Denise

There are choices in life which you are aware, even as you make them, cannot be undone; choices after which, once made, things will never be the same.

I'm not exactly sure what this was supposed to add to the series except for to serve as a reminder of just how much I loved the secondary characters of the previous books. All of the characters, excepting Flavia of course, that you have grown to love or love to hate (Feely and Daffy) are not in this book. Dogger does make a teeny tiny appearance via letter but it was not enough to satisfy. This of course causes both Flavia and readers to have homesickness for Buckshaw. I do love Flavia, but to send her off to the wilderness of Canada (just exaggerating, don't send me hate mail) by herself and pretty much shun her didn't sit well with me. Flavia seemed a bit different in this book and was pretty much the only character I cared about.

None of the secondary characters were interesting enough for me to care about them. I really thought that Mrs. Bannerman was going to be a stand out but she fell just as flat as the other characters. I just couldn't take all their secrecy and once the big reveal happened at the end I didn't feel that all that secrecy was called for. I am extremely happy with where Flavia was headed at the end. Quite frankly this pales in comparison to the other books in the series and is my least favorite (if you couldn't already tell from this review). Here's to hoping that the series gets the same magic back that I loved from the previous books.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the galley.