2011 book 42

Alan Bradley's A Red Herring Without Mustard
The third Flavia de Luce mystery finds our young scientist heroine involved with some Gypsies, a smuggling ring, and a long-missing child. I loved the first book in this series and was somewhat disappointed in the second, but this one was really strong--which is difficult to do when the protagonist of your mystery series is a child. Of course, this is one of those series that's more about the characters and the setting than solving crimes (though Flavia's interest in forensics helps move the story along), which is why I like it so much. A.