Night of the Living Zed

Written by Basil Sylvester and Kevin Sylvester

HarperCollins Canada

978-1-4434-6920-3 

256 pp.

Ages 8–12

January 16 2024

 

Sure, everyone gets ready for Christmas. There's the tree decorating, the shopping, the baking. But what about the "super-duper-stupendousest of all holidays" (p. 3): Halloween! Zed Watson, star of Basil Sylvester and Kevin Sylvester's highly-acclaimed first collaboration The Fabulous Zed Watson! (2021) is all about Halloween, so it's going to be a shame if they miss it because they're heading out of town with best friend Gabe to solve the mystery of Glyndebourne Manor, the house once owned by the rich and famous opera costume and set designer, Charlotte Scherrer. But it's all in support of a good cause: getting a reward that could help elevate the upcoming nuptials of Gabe's sister Sam and partner Jo.

So, determined to spend the required 3 days and 2 nights in the supposedly-haunted house and search for Charlotte's treasure, Zed and Gabe set off on October 29, hopeful of solving the mystery before Halloween. Well, Zed is convinced of it. Gabe is less sure about it, but the operatic flavour of decorations in Charlotte's century-old, 4-storey house gets him interested. Things become more complicated when the rules state that they must move from room to room but never exiting through the door they entered. Only by solving complicated clues related to Charlotte's life and memorabilia do Zed and Gabe have any chance of making it through this challenge. Of course, there's also the ghosts and copious booby traps to trick them, so solving the mystery is a lot less obvious than finding a pile of gold.

 

With humour and compassion, the two friends, face each challenge head on. They carefully scrutinize curious rooms filled with opera collectibles, they construct maquettes, they read personal journal entries, and they piece together Charlotte's life to help them uncover hidden means of egress. But, as long as the ghosts don't impede their progress and they don't runaway, they've got a good chance to find...something?

Night of the Living Zed has all the colour of Basil Sylvester and Kevin Sylvester's first book, The Fabulous Zed Watson!, but it's a fresh new mystery with a different set of characters. Readers will be pleased to visit again with the quirky Zed and Gabe, a pair of young friends with strong but different personalities.  There's non-binary Zed who approaches life at break-neck speed, enthusiastic about vampires and ghosts, eager to interact with the supernatural, and lover of all things Halloween. Gabe is less forward, but still fascinated by and knowledgeable about opera and plants, and loves playing the piano and wearing multi-pocketed clothes. And he's a little ghost-shy. In addition to a host of regulars, like Ph. D. candidates Sam and Jo, and a plethora of named inanimate objects–there's Sam's vehicle Carssandra, Zed's stuffed jackalope Aloysius, and their pumpkin nightlight Willoughby–readers meet Bertie and Hyacinth who are Charlotte's relatives, and a pair of treasure seekers called Soraya and Dean (often called Dan by Bertie).

The characters are wacky and the dialogue between them is priceless. It's this humour, including their gaffes that take Night of the Living Zed from mystery to a romping good time. From doing their Halloween-O-ween inspection–and learning Mrs. Gianelli is upgrading from licorice sticks to candy bars–or Gabe explaining to Zed that "i.e." is Latin for "Id est" and they answer, "You dest? What's a 'dest'?" (p. 80), there's a rich but underlying humour that will make readers smile and laugh out loud. And then there's the mystery. It is not easily solved, neither by Zed and Gabe nor the readers, so we have to hang in through all the ups and downs, and twists and turns, to get our "Aha!" moment.

I know it's a long way off until Halloween–maybe we can look at January as pre-pre-pre-Halloween-O-ween–but a mystery is a great read anytime, and Night of the Living Zed is a great one. With their open heart and enthusiasm for life and for exploring the unknown, Zed can take us and Gabe along on any new adventure they want, ghosts or no ghosts.

 

 • • • • • •

 

The Fabulous Zed Watson (2021)

Night of the Living Zed (2024)

 

Swept Away: Ruth Mornay and the Unwanted Clues

Written by Natalie Hyde

DCB

978-1-77086-689-8

200 pp.

Ages 8-12

April 2023 

Reviewed from advance reading copy

When 63-year-old Beatrice Payens is swept away in the Teeswater River, her 11-year-old friend and next-door neighbour Ruth Mornay is grief-stricken and perplexed. Why would Bea, head of the Teeswater River Embankment Rehabilitation Society and diligent advocate for signage warning Pinkerton residents about the danger of getting too close to the water's edge, be so negligent? Something doesn't add up for Ruth. 

 

Things get weirder when Hugh Rolls and his young son Saul move in next door, inheriting the house from their Aunt Bea, though Ruth knew Bea had no relatives. Ruth has even more questions. Problem is, all Ruth has are questions. Troubled by weird dreams of drowning and a paltry trio of bequests–a weird water sprinkler head, some old, embroidered gloves and an ugly picture of flowers made from human hair (yech!)– Ruth starts looking for clues and suspects among her fellow residents of Pinkerton (population 134). With Saul as her secret ally, Ruth works at putting the clues together, when she isn't running after her escaped Rhode Island Red hen, Dorcas.

 

The best mysteries are the ones you don't know are mysteries. Ruth suspects something is amiss, but she doesn't really know that Bea didn't just slip into the water accidentally. But, like a puzzle with only a few pieces, Ruth starts slowly. And she thinks and speculates, and she asks questions, and she watches. With Saul, another keen observer and solver of mysteries, Ruth learns there really is much more to Bea's story and her own. That's why Swept Away is so fulfilling as a read. Not only does Ruth figure out what happened to Bea–even putting herself in danger–she learns more about herself and her family in the process. She could never have guessed that pursuing a hunch she had about Bea's disappearance could lead her to a new friend, some family history, and an important discovery about herself. Better yet, writer Natalie Hyde, who has authored outstanding middle-grade novels like Up the Creek (2021), Mine! (2017), and Saving Arm Pit (2015), blends a strong plot with an assortment of unique characters, and a touch of humour. A mystery is always an alluring story but add to it a child with six older brothers and no access to computers, a delinquent but clever hen, a wandering pig, townspeople like the town snoop Mrs. Gorgonzola and Ruth's tedious non-best friend Emily Parsons, and you get a whodunit with twists and turns but also laughter. Natalie Hyde always slips in some subtle humour to add a layer of fun. 

Four years ago at the Fall Fair, Mrs. Parsons–Emily's mom–had to be restrained by committee members when she learned Mrs. Gorgonzola's red pepper jelly had beaten hers. She claimed Mrs. Gorgonzola stole her recipe, which was her grandmother's, and passed it off as her own. Mrs. Gorgonzola said Mrs. Parsons shouldn't flatter herself, that the only thing the Parson red pepper jelly was good for was to oil her furniture. (pg. 81)

Often Ruth's observations about her small town are what give us the most humour, like the red pepper jelly debacle or the purported theft of Mrs. Gorgonzola's ugly green neon lava lamp. It's what's really happening in Pinkerton; it just happens to be funny too.

See if you can figure out this whodunit but, even if it comes as a surprise, especially what it means for Ruth, you'll enjoy visiting Pinkerton, a not-so-sleepy small town, a hot bed of secrets, and a playground for a miscellany of farm animals.