Review: High Rise Mystery by Sharna Jackson

There's no time for child’s play this summer as would-be supersleuths, Nic and Norva, discover a real-life murder on their home turf, otherwise know as south London high-rise, The Tri. 

Deceased art teacher Hugo has been dumped in a refuse skip, and despite a load of suspects and forensic evidence, the assigned police squad seems worryingly shambolic. 

Determined to bring Hugo's killers to justice, the eagle-eyed sisters initiate a thorough investigation, aiming to solve their first heinous crime way too close to home! 

Sharna Jackson's debut mid-grade mystery with cliffhangers aplenty won the Waterstones' Best Book for Younger Readers 2020. And, with two Black protagonists as detectives—a role Black children rarely get to inhabit—it's a much-needed addition to the growing children's crime/detective subgenre. 

As is customary in detective duos, there's a detail-orientated rational one (Nic) balanced by a more intuitive, touchy-feely partner (Norva). Combined they are an unstoppable force, their dialogue peppered with Gen Alpha street-speak befitting the vibrant urban setting.  

The girls' vulnerability sometimes cuts through their bantery teenage bravado, and Jackson judges these serious and playful moments insightfully. For example, through tummy aches, dry mouths, and tears we glimpse how the traumatic murder has taken a mental and physical toll on the girls. They've thrust themselves into a dangerous adult situation while being just a bit too young to fully handle the heat, and this nuanced characterisation is exceptionally strong. 

Like all the best whodunnits, we have a diverse array of suspects, from various ethnic backgrounds. We see a community sharing food, gossip, and charitable tasks, in between the odd tense neighbourly disagreement. Jackson deftly drip-feeds intriguing clues as to their alibis and motives, right up until the final nail-biting chapter. She also portrays a Black man as a prime suspect while white locals are overlooked by the police. Reading this in the same month a British Black barrister was mistaken for a defendant feels a particularly poignant social commentary.

The utter incompetence of police officers in the story, to the extent they ignore child safeguarding issues, is a little overplayed—you have to suspend disbelief quite a lot—but ultimately it's a forgivable flaw that enables the resourceful youngsters to complete their mission without restrictions, even in the small hours, serving to heighten the sense of jeopardy.

But as the intricate dialogue-driven twists and turns become pacier, at times you lose a sense of the plot—more narrative may have provided extra processing time. And despite the widely-spaced text and fun graphical inserts from the girls' detailed case file, at over 350 pages the book might be too demanding for some year 6 readers. So many areas are explored: love and anger, generosity and greed, friendships and family relationships. As murder and death are significant themes, you'll need to check the maturity levels of readers to ensure suitability. 

If this text is appropriate for your children, it could be used to inspire creative writing, for example, police or newspaper reports, persuasive letters from Serena's extortionists, or from Nic and Norva complaining to the police chief. Children might also enjoy hot-seating characters, scripting and performing their own dramatic dialogue, or filming prepared news reports (computing/drama). They could also create detailed drawings of the urban high-rise setting (art and design).     

High Rise Mystery is a thrilling page-turner that forces you to dive into the girls' adventure-filled world and not come up for air until they're done! As well as this, it shines a light on modern-day council estates—and the good and bad surprises that might be waiting around block corners. If this first novel is anything to go by, the sequel is bound to be a corker! 

Guide for teachers and parents

Genre	Mystery: crime/detective fiction
Child-led interests (EYFS)	N/A
Age group (EYFS, KS1, KS2)	KS2 (year 6 only)
Curriculum links/topics (EYFS/NC)	English: Spoken language (Y1-6) - ·     give well-structured descriptions, explanations and narratives for different purposes, including for expressing feelings ·      use spoken language to develop understanding ·     participate in discussions, presentations, performances, role play/improvisations and debates ·     gain, maintain and monitor the interest of the listener(s) ·     consider and evaluate different viewpoints, attending to and building on the contributions of others ·     select and use appropriate registers for effective communication Reading comprehension (Y6) - ·     increasing their familiarity with a wide range of books, including myths, legends and traditional stories, modern fiction, fiction from our literary heritage, and books from other cultures and tradition ·     preparing poems and plays to read aloud and to perform, showing understanding through intonation, tone and volume so that the meaning is clear to an audience ·     checking that the book makes sense to them, discussing their understanding and exploring the meaning of words in context ·      asking questions to improve their understanding ·     drawing inferences such as inferring characters’ feelings, thoughts and motives from their actions, and justifying inferences with evidence ·     predicting what might happen from details stated and implied ·     summarising the main ideas drawn from more than 1 paragraph, identifying key details that support the main ideas ·    identifying how language, structure and presentation contribute to meaning ·     participate in discussions about books that are read to them and those they can read for themselves, building on their own and others’ ideas and challenging views courteously Computing - select, use and combine a variety of software (including internet services) on a range of digital devices to design and create a range of programs, systems and content that accomplish given goals, including collecting, analysing, evaluating and presenting data and information Art and design - to create sketch books to record their observations and use them to review and revisit ideas; to improve their mastery of art and design techniques, including drawing, painting and sculpture with a range of materials [for example, pencil, charcoal, paint, clay]
Suitability	whole-class, school/class library, home reader
General features	chronological structure with flashbacks and cliff-hangers to add suspense; informal dialogue; familiar setting but something unusual has happened; drip-feeding of factual/clues; layering of info; use of questions to intensify the mystery (What about his limp?/ Oh my god, who’s that?); omission of names/use of pronouns to add mystery (The door to the hub swung open. The smell of diesel filled the room./ Someone was leaning against the wall…); mysterious language (wrong, odd, strange)

All the Black children's books that I review are checked against my Jericho Benchmark.