Dead Man's Cove is a delightful, nostalgic mystery that'll make you remember the time you pretended to be Harriet the Spy, trying to figure out the puzzle in front of you, and in this modern children's detective story, you'll join Laura as she tries to find a place in her new home. I've already read the World Book Day short story, The Midnight Picnic, and can't wait to start the second book, Kidnap in the Caribbean. Just wonderful! I really liked the way that St John wrote the novel. It flowed really well; nothing was too awkward about it. I also found it was really easy to read for younger audiences, without making it too young sounding. Each character definitely had their own manner of speaking throughout the entire story that made it easy to know who was speaking at different parts. This book dealt with a lot of things like abuse, slavery, gangs, and poverty-causing debt. All of the subjects, I thought, were kind of mature for a book written for ten-year-olds, but it was written in a very tasteful fashion meant for a younger audience. Five Run Away Togetherby Enid Blyton. I think I read my first Famous Five novel when I was six and I was hooked from that moment on. Sure there are bits of that have dated and Enid Blyton is not the world’s greatest prose stylist. But decades on, the appeal of the Famous Five is as strong as ever. Impossible to resist. What You Need To Know Now: The World in Facts, Stats, and Graphics - Joe Fullman, Ian Graham, Sally Regan and Isabel Thomas

When orphaned Laura Marlin is sent from the children’s home to live with her uncle in Cornwall, she dreams of a life of excitement just like the characters in her favourite detective novels. But when she gets to Uncle Calvin’s spooky house, she is confronted with mysteries. Nothing is as it seems. Is Tariq, the shopkeeper’s silent son, a friend or an enemy? Why does her uncle seem so intent on hiding his past? And why is everyone so afraid of Dead Man’s Cove? When Laura finds a message in a bottle, she starts to investigate. But this deadly quest will test her detective skills to the limit – and put her on a collision course with villains who will stop at nothing to get their own way. Laura’s adventures begin in this first captivating mystery from the bestselling author of the White Giraffe series.Dead Man's Cove was the first book chosen for my monthly book club. I had been wanting to read it for a while because it sounded like a perfect middle grade adventure and mystery in the vein of Enid Blyton, plus the cover is stunning! Dead Man's Cove is the first story in the Laura Marlin Mysteries series, following 11-year-old Laura as she works on becoming an ace detective, inspired by her favourite fictional detective Matt Walker. Laura is living in Sylvan Meadow's Children's Home when she is discovered by her uncle, Calvin Redfern, and taken to live in St Ives, Cornwall, where her detective skills are about to be put to use. The Tiger who Came to Teaby Judith Kerr. I fell in love with the smiley, chubby tiger in Judith Kerr’s classic picturebook during one hot Zimbabwe summer when I had to read it four or five times a day to my niece. If it had been up to her I’d have read it even more frequently. Each time I got to the end, she pleaded for us to begin again. Pure genius.

I'm definitely going to read more of St. John's books, especially more of the Laura Marlin mysteries. This book would be an absolute corker of a read for LKS2 as a whole class. Even a seasoned reader could be forgiven for not seeing all the plot twists before they take place. St. John also reveals the darker elements of society (factory sweatshops from India/slavery/child labour) which I think could open up some interesting debate among the class. They came for her at 6.47am. Laura made a note of the time because she'd been waiting for this moment for eleven years, one month and five days and she wanted always to remember it - the hour her life began.' I bought this one during my vacation in 2018, so almost 6 months ago, but never was in the mood to read this one. Oh boy, past me, why why? Because as soon as I started this one I was totally in the story. I wanted to read on and on and on. Oh, oh, and thank you author for writing a girl character with short hair. It doesn't happen that often that girls have short hair. And I know that as a kid I would have loved this book. Because when I was a kid (and quite some time afterwards again) I had supershort hair. However so many girl characters have long/semi-long hair. :( year old Laura is an orphan. Her father, an American soldier, disappeared long before she was born, and her mother died during childbirth. All her life, Laura has lived at the Sylvan Meadow's Children Home. Always hoping and dreaming of finding a home where she can stay longer than half a day because she is fussy. And then finally, such a dream comes true. Her uncle, her mother's brother, is found, and agrees to take her in. She moves to Cornwall to live with her uncle and immediately falls in love with it.

After she arrives in St. Ives, where her uncle lives, she finds all sorts of mysteries that call out to her to be solved: What is her uncle's real occupation? Why does he forbid her to go to Dead Man's Cove? Why has the silent boy Tariq, who lives with an Indian couple who run a grocery store, suddenly rejected her friendship? Who has been leaving her messages in a bottle? These are only a few of the puzzles that Laura's curiosity won't let her leave unsolved. An orphaned girl with a big love for detectives finds herself thrown into mystery when she moves in to live with her uncle. I decided to read this book because a family member recommended it to me and said that it was very good. I also liked the themes of the book. If I'd have read Kat Wolfe Investigates after reading this, instead of the other way around, I think I might have felt a little cheated. They are similar in a lot of ways, and while Kat Wolfe feels a lot like a more current and updated version of Laura Marlin, it left me feeling this book was a little left behind and forgotten, but I think I enjoyed it more than Kat Wolfe. What was up with her uncle? I knew it very fast, and then it was fun reading to see how long it took Laura to figure it all out. I did think it took her quite some time, and it was mostly due to her stalking her uncle in the night and overhearing a conversation. :P

The whole plot was really good and the ending was really well done. I won't spoil it (it being a mystery book and all) but all of the loose ends were tied. I didn't figure out the mystery before the end of the book, which was really nice because that can be really annoying. All of the clues did actually connect to the mystery. I can't really say much about what the plot is, but it really is an exciting adventure from start to finish. A character I found interesting was Mr. Calvin Redfern who was the uncle of Laura Marlin. In the story he was described as a “disheveled one-eyed tyrant who arrived into town in the dead of night”, and I thought what this means was that nobody knew him well and that he just appeared from somewhere one day. Later on, in the story he is revealed to be a detective that moved into town because of a tragic accident but is being followed by a gang who wants to seek revenge. I thought he was interesting because in the beginning he looked like a normal person who might have had a very bad past and moved in to start a new life but then it turns out that he is actually a detective undercover and solving a mystery. I also think that his character is very important in the story. Tariq? I loved that guy, though I did feel sorry for what was happening to him. As for what was going on with him? It took me a bit longer to find out all the details, sure, I had some suspicions but I hadn't expected the story to take that turn. Orion Children's Books (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd ) an imprint of Orion Publishing Co year old Laura Marlin longs for a life of adventure, like those in her favourite books. Orphaned at birth and raised in a children’s home, she finally gets the chance to escape her dull existence when her uncle comes forward to adopt her. Her new life in Cornwall proves more mysterious than she might have wished for, however, and Laura has to use all her powers of deduction to unravel the secrets surrounding Dead Man’s Cove.

Lauren St. John Press Reviews

Her uncle, Calvin Redfern is a very intriguing character. Whenever he's around, you get the sense that there's something hidden about him. - secrets. Lauren St John was born and raised in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). From the age of 11 she lived on a game reserve, which provided the inspiration for her memoir Rainbow’s End and her White Giraffe series of children’s books. Dead Man’s Cove is the first in her series of Laura Marlin mysteries.

Lauren St Johngrew up surrounded by horses and wild animals on a farm and game reserve in Zimbabwe, the inspiration for her memoir, Rainbow’s End. After studying journalism, she relocated to the UK, where she spent nearly a decade on the European and PGA Tours as golf correspondent to the SundayTimes. She also wrote the acclaimed music biography Hardcore Troubadour: The Life & Near Death of Steve Earle. She is the author of the multi-award- winning The White Giraffe series for children, as well as the Laura Marlin mysteries, the first of which, Dead Man’s Cove, won the 2011 Blue Peter Book of the Year Award. Her bestselling One Dollar Horse series was followed by YA horse romance, The Glory, now optioned for film. Laura Marlin is a brilliant detective story written by one of the best children's writers out there, Lauren St John, who has recently won the Blue Peter award. Laura's an orphan who has spent most o her life in a children's home, dreaming of long-lost relatives coming to find her. When an uncle suddenly does come to claim her and bring her to live with him in his seaside home in a small Cornish town, Laura is excited to begin her new life. But while her uncle is kind and gives her plenty of things she's never had in her life (including a doggo friend), he's not so generous with his time, always busy with some vague assignments and working at strange hours. Laura also can't work out if the shopkeeper's boy actually wants to be friends with her or not, and there's lots of suspicious and worrying things happening with him and his family, which of course Laura must investigate.Dead Man’s Cove won the 2011 Blue Peter Book of the Year award and was short-listed for Children’s Book of the Year at the Galaxy National Book Awards. Even though this book was meant for a younger audience, I enjoyed it. It made me really nostalgic of when I was younger, and I wanted to be a detective. Even though that's no longer my ambition, I could still relate to the main character nonetheless.