A Whiff of Mystery

Fox Investigates #2

by Adam Frost, Emily Fox (Illustrator)

Solving Crime in Record Time! One knock-out perfume, an underground hideout and a string of bogus bank robberies. From the canals of Venice to the mountains of China, detective Wily Fox is on a mission to sniff out the thief of a precious perfume recipe. But the crafty villain is involved in some stinky business and it's getting right up Wily's nose... Fun and fast-paced detective stories, perfect for fans of Geronimo Stilton and The Dragon Detective Agency.

140 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2015

About the author

"Adam Frost was born in Epping and grew up in Buckhurst Hill, Essex. He attended Buckhurst Hill County High School. He earned a BA in English Literature from the University of Oxford and a PhD from the University of Cambridge. His dissertation was on the short stories of H.H. Munro."

"Adam Frost published his first book Ralph the Magic Rabbit in 2006. It was shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize."

"Frost also designs information graphics for The Guardian and other publications. His graphic with Zhenia Vasiliev, ‘The 39 Stats’, was awarded a Silver Medal in the 2013 Information is Beautiful Awards. Other graphics have focussed on the Gothic novel, entomophagy, and the election of Pope Francis."

~Excerpts from Wikipedia.org - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Fro...

Reviews

[G]

There are many fun and interesting mysteries to read. One of my favorites that I read over the summer is Fox Investigates: A Whiff of Mystery. This book is written by Adam Frost. The book is published by the Stripes Publishing company. One of the themes of this book is “No matter how good the criminal is at changing who he really is, the detective will always find out who he truly is. The theme is developed well throughout the book, the author mainly uses the characters to show the theme. He uses the characters dialogue, actions, and appearances to show the theme. At the end of the story Wily Fox is able to figure out who the criminal is, even though the criminal had many tricks up his sleeves. The theme is carried throughout the story and is finished when Wily Fox figures out who the criminal is.
Wily Fox must use his clues in order to find out who stole the bottle of Utopia, a famous and dangerous perfume. This is made difficult as the criminal changes his appearance many times throughout the story. The criminal first makes himself appear as though he is the Elegant young suitor for princess Parmigiano, ““He sent me flowers every day. Wrote me letters every week. And then two weeks ago, he vanished.”” However this was not enough evidence to connect the crime of the stolen perfume to the one with the missing suitor. Later in the story, Wily asks “ “Did he ever mention Utopia'' Wily asked. The princess frowned. “Yes. He asked if it really existed. I said it was a secret, but that we’d have no secrets once we were married.”” This connects the crimes because both of them are cycled between Utopia. The Elegant young suitor decides to vanish because he didn’t want to wait that long to get his hands on the bottle of Utopia perfume.
Next, the criminal made himself appear as though he is Bianca Badger, a fashion reporter for the Pisan Gazette. “Wily nodded. All the clues pointed to Bianca. It looked like she had tried to get the bottle of Utopia by charming the princess. She’d disguised herself as a handsome stranger, but then the princess had said they’d have to get married and that was the end of that. Bianca had no choice but to steal the recipe from Adolfo instead.” This time again the criminal was making himself appear as someone else. However this also adds to the number of clues that Willy has, this helps Wily discover who the criminal really is at the end of the story.
The final person that the criminal made himself appear as was Rou Red Panda, who owns the biggest fashion and perfume store in China. “ A badger’s tail wasn’t that white or that fluffy. But a red panda’s tail was… Rou Red Panda.” Along the way there Wily had found more clues, “ Wily thought about the black face paint he’d found in Pisa. If Rou had painted her fur black, she’d look a bit like a …badger.” As you can see the criminal uses different techniques to change his appearance. Using the clues from earlier, Wily is able to conclude that Rou Red Panda was probably the criminal. That is until he gets more clues from what happens next in the story. Those clues and the ones before allow him to fully find out who is behind the mystery of the stolen perfume.
At the end of the story Wily figures out who the criminal is, and it turns out to be none of the people that he suspected. The author uses many techniques to show the theme. Throughout the story you can see this theme of “No matter how good the criminal is at hiding himself, the detective will always find out who he is.” I would recommend this book to anyone that is into a quick and funny mystery book to read. One thing that would have made this book much better would be if it was a bit longer. There are only 126 pages. I would love it even more if there were more pages to make the story last longer. This book has many strengths and weaknesses, but some of the strength that it has is the humor and the fun creativity in the book.

[Robert Max Steenkist · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mi hijo lo amó. Se divirtió, le generó intriga, sufrió cuando le pedí que lo dejara para irse a dormir y me pidió que le comprara más de la serie cuando lo acabamos.

[André · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gostei muito deste livro ,porque é muito divertido...
Acho que se lessem o livro teriam a mesma opinião que eu.
Recomendo este livro ao :Rodrigo .

André