I am very keen to read this even though it is a children’s book and I am an adult, as I adore children's books and I adore Hallett’s books with their mysterious puzzles, so it seems a win-win! I also immediately love the cover with the sticky-out embossed title which feels so nice to run your finger over! Grab your copy and let’s read it together!
I am very keen to read this even though it is a children’s book and I am an adult, as I adore children’s books and I adore Hallett’s books with their mysterious puzzles, so it seems a win-win! I also immediately love the cover with the sticky-out embossed title which feels so nice to run your finger over! Grab your copy and let’s read it together!
Ava and Luke are siblings now living apart as their parents have separated and one child is living with each parent. Luke finds a box in the attic marked Top Secret, and begins to send details of the contents to his sister via text. Hmmm, so far I have to say I’m finding it all a little over-simplified, but I guess I have to bear in mind the age of the reader she is writing for which isn’t me! But I am enjoying it, and it’s a clever strategy having the two siblings each living with one of their parents as this allows them to communicate by text, which the reader can then handily read. Finding the box marked Top Secret in the attic seems a bit of a stretch too, but I guess this is a very appealing idea to young readers and I’m already wondering how and why the box is there.
The box contains papers detailing a camping trip of boy scouts and girl guides in the 1980s on the edge of a wood which is planned to be destroyed by two developers, Sallow and Razer. Diaries are being kept by each tent. A penknife belonging to one of the scouts, Ricky, has been stolen and it then reappears far cleaner than it was before it was stolen, which is puzzling and a little alarming for Ricky. One of the guides, Sofia, is keen to always keep her mother’s vanity case close by her, and while Sofia is collecting berries from the wood a woman named Maureen speaks to her and pays her to climb a tree and retrieve something from it, but when Sofia has climbed back down again Maureen has run off. Sofia had also pretended to Maureen that her name was one of other guides Josie (who is famous in the camp for climbing trees). Hmmm, so did Sofia collect whatever it was that Maureen wanted her to collect, I wonder? And I am beginning to think Sofia must be keeping an animal in her mother’s vanity case and the berries and water she collects are for this animal. And I love that the scouts and guides are encouraged to write diaries of their camping trip as this again is such a clever strategy of providing written records for the reader to read, and as it’s set in the 1980s there are no phones for the kids to be busy texting on so again they have to write down their thoughts on paper, which is perfect for us, the reader, and for Ava and Luke too, of course! But how can the 1980s seem such an old-fashioned time to Ava and Luke, arrrggh, that makes me feel old! Though I’m finding it amusing to see the words that Ava and Luke need to look up as they are unfamiliar words to them, such as ‘phone box’!
Ghost stories are told each evening by the camp leader, Baloo, particularly regarding a ghost in the wood by their camp. The body of a male professor is found in a cabin belonging to developers, and as the body is carried away one of the children spots that there is a large number on the calculator feature of his digital watch, 77345663. Later, Ricky also finds this large number carved into a stick, and he recognises that it had been carved with his knife as it has a nick in it, so he presumes his knife was taken and then cleaned for this purpose. Ooooh, I immediately remembered that you can turn a calculator upside-down and certain groups of numbers then create words, so I did this for the 77345663 number and I think it makes the word ‘eggshell’!! Admittedly, that gets me no further about what this word means in relation to the story but I am feeling inordinately proud of myself, tee hee! I just hope I’m right and I’ve not just wasted about 20 minutes trying to work that out! And I note that many of the people at the camp have digital watches and these watches seem to be mentioned quite a lot, as Maureen has one, and the developer Sallow has one, the dead professor has one, and I think one of the older kids at the camp does too, so I’m thinking this emphasis on these watches must mean that they are significant in some way (and that my ‘eggshell’ deduction is therefore correct!). I’m also wondering if Baloo’s story of a ghost in the wood is purely to ensure that the kids keep out of the wood, but why would he want to ensure that, is it just because wandering around a wood at night clearly isn’t safe for kids to do, or does he have something to hide? And I also keep flicking back looking at the programme of daily activities for the kids which are detailed frequently, wondering if there is some hidden meaning in these? I can’t really see the point of including them otherwise (unless it is to just fill the book out, but I don’t really think Hallett would do that).
The guides go to collect eggs from the local farm (it has been the scouts’ job up to this point) and they notice that the farmer is surprisingly smartly dressed, and one of the guides notice two people who appear to be locked in a shed, and later a message reading ‘Help Us’ is found written inside one of the egg boxes. There is also a label found with the name Lanius Collurio. Arrgggh, I was all excited at the Lanius Collurio name and spent a huge amount of time trying to rearrange the letters to spell something else, but tee hee, it’s just Latin for the rare red-backed shrike that has been seen in the wood, what a shame, I was so hopeful it was a puzzle! However, I’m fascinated that when I’ve googled there is actually such a bird as the red-backed shrike and indeed this is its Latin name, I had just presumed this was something that Hallett made up for the book! I’m beginning to wonder now if the whole mystery is about this rare bird, does it live in the wood and the developers want to conceal this as they wouldn’t be able to destroy the wood otherwise? Or has the rare bird been placed there in the wood by the protestors in order to stop the developers destroying the wood, and is this why the word ‘eggshell’ is relevant as they need to plant or find an eggshell to demonstrate/pretend that the bird has lived there for a long time? And I agree with Ava and Luke that the people locked in the shed must be the real farmers, though I’m not sure why they are locked in there and by who, and I’m also a little worried and puzzled that the guide who spotted them hasn’t reported this to anyone!
Several people have reported being scared by yellow eyes in the wood, and Mr Jolly (one of the leaders) had set up a camera in the wood which photographs motion at night, but when he asks the guides to post this camera film for him, Ralph (one of the older scouts) intercepts the parcel. Later, Maureen is found dead. Ava and Luke find all the letters written by the scouts and guides that were supposed to be posted, as well as the camera film, inside the Top Secret box, and as Ava has contacted Jenny Jackson (the newspaper reporter there at the time of the camping trip) asking her for her memories of the camping trip, Jenny offers to develop the camera film for them. She later tells them that all of the 22 photos are too dark to show anything. Eeeek, there should be 24 photos on the camera film so that means that two are missing, or has Jenny concealed these two photos for some reason? I have to say that Jenny is beginning to look a bit suspicious to me. And these yellow eyes in the wood are certainly strange, what on earth is the creature that they belong to, or is it just some trick with torches or something to keep people out of the wood (and then why?)?
Ava and Luke have discovered that if the number 77345663 is typed into a calculator and turned upside-down it spells the word ‘eggshell’, and they also realise that the stick with this number carved onto it had been marking a particular tree that contained a treasure and they suspect that the treasure may be a nest, but that as Ricky had moved the stick then no-one knows what tree it was marking, apart from Sofia (as Maureen had asked her to climb that tree). Ava and Luke also find a cassette tape in the Top Secret box which had inadvertently recorded a conversation between Jenny and Maureen, where Maureen discusses that Jenny paid her to poison the professor, and it is also clear that Jenny is planning to use the same method to kill Maureen. Ava and Luke realise that Jenny was at the local farm with the developer Razor, pretending to be the farmers. Meanwhile the documents in the Top Secret detail how the developers and Jenny have kidnapped Josie, as they mistakenly believe she knows which tree contains the treasure (as Sofia had pretended her name was Josie when she climbed the tree for Maureen) and are demanding she climbs the tree and hands them the treasure. Ricky and Skip arrive to try and rescue Josie but are captured themselves, and Josie reluctantly climbs the tree to steal the treasure in order to save them from being hurt. The treasure is an egg but when Josie climbs the tree and finds the nest, she realises that the egg is missing. Phew, this is all quite tense with poor Josie being kidnapped and now Ricky and Skip captured too and all being threatened with harm! And Jenny clearly is a bad person! But I am very relieved that I was correct with the ‘eggshell’ word from that number!
The developers are arrested, but Jenny escapes. The two deaths are put down to accidental eating of poisonous mushrooms. It is discovered that Sofia has her pet hamster in her mother’s vanity case, and had also popped the egg in there too (which she’d taken from the nest in the tree for Maureen), tucking it under the straw, so the egg is returned to the nest. It is also discovered that Ralph was helping the criminals. Ana and Luke get Jenny arrested for conspiring to murder the professor and for the murder of Maureen. They also discover that the professor who was killed had hidden a letter in a thrush’s nest, which is also stored in the Top Secret box, and his letter details his find in the wood of ‘a totally unique species’ of the ancient great patoo bird and that the wood is ‘a unique ecosystem found nowhere else in the world’. He also states that the developers, Sallow and Razer, had employed him to find poisonous mushrooms so the wood could then be destroyed and they could put their waste disposal site in its place, but he writes in the letter that he will instead tell them that there are no poisonous mushrooms and that the wood must stay in order to protect some rare species, and the letter also details his suspicions that Sallow and Razer may try to silence him and also that his assistant, Maureen, seems to be trying to kill him. Ana and Luke learn that the patoo bird camouflages itself into the tree bark so is nicknamed the ghost bird as it effectively ‘disappears’ due to its camouflage and that it has huge yellow eyes, so they realise that this was actually the ghost reported in the wood. They also learn that anyone who has discovered the bird (such as Skip and Josie) vow to keep it secret, and they realise that Skip had used an acrostic in his letter to refer to the great potoo, as taking the first letters of the words in the sentence ‘that his expedition got really eerie and then probably odd, tricky or ominous’, spell out ‘the great patoo’. Eeek, this acrostic is just typical wonderful Hallett! I love her acrostics in The Twyford Code, I just adore that she includes things like this and that she has done so again in this book, what a treat! And everything’s being tied up and explained nicely now! So Jenny was working with the developers and also wanted the egg of the rare red-backed shrike so when the bird then became extinct after the wood was destroyed then the egg would be even more valuable. And the local farmers were imprisoned to stop them protesting against the destruction of the wood and blocking Sallow and Razer’s planning permission, but in the end the farmers gained protected status for the wood to protect the shrike, so that’s good that the wood is protected. And it seems like everyone thinks this is being done to aid the red-backed shrike, that’s clever as it ensures that the great patoo stays a secret (but it is surely a little coincidental that both rare birds are found in that wood, although I guess the professor had said it was a unique ecosystem, so it therefore presumably enables rare species to thrive). However I did wonder why Josie and Ricky and Skip hadn’t said at the time that Jenny was involved as she was there when they were being held captive, as she could then have been traced and also arrested.
Ana and Luke get sent a Detective Badge. They still don’t know why the box was in their attic and what connection there is between someone in their family and the camping group, but it is implied that their dad knows something but won’t say, and it is also implied that there are more boxes (and therefore more novels) to come featuring Ana and Luke. Oooh, I’m very excited that there are more books to come, that’s a beautiful tantalising lead to keep the readers anticipating the next few books in the series! But I’m a bit frustrated we’re not given the answer now as to why and how the Top Secret box was in the attic, however that won’t stop me guessing, tee hee! Could it be that dad is the younger brother of one of the campers? Or could their mum be the guide Jackie, as it was she who was obsessed with getting the Detective Badge that Ana and Luke have now got so did she suggest this idea of the badge to the police, and it was Jackie who said she thought there was more to the professor and Maureen’s deaths than accidental poisoning so did she then collect together all the information from the camping trip in the hope that it could one day be investigated and her suspicion proved right? Or, as the house was Ana and Luke’s grandparents, could they have been some of the scout leaders and therefore kept the box? Oooh, so many possibilities, I can’t wait to find out!
I have now (as I always find myself doing with Hallett’s books for adults) gone back through the book again and again looking for other puzzles or clues that I may have missed, but I can’t find any. I did feel sure too that there must be something hidden in those programmes of daily activities for the kids which were detailed so frequently, but again I can’t see it. And I’ve googled and can’t find any hints of anything extra that I’ve missed, but I’m just used to there always being a hint of some possible extra thing in her other books, or perhaps that’s just me being obsessive and not wanting to let the book go! But if you’ve found anything extra, then please please let me know! However my googling has revealed that the great patoo is an actual real bird! I am amazed, I had just presumed that Hallett had made this up, and indeed it sounds like a very unbelievable bird! But I love that it is real, and am now fascinated by it, what an amazing creature! And I love that Hallett had done such research on this (or perhaps already knew a lot about birds and wanted to share her knowledge).
Well, I thoroughly enjoyed reading that book, admittedly it wasn’t as meaty and in-depth as her books for adults but then I didn’t expect it to be, I think Hallett has adapted her style very well for children though and I’m delighted that she kept her trademark styles of information transferred to the reader in a quick punchy fast-paced epistolary format through texts and audio (and also lovely old-fashioned written word with the diaries), and I adored the puzzles with the acrostic and the numbers revealing the word ‘eggshell’ and am delighted again that she included these trademarks as I love her books for these things, and I also loved that she had done such research again (this time on the great patoo) as she does with her other books. It must have been a challenge adapting her style for a much younger reading age though and still incorporating all of these things, and I admire that she did that (and I’d say successfully, though obviously I’m judging it as an adult). She really is a remarkable writer, and I’m so pleased that me cheekily jumping onboard with a book that wasn’t really aimed at me has still been a very enjoyable read. I look forward to the next in this series, which I see is Death At The Museum (which isn’t out till June 2026), whilst also very much looking forward to reading her next book for adults, The Killer Question, which I have purchased and can’t wait to begin, and I’m now tempted to re-read (again) her wonderful book which featured acrostics and children’s books, The Twyford Code! I’m also keen to try Holly Jackson’s detective book for young adults (keeping with this theme), A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, which sounds very good.
