The Secret of the Golden Flower

Gr 6–9—Readers seeking action and intrigue, meet Nicki Haddon. She was adopted into a wealthy British family, yet there are nagging, unanswered questions about her Chinese heritage. Does the British equivalent of the CIA seek her help because she is savvy and intelligent, or is she recruited because of her Kung Fu black belt? In the opening pages, Nicki and her butler become enmeshed in a frantic search for a slim, ancient Chinese volume on alchemy. Nicki finds clues in a bouquet of flowers. She uncovers connections between a lost Chinese book and a lucrative international drug ring based in London. The teen sleuth never fails to pick up on subtle clues involving coded text messages, and she has great instincts about clever high-tech work-arounds, like using a disabled cell phone as a GPS tracking device. There never seem to be too many new twists or details for Nicki to juggle, and the pace of the action is brisk. There are ample background details about London and upper crust England, as well as Chinese culture and history.