Sensible Hare and the Case of Carrots - Hardcover

Daren King is the author of four adult novels - Boxy an Star, which was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award, Jim Giraffe, Tom Boler, and his latest, Manual. He lives in the UK.

David Roberts is a highly acclaimed illustrator, both for children's and adult books, whose credits include Mouse Noses on Toast, Philip Ardagh's Eddie Dickens Trilogy and Tom Baker's The Boy Who Kicked Pigs.

King opens this madcap detective chapter book by admitting that “Sensible Hare was not a sensible hare.” He then runs his daft hero through all manner of silliness as Sensible sets to work solving the mystery of a missing suitcase full of carrots. Sensible runs afoul of a menacing landlord who totes around three mini–menacing landlords in his pocket, a gaggle of dopey and dastardly villains, and a squad of buffoonish, tea-drinking constables. He’s helped along by his pal Ottoman Otter, who, for no reason at all, has a thimble, and “had named the thimble Thimble, after his grandma, Thimble Otter, who had been named after a thimble.” That should clue you in to the sensibility at work here, which shoots for wacko humor in lieu of sense at every juncture. While some might get tripped up in all the zany zigzags, fans of Bruce Hale’s Chet Gecko mysteries who don’t mind some heavy absurdity will find it a hoot. Roberts’ line illustrations, a sort of cartoonish take on Edward Gorey’s Mystery! work, help set the oddball scene. Grades 2-4. --Ian Chipman