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A review by thetomatowriter
The Shrunken Head by Lauren Oliver, H. C. Chester
4.0
I picked up an ARC of this book at a writing festival. Just from the cover, it looked really quirky and a little dark and generally like a fun, easy read. And it was. The target audience is elementary and middle school kids and I would say probably for kids who like books like A Series of Unfortunate Events or Wayside School or maybe even The Boxcar Children. But it holds up as an enjoyable read for older readers as well (I'm almost twenty-five).
The four main characters are orphans that have grown up in Dumfrey's Dime Museum of Freaks, Oddities, and Wonders, raised by the kindly proprietor, Mr. Dumfrey--and they're each wonders themselves. Thomaas is an energetic boy with a love of statistics and a completely flexible bone structure (he can "squeeze himself into a space no bigger than a bread box"). Responsible and somewhat bossy Philipppa is a mentalist. Sam is a scrawny, shy twelve year old who lets his hair fall over his face to hide his pimples and happens to be the world's strongest boy. Max, a newcomer and a little rough around the edges, can throw knives with perfect precision. They enjoy life in the museum pretty well and love their adopted family there, but people have begun to lose interest in dime museums and Dumfrey's is in more financial trouble than they realize. When their "shrunken head" exhibit starts to garner some attention, it seems like the museum might be saved, but just as things start looking up, the head is stolen. The kids decide to find the head and the culprit who took it, thereby saving the museum, but when their investigation lands them at the scene of a murder, the police begin to suspect Mr. Dumfrey.
I finished this book in two days, which is pretty rare for me. The characters, writing style and setting are endearing without sugarcoating the darker elements. There's a classic suspense to it and they build the bond between the kids very naturally. There were two big reveals at the end and neither of them were a shock to me, maybe because I grew up reading and watching mysteries, but if predictable, they weren't boring. By the end of the book, we understand much more about who these four main characters are and why Mr. Dumfrey took them in, but it left me wanting more. I knew before I was very far in that I would have to read this whole series, but if I hadn't been able to decide, the last couple of chapters would have sealed that for me. Because I had an ARC there were a few typos and things like that but they weren't obtrusive and were probably fixed in the final version, anyway.
The four main characters are orphans that have grown up in Dumfrey's Dime Museum of Freaks, Oddities, and Wonders, raised by the kindly proprietor, Mr. Dumfrey--and they're each wonders themselves. Thomaas is an energetic boy with a love of statistics and a completely flexible bone structure (he can "squeeze himself into a space no bigger than a bread box"). Responsible and somewhat bossy Philipppa is a mentalist. Sam is a scrawny, shy twelve year old who lets his hair fall over his face to hide his pimples and happens to be the world's strongest boy. Max, a newcomer and a little rough around the edges, can throw knives with perfect precision. They enjoy life in the museum pretty well and love their adopted family there, but people have begun to lose interest in dime museums and Dumfrey's is in more financial trouble than they realize. When their "shrunken head" exhibit starts to garner some attention, it seems like the museum might be saved, but just as things start looking up, the head is stolen. The kids decide to find the head and the culprit who took it, thereby saving the museum, but when their investigation lands them at the scene of a murder, the police begin to suspect Mr. Dumfrey.
I finished this book in two days, which is pretty rare for me. The characters, writing style and setting are endearing without sugarcoating the darker elements. There's a classic suspense to it and they build the bond between the kids very naturally. There were two big reveals at the end and neither of them were a shock to me, maybe because I grew up reading and watching mysteries, but if predictable, they weren't boring. By the end of the book, we understand much more about who these four main characters are and why Mr. Dumfrey took them in, but it left me wanting more. I knew before I was very far in that I would have to read this whole series, but if I hadn't been able to decide, the last couple of chapters would have sealed that for me. Because I had an ARC there were a few typos and things like that but they weren't obtrusive and were probably fixed in the final version, anyway.