SLEUTH ON SKATES

An appealing girl detective makes her debut in the first of a mystery series.

First-person narrator Sesame, as she calls herself, aspires to be a supersleuth and has intelligence, a pair of purple skates, and a resourceful, if not wholly sanctioned, independence at her disposal. At 11 1/2, the bright, only child of accomplished parents (Mum, the head of Christ’s College at Cambridge University and Dad, the college’s chaplain), Sesame is amusingly exasperated with their attentiveness, and she’s got a preteen’s talent for smart comebacks. “Jesus Christ, Sophie Margaret Catriona!” her mother gasps in frustration with her at one point. “Is that his full name?” responds Sesame. When an undergraduate goes missing, Sesame pounces eagerly on the mystery, solving it via determination and coincidence with the help of a couple of school friends and a university student or two. It’s soon revealed that no harm has come to the girl, but dirty dealings are at work, specifically having to do with the way the university’s computer network has been compromised by an aggressive corporate marketing firm. The slightly breathless plot ties up neatly, with bits of university life woven in (a performance of Swan Lake, a nighttime paddle up the river Cam, meetings with various porters and professors—even Stephen Hawking in an unnamed cameo).

A likable and diverting British import.