A Mystery for Thoreau
Grade 8 Up—Set in Concord, MA, in 1886, this mystery centers around Oliver Puckle, a 16-year-old reporter who gathers news for his uncle's paper. When the body of an elderly community member is discovered near Henry David Thoureau's cottage at Walden Pond, Oliver is determined to solve the crime. He soon surmises that the murder is related to the recent arrival of an attractive young woman, who has since gone missing. Although Thoreau, an acquaintance of the narrator's, uses his knowledge of the woods to help interpret clues, he is more a decorative overlay than an integral character in the whodunit. The same can be said of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Louisa May Alcott, who both make cameo appearances at the newspaper office. A foreword by the author's son recounts Platt's career and explains how this book was found among his papers and published posthumously. Taken as a whole, the novel seems sketchily researched and hastily thrown together-more a work in progress than a completed manuscript.—Miriam Lang Budin, Chappaqua Public Library, NYCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.