Name: Cream Buns and Crime
ISBN: 9780141376561

Robin Stevens

A collection of short stories, tips and tricks on being a detective, from the author of Murder Most Unladylike.

Cream Buns and Crime

mighty dragon 

it's very rare for a companion book to be as intriguing and fun as the actual books in the series. really enjoyed this one.

Kim Tyo-Dickerson

An entertaining and satisfying collection of Murder Most Unladylike short stories, detective lore, and codebreaking guidance by various characters in the beloved series. Daisy actually writes a couple of her own detecting adventures, with the usual snarky references to Hazel's meticulous note-taking and insistence that Hazel is the able Watson to her Sherlock Holmes-style leadership as President of the Wells and Wong Detective Agency. Although quirky as always and grudging with her compliments as usual, her deep admiration for Hazel's skills and her appreciation of their friendship is never in question. 

The Junior Pinkertons, rivals from Weston Boys' School and sometimes collaborators with Daisy and Hazel on their cases, join in the fun. Hazel's friend Alexander Arkady, who featured in the wonderful homage to Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express in First Class Murder, contributes a story about the Pinkertons' first case, while his co-president George Mukherjee shares a "Guide to Unsolved Mysteries" including brief overviews of Jack the Ripper and other less-familiar still-puzzling crimes like "The Cheapside Hoard", "The Road Hill House Murder" and the surprising "The Disappearance of Agatha Christie."

Robin Stevens presents as herself and series author with some fun details about "The Golden Age of Detective Stories" and "The Books that Made Murder Most Unladylike" which point her readers to the talented writers and their detectives that inspired her to create her young characters and structure her boarding-school centered mysteries. She includes an important overview of how mystery writers can rely on and yet choose to break from time to time the "rules" of what a crime writer "should and shouldn't put in their books" (71). There is a particularly insightful moment where Stevens refers to the crime writing rules by Ronald Knox that she has in mind while writing her stories, and she outlines how Knos, who had a pretty flat-out racist rule 5 that Stevens absolutely had to break "No Chinese person must figure in the story", needs to be revised, pointing out how important it is not to allow those kinds of prejudices to continue to restrict and marginalize characters and stories.

A glorious romp of voices, tales, and trivia to keep the pages flying for all Stevens' legions of fans. Highly recommended for ages 10+, and really is best enjoyed after reading books 1-5 in the series.

Rose Stanley

This is a fun collection of short stories, how-to guides to various aspects of detecting, and facts about fictional detectives, the authors behind them, and the real-life mysteries that may have inspired the stories they star in. Also there are baking recipes, good times.

Not quite as good as Ms Stevens' full length stories, but those are a very hard act to follow...

A collection of short stories for budding Detective Society members. Daisy and Hazel invite you to discover their untold stories . . . Daisy Wells and Hazel Wong are famous for the murder cases they have solved - but there are many other mysteries in the pages of Hazel's casebook. From the macabre Case of the Deepdean Vampire, to the baffling Case of the Blue Violet, and their very first case of all: the Case of Lavinia's Missing Tie. Just like Daisy and Hazel's cases, there's more to this book than meets the eye, including: Brilliant mini-mysteries, including two brand-new and never seen before stories Daisy and Hazel's own tips, tricks and facts This is the perfect book for Agatha Christies In Waiting and fans of the award-winning, bestselling Murder Most Unladylike series.

A Murder Most Unladylike Collection

Giulia Pianta

This didn't really add much to the main story line, but it was such a lovely addition! I didn't particularly care for the parts on how to be a detective or how to solve codes, as that is definitely aimed to younger readers. The one bit I enjoyed was the list of mystery writers (I will have to check some of them out).

The short stories were all lots of fun. It was nice to be with the Junior Pinkertons in their school and have an adventure there. Daisy is still a weird character to me, I feel her charm but I also believe some of her behaviours are not the best, while Hazel is so sweet and kind. And Beanie is growing so much on me!! She is so sweet and adorable, sometimes I just want to grab her by the shoulders and shake her, but overall I like her and enjoyed reading a story from her point of view.

I feel like I am flying through this series, the books and short stories are so captivating that I read them really fast.

Cream Buns and Crime

Reviews

Highlights