

I've started but found it a struggle to get back to reading it. For some reason I thought this book was set in the American south and I was very wrong. She's also just a little too precocious for me.

Anyone else struggling or have more praise to help motivate? :)

It does have a bit of a lull after the beginning, but it picks up again in the second half, Sasha

This was a DNF for me. Flavia was too much of an adult for me and I didn't care enough about any of the other characters or the plot to commit.

I finished it, but only because I went the audiobook route for the car on my 1.5h daily commute.

Flavia was definitely far too precocious. The parts that most interested me were when her dad is talking about his school days and the Ulster Avengers.