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I am a big fan of Sherlock Holmes. So when I saw a book about Sherlock's daughter, who who wants to follow in her fathers deductive reasoning footsteps, I knew I had to read it. Plus throw in the fact that her specialty leads her to a job at a museum as a "purveyor of abnormal science" how could I pass it up?? Sherlock plus mystery plus just a touch of creepy and weird. That just sounds so good! And it was good! It was exactly as I expected it to be.

There is plenty of good ole Sherlock snark and wit in Arabella, so I loved her right off the bat. She is not like other young women her age. And given that the book takes place in 1910, that is not necessarily a good thing. One of her oldest friends is the son of Dr. Watson- Henry. Henry is so smitten with Arabella, or as he calls her Bella. It was so adorable to watch how devoted and protective he was of her. Whereas everyone else say her as different and weird, he was just so enamored by her. This book was true to the time period and it read like the original Sherlock Holmes stories, but in a way that makes it accessible for young adults. I found the book very readable.

There are multiple mysteries in Boneseeker. Not only is there the mystery of the bones, but there was also the mystery of Bella herself. Everyone around her, herself included kept referring to her as different and "not normal". Even Dr. Watson, who was like a second father to her and cared about her thought she was different than other girls and you could tell he didn't want Henry romantically entangled with her. I was so curious about all of this. What did they all mean she was not normal? Was it just because she was like her father and was logical to a fault? Was it just that she didn't interact with people properly for the time, or was it something else? Something that actually made her not normal? I found myself wondering this for over half of a book, and I was even more interested in figuring Bella out than I was figuring out what all these giant bones belonged to.

I really enjoyed Boneseeker. It had a noir mystery feel to it. I know this sounds really weird, but the writing and the scenery had me picturing most of this book in black and white. Maybe the cover had something to do with that as well. It felt exciting and different to me. Henry is great and Bella is such a fun character to read about. Henry called her condescending and charming all at once. I think he was right, but man oh man can she pull that off beautifully. Fans of historical mysteries, and fans of Sherlock Holmes should add Boneseeker to their reading lists.