What Time the Sexton's Spade Doth Rust: A Flavia de Luce Novel

by Alan Bradley Narrated by Jayne Entwistle

Overview

NATIONAL BESTSELLER ¿ Amateur sleuth Flavia de Luce, along with her pestilent younger cousin, investigates the murder of a former public hangman and uncovers a secret that brings the greatest shock of her life.

“I love the Flavia de Luce novels! Flavia is the best female detective I've ever read, full of realism, self-confidence, and emotion (in roughly equal parts), and her tales are hilarious, engaging, and occasionally heartbreaking.”-Diana Gabaldon, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Outlander series

A WASHINGTON POST BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR

Flavia de Luce has taken on the mentorship of her odious moon-faced cousin Undine, who has come to live at Buckshaw following the death of her mother. Undine's main talent, aside from cultivating disgusting habits, seems to be raising Flavia's hackles, although in her best moments she shows potential for trespassing, trickery, and other assorted mayhem.

When Major Greyleigh, a local recluse and former hangman, is found dead after a breakfast of poisonous mushrooms, suspicion falls on the de Luce family's longtime cook, Mrs. Mullet. After all, wasn't it she who'd picked the mushrooms, cooked the omelet, and served it to Greyleigh moments before his death? “I have to admit,” says Flavia, an expert in the chemical nature of poisons, “that I'd been praying to God for a jolly good old-fashioned mushroom poisoning. Not that I wanted anyone to die, but why give a girl a gift such as mine without giving her the opportunity to use it?”

But Flavia knows the beloved Mrs. Mullet is innocent. Together with Dogger, estate gardener and partner-in-crime, and the obnoxious Undine, Flavia sets out to find the real killer and clear Mrs. Mullet's good name. Little does she know that following the case's twists and turns will lead her to a most surprising discovery-one with the power to upend her entire life.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

07/15/2024

The enchanting 12th installment of Bradley’s Flavia de Luce series (after The Gold Tresses of the Dead) finds the precocious adolescent sleuth attempting to prove her family cook innocent of murder. Eight years after WWII, England is still suffering privations that have led many—including the de Luces’ trusted cook, Mrs. Mullet—to forage in the forest for food. When former hangman Major Greyleigh is found murdered, the local inspector turns his suspicions to Mullet, who fed Greyleigh an omelet made with foraged mushrooms moments before he died. Flavia, however, knows there must be some misunderstanding, and she rallies to Mullet’s defense with the help of her gardener and her troublesome younger cousin, whose boorish personality is nearly offset by her willingness to help Flavia bend the rules when necessary. Flavia’s investigation sees her teasing out information from the village postmistress, a scrapbooking neighbor, and the church gossip circle. She also tricks her way onto a U.S. Army base, where she confirms her family’s involvement with a shadowy group of assassins and discovers a secret that may break her heart. Flavia’s characteristic quirky humor and unorthodox thinking are on full display, and the ending finds her taking a well-earned step forward in her maturity. This series is as fresh as ever. Agent: Denise Bukowski, Bukowski Agency. (Sept.)

From the Publisher

I love the Flavia de Luce novels! I identify, though I unfortunately didn’t have an Uncle Tarquin and was forced to make do with a Christmas chemistry set from the Sears catalog. Flavia is the best female detective I’ve ever read, full of realism, self-confidence, and emotion (in roughly equal parts), and her tales are hilarious, engaging, and occasionally heartbreaking.”—Diana Gabaldon, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Outlander series

“To say I am overjoyed by the return of the magnificent Flavia is a massive understatement. It is a great day when we have her back in our lives with a new, and riveting, crime to solve. Brava, Flavia. Bravo, Alan!”—Louise Penny

“Cozy mystery fans will love this latest delightful installment featuring Flavia de Luce, Alan Bradley’s plucky and spirited protagonist.”—Nita Prose, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Maid

“Enchanting . . . Flavia’s characteristic quirky humor and unorthodox thinking are on full display. . . . This series is as fresh as ever.”—Publishers Weekly
 
“Rejoice, fans of fiction’s youngest franchise detective: Flavia de Luce is back. . . . Nobody could possibly unite intelligence work, mythological monsters, and village gossip as adroitly as Bradley’s heroine.”—Kirkus Reviews

Louise Penny

To say I am overjoyed by the return of the magnificent Flavia is a massive understatement. It is a great day when we have her back in our lives with a new, and riveting, crime to solve. Brava, Flavia. Bravo, Alan!

#1 New York Times bestselling author of The Maid Nita Prose

Cozy mystery fans will love this latest delightful installment featuring Flavia de Luce, Alan Bradley’s plucky and spirited protagonist.

#1 New York Times bestselling author of the Outlan Diana Gabaldon

I love the Flavia de Luce novels! I identify, though I unfortunately didn’t have an Uncle Tarquin and was forced to make do with a Christmas chemistry set from the Sears catalog. Flavia is the best female detective I’ve ever read, full of realism, self-confidence, and emotion (in roughly equal parts), and her tales are hilarious, engaging, and occasionally heartbreaking.

Library Journal

08/01/2024

After Flavia de Luce's father died, she inherited the family home, Buckshaw, and is now responsible for her obnoxious younger cousin Undine. She's excited to take on a new murder investigation but not at all happy that the chief suspect is Mrs. Mullet, the family's longtime cook. Mrs. Mullet also cleans and cooks breakfast for Major Greyleigh, a neighbor and retired hangman. Greyleigh has been found dead, and the police suspect poisoned mushrooms. Mrs. Mullet picked mushrooms and served them that morning. Flavia's always loyal to the staff, though, and she knows Mrs. Mullet wouldn't kill anyone. Together with Dogger, her partner in Arthur Dogger & Associates, Discreet Enquiries, Flavia listens to gossip and charges around on her trusty bike. The insufferable Undine uncovers too many clues to please Flavia, but it's Flavia herself who discovers shocking secrets about her parents and aunt at the nearby American military base. VERDICT Flavia's fans will rejoice at her return five years after The Golden Tresses of the Dead, but less-devoted readers will be confused by the scattershot methods of the young chemist and amateur sleuth. Primarily for series fans.—Lesa Holstine

SEPTEMBER 2024 - AudioFile

Narrator Jayne Entwistle returns for her 11th performance as Bradley's precocious 14-year-old amateur sleuth, Flavia de Luce. When Buckshaw Mansion's longtime cook, Mrs. Mullet, is suspected of poisoning local recluse and former hangman Major Greyleigh, Flavia and her pesky, young cousin, Undine, are on the case to clear her of murder. Entwistle infuses Flavia with a crisp British accent, an educated manner, and a passion for chemistry in stark contrast to Undine's whiny mannerisms. Mrs. M. charms as a country woman, and Dogger is steady as the ever loyal manservant. Spot-on American soldiers make brief appearances. Entwistle shines in her portrayals of Flavia's shock when she meets the mysterious Asterian, her fear as she dodges a fiery death, and her boldness when confronting Aunt Felicity. S.D.B. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews

2024-07-04
Rejoice, fans of fiction’s youngest franchise detective: Flavia de Luce is back after a five-year hiatus, and she hasn’t aged a bit.

Flavia’s never been more alone. Her beloved father, Col. Haviland de Luce, has died, leaving her an orphan; her sister Ophelia is off on the grand tour with her bridegroom; and her sister Daffy (Daphne to the uninitiated) is bound for Oxford. Flavia would be entirely on her own if it weren’t for her father’s war comrade Arthur W. Dogger, now a gardener who’s accepted 11-year-old Flavia as a full partner in his detective agency; her orphaned cousin, Undine; and Margaret Mullet, the cook at Buckshaw, the de Luce home in Bishop’s Lacey. And Flavia may be about to lose this last companion, because when her neighbor, retired civil servant Maj. Tommy Greyleigh, suddenly dies, Insp. Hewitt thinks that Mrs. Mullet fed him a dish of poisonous mushrooms. Since Flavia knows more about poisons than anyone else alive in 1952, she eagerly jumps to the defense of Mrs. Mullet, who’s questioned and released. But that’s not enough for Flavia, who’s become convinced that Maj. Greyleigh was assassinated on the orders of Asterion, a shadowy figure in that equally shadowy intelligence force, the Nide, where Flavia’s father and her aunt Felicity once reportedly worked. No one remotely associated with the Nide, or with the nearby American service base at Leathcote, will utter a word about the dread Asterion, so it’s up to Flavia to smash every taboo in her quest for truth, justice, and diversion.

Nobody could possibly unite intelligence work, mythological monsters, and village gossip as adroitly as Bradley’s heroine.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940160509617
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	09/03/2024
Series:	Flavia de Luce Series , #11
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

One

The greatest minds in the world are often cranky when they first awaken in the morning, and mine is no exception. If I am to ascend above the ordinary, I require solitude the way a balloon needs helium.

Which is why, barely a quarter of an hour after a hasty and solitary breakfast at Buckshaw, I am hunched under a black umbrella in the ancient churchyard of St. Tancred’s: the only place I can be certain of being left alone and in peace.

There is a particular kind of graveyard soil that bubbles when it rains. I have my own theory about the cause of this phenomenon but have come here for further study before committing my thoughts to paper.

In my experience, nothing is more deeply refreshing than to huddle under a bumbershoot in the rain and the raw fog of a country graveyard. Bare inches above your head, the downpour drums a military tattoo on the taut black silk as your nose greedily drinks in the invigorating pong of tombstones, wet grass, and ancient moss: a smell that opens doors in your mind you didn’t even know you had.

Churchyard moss is soft to sit on—but wet. Mrs. Mullet says I’ll get rheumatism and need to have my bones replaced.

It may sound cold and clammy, but there is a special warmth in knowing that you are utterly alone—except for the dead.

With the dead, there are no sudden rages; no fits of hissing savagery; no flung plates or cutlery; no petulant sulks or towering rages. Just beneath your feet the deceased are being devoured by fat black beetles, in a vast and grand banquet, while merry mushrooms digest the welcome leftovers of coffin wood. It is a world of harmony and dark contentment, a world of quiet grace and beauty. It is a happy dance of death.

I thought about the year I had sent up an armful of skyrockets from a remote corner of this same churchyard on All Souls’ Night, each labeled by hand with the name of one of the nearby but almost forgotten dead:

Blam!

That was Nettie Savage (1792–­1810).

Kaboosh!

Samuel Pole (1715–­1722).

Blassh! Arden Glassfield (1892–­1914).

Boom! Poom! Poom! A triple salvo for Annie Starling, Spinster of this Parish (1744–­1775).

Unfortunately, one of Annie’s fuses had come down in the gutters of the church, igniting a stupid cluster of accumulated moss and debris and thus setting on fire the House of God. The Bishop’s Lacey Fire Brigade had to be called to extinguish the small but fierce blaze. Father had expressed his displeasure by requiring me to make a monthly donation to the Fireman’s Fund, which, since it was ultimately his money, was no hardship at all. The tough thing was that I had to deliver each donation in person, which at first was excruciating and made me feel like a worm, but in the end I got to know a lot of firemen and learn the chemistry of quenching blazes.

Oh, those days of glory! And oh, to have them back again!

These days, my only friends are fungi.

Sometimes, when I can’t sleep, I pretend that I myself am a fungus, creeping silently and unobserved along some slimy moonlit surface, greedily feeding on unsuspecting bits of bark, smacking my fungus lips as only a fungus can smack them.

Smack! A nice bit of pine needle. Smack! A taste of bitter willow. Smack! An unexpected splinter of coffin lid, with its faint bouquet of formaldehyde. Encouraged, I move on, hoping for something more meaty.

And so on and so forth . . . until I fall into a gray and groggy sleep.

Which brings us back to St. Tancred’s churchyard in the rain.

I needed time alone.

“Flavia!”

Oh, jellied curses! It was Undine, my pestilent little cousin: the Bane of Buckshaw. How had she found me? I had tucked my trusty bicycle, Gladys, away in the church porch, both to keep her dry (Gladys loves running in the rain, but hates standing in it) and to keep her from unwelcome eyes.

I squatted even more deeply, scrunching my body slowly, as much as I was able, as if doing so would make me smaller, or maybe even invisible. Perhaps the pest would mistake my wet umbrella for part of a black marble tomb.

“Flavia!”

I held my breath and gritted my teeth. In her mackintosh and waterproof hat, she looked like an apprentice ghoul.

But she had spotted me.

“What is it, oh precious one?” I finally managed, brushing a raindrop from my eyelid.

She was looking at me, mouth agape, as if I had just climbed down from the sky on a golden rope.

“Why do you insist on following me everywhere?” I asked.

“ ’Cause I’m your crocodile,” she hissed, snapping her jaws and making a ghastly clicking noise with her throat. “Tick-­tock. Tick-­tock.”

“Kiss my crumpet,” I said.

“You’re nuts,” she said. “Do you know that? You’re nuts.”

My gorge, as they say, was rising. I bit my tongue.

“I want us—you and I—to take an oath, right here and now,” I told her, “on the sacred tomb of Saint Tancred, so to speak, to be kinder and more gentle with each other. We’re both orphans, remember, and orphans ought to stick together. Do you know what I mean?”

“Yowza!” she said enthusiastically.

“Don’t say ‘yowza,’ ” I said. “It makes you sound like a ventriloquist’s dummy. You’re spending too much time with Carl Pendracka.”

Carl was one of my sister Ophelia’s former suitors: an American serviceman from St. Louis, Missouri, by way of Cincinnati, Ohio. Carl’s childhood had been, in his own words “seasonally migratory.” Although Carl’s ardor had been dampened somewhat by Feely’s marrying one of his rivals, he nevertheless had taken to hanging round Buckshaw again after the wedding, perhaps, as my other sister, Daffy, suggested: “in search of smaller game.”

“Carl is a swell guy,” Undine said. “He’s teaching me to fart ‘Hail to the Chief.’ ”

“Undine! Don’t be coarse.”

“I wanted him to teach me ‘Rule Britannia’ but Carl said that’s a concert piece, and too risky for a beginner. You have to work up to it, like the Triple Splutterblast. So far, I’ve only mastered the Baby Duck. Carl says I need to learn to release the contralto and avoid squizzlers. So, I come here to practice sometimes. In case of an accident, you know. Say, Flavia, here’s a riddle for you: What’s white, has a handle, and flies?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t want to know,” I said.

“A chamber pot!” she shouted, doubling over with laughter and slapping her knee.

“You’re disgusting,” I said, trying not to smile. I didn’t want to encourage her.

“I’m not disgusting. I’m enterprising. Do you know that a Frenchman named Joseph Pujol became filthy rich breaking wind onstage in front of enormous audiences? And not just musical selections—he could also do animal impressions!”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“Carl says I should begin by increasing my cabbage intake—plus plenty of beans. Carl says that will have even the angels begging for mercy.”

“I’m not interested.”

“You’re a prude.”

“I’m not a prude. I’m a decent human being.”

Undine squinted one eye and sized me up as if I were for sale in an oriental market.

“You’re a Buckshaw de Luce. You’re all the same. Hoity-­toity. Nothing but starch and sauce. Lah­de-­dah. Sniff my hem. Ibu used to poke fun at you lot, you know.”

Ibu was the name she called her late mother, Lena, who had come to a horrible and spectacular end in a shower of stained-­glass shards, some of them dating to the thirteenth century.

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