The Five Lost Aunts of Harriet Bean - Softcover

Alexander McCall Smith

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0747580472 ISBN 13: 9780747580478

Publisher: Bloomsbury Childrens Books, 2006

Synopsis

One day, out of the blue, Harriet Bean's dad says to her, 'Your aunts would like to hear about that!' Harriet is shocked - this is the first time she's heard anything about any aunts, and suddenly, she has five of them! Naturally, she's very curious to meet them, especially as her dad has told her that they each have a rather special ability (apart from Aunt Majolica who's just extremely bossy). The trouble is, the family was split up years ago and they all lost touch with one another. Will Harriet be able to reunite her dad with his sisters and enable the family portrait that was started many many years ago to finally be completed? She is determined, and starts her quest for the five missing aunts with a trip to the circus ...

About this title

About the Author

Alexander McCall Smith is professor of Medical Law at the University of Edinburgh. He is also the author of over fifty books. These range from adult fiction to specialist titles, such as Forensic Aspects of Sleep, to a wide selection of children's books. In 1999 The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency was published. This book quickly became a bestseller and was voted one of the 'International Books of the Year and the Millennium' by the Times Literary Supplement. In America the success of the series was instant with sales exceeding two million in the USA alone. Winner of three Author of the Year awards in 2004 (British Book Awards, Booksellers' Association and Waterstone's), Bloomsbury Publishing are very proud and excited to be re-publishing Alexander's key children's books.

From School Library Journal

Grade 2-4–An offhand comment from her father sets nine-year-old Harriet Bean on the path of finding the five aunts whom she has never known. This seems like the perfect start of a juicy family mystery but it never quite turns into one. When given the full story of her father's loss of his five older sisters and a clue to the whereabouts of one of them, Harriet embarks on a hasty journey of collection. Useful coincidences make the women ridiculously easy to locate; it also helps that the final two are mind readers and come seeking her. The real mystery is how the father can possibly be absentminded enough to misplace five sisters. All of them are likable characters with interesting personality quirks and gadgets: strong-woman Veronica uses pedal power to drive her circus trailer from city to city, and twin detectives Thessalonika and Japonica are masters of disguise with convincing costumes. It is these two who give Harriet the chance to solve a mystery in the sequel, which takes place at a racetrack's stables. Masquerading as a jockey, Harriet is confronted with a villain who uses glue to stick a horse's feet to the floor so that he won't run well the next day. It's contrived stuff such as this that takes most of the charm out of this easy chapter-book series.–Kathleen Meulen, Blakely Elementary School, Bainbridge Island, WA
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About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Childrens Books
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 0747580472
• ISBN 13: 9780747580478
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 144