The Dead Kid Detective Agency
$8.95-
Thirteen-year-old October Schwartz is new in town, short on friends, and the child of a clinically depressed science teacher. Naturally, she spends most of her time in the Sticksville Cemetery, which just happens to border her backyard. And that backyard just happens to be the home of five dead teenagers, each from a different era of the past: there’s the dead United Empire Loyalist! The dead escaped slave who made her way north via the Underground Railroad! The dead quintuplet!
Soon, October befriends the five dead kids. Together — using October’s smarts and the dead kids’ abilities to walk through walls and get around undetected and stuff — they form The Dead Kid Detective Agency, committed to solving Sticksville’s most mysterious mysteries. October’s like Nancy Drew, if she’d hung out with corpses.
When Sticksville Central High School’s beloved French teacher dies in a suspicious car accident, it provides the agency with its first bona fide case. Soon October and her five dead friends find themselves in the midst of a nefarious murder plot, thick with car chases, cafeteria fights, sociopathic math teachers, real estate appointments, and a wacky adventure that might uncover the truth about a bomb that exploded almost 40 years ago.
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Evan Munday is the illustrator of the novel Stripmalling, written by Jon Paul Fiorentino (ECW 2009), and is the cartoonist behind the self-published comic book, Quarter-Life Crisis, set in a post-apocalyptic Toronto. He works as a book publicist for Coach House Books. The Dead Kid Detective Agency is his first novel. He lives in Toronto, ON.
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Published: October 2011
ISBN: 9781550229714
Dimensions: 5 x 8.75 in.
Pages: 320
Reviews
“An engaging tale with a resilient heroine, a dead but lively supporting cast and enough wit to grease the wheels.” — Kirkus Reviews
“Munday’s unique brand of funny is completely worthy of teenagers, one of the most challenging audiences to coax into laughter. Munday is one to watch, as this first novel in a planned series proves in spades.” — Shannon Ozirny
“Hilarious, geeky pop culture fun and surprisingly touching, Dead Kid Detective Agency was an absolute joy to read. And any writer who says about Jackie Chan that readers should drop his book and watch Chan’s ‘Hong Kong stuff’ makes an immediate fan of me. I finished this book on a Sunday afternoon and already look forward to Book 2.” — Literary Treats
“[Evan Munday’s] text is full of pop culture references, some more obscure than others, but comes with a handy reference guide in the back. Not knowing the references won’t frustrate or deter readers from the story. A successful graphic artist, Munday also proves himself to be a worthy wordsmith on his first foray into children’s literature.” — Vikki Vansikle
“Munday handles this unbelievable plot deftly as you root for October and her friends.” — 410Media
“This book would really appeal to kids who enjoy fantasy, and a twist of the grim. The concept is pretty dark, but the book doesn’t go into too much gruesome detail. Even though October’s circumstances are not cheery, her high school experiences will be familiar to many kids.” — National Post