Galumphing and swanking around

A middle grade British boarding school murder mystery

Hi, friends,

Mealworms are pretty dang grody looking—especially in large quantities, like those big bags of them you can buy at Agway?—AND they’re expensive, but I have never been more tempted to buy some. We’ve got a couple of pairs of bluebirds completely chowing down on the mealworm suet we’ve got out, and I bet they’d be even more into just straight-up mealworms on a platter?

I want to keep them happy so they stick around, and maybe call some of their friends. It’s so heartening to see that flash of bright blue and rusty orange, even in the middle of a snowy day.

The goldfinches are starting to get yellower, too.

In related news, I am 900 years old.

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Set in 1936, A Girl Called Justice follows twelve-year-old Justice Jones, the daughter of a barrister and a mystery novelist. It’s shortly after the death of her mother—the mystery novelist—and Justice is headed to boarding school for the first time. Insert the requisite mean girl, incomprehensible slang, terrible food, muddy lacrosse games, freezing dorm, beautiful Head Girl, and some midnight feasts.

But then, as this is a boarding school MURDER MYSTERY, also add in a locked—and possibly haunted?—tower, a suspicious death, possible poisoning, possible kidnapping, and a legit murder. It took a little while to win me over—at first it was feeling enjoyable, but maybe not memorable to the point that I’d be tracking down the next two in the series—but once the murder happened, it turned ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS and I jumped fully in with both feet.

In other words, I will DEFINITELY be reading the next two.

This was the line that did it:

Saturday afternoons were normally devoted to sport but, with Miss Thomas unavoidably detained by death, this was obviously impossible.

Is it not just, like, the perfect encapsulation of the subgenre?

And then there was this:

Justice had forgotten that there was a rehearsal that evening. Frankly it wasn’t much of a punishment to miss seeing Rose and Helena swanking around in white nightdresses.

Which, sure, I use “swanning around” with probably excessive regularity, but SWANKING AROUND might be even better and I might start working it in, if only to give swanning around a break.

AND she used the word “galumphed,” which is my current favorite. As Oliver Trask—the tooliest tool to ever tool, ifykyk—would smarmily say: “It’s so much fun to say.”

ALSO, there was this, a moment so true to our home life—we heat with wood, and in the winter, it’s pretty common for us to wake up to a house that’s in the low-40s—that I read it aloud to Josh and he was like, YEP, IT’S AN ARTFORM:

The dormy was freezing as ever. Justice tried to get into her pyjamas as quickly as possible, without ever once exposing any skin.

Easy, breezy, funny, smart, super-duper charm-a-roo fun.

Did I just smash the ORDER button on the entire series? You bet I did.

And I was even able to justify the cost to myself because they’re not just for me! They’re also for Josh, who is very very much a fan of middle grade mysteries starring precocious girl sleuths, and he was visibly bummed out that I had to return this one to the library before he got a crack at it.

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Movie posters: The Woods (2006), and Seance (2021)

Watching: Boarding School Horror

I’ve been off movies for a bit, but Justice Jones inspired me to watch a couple of boarding school movies—one that I’d seen a million years ago, and one that was new to me—and now it feels like I might be back on the train again.

The Woods (2006, Lucky McKee): Set in the 1960s, this one is about a girl who is sent off to boarding school after clashing with her mother one too many times. Patricia Clarkson is the IMPECCABLY DRESSED headmistress and it is clear from the get-go that the adults on campus are up to NO GOOD. Lots of parallels, plot-wise, with Suspiria. SUPER atmospheric, especially in the first two acts, and despite getting kinda silly towards the end, it all holds up surprisingly well. It’s a different kind of movie, but I’d put it up there with The Craft for 90s-00s girl-centric teen horror. Also, Bruce Campbell is in it.

Seance (2021, Simon Barrett): This one… was more of a mixed bag. Contemporary, combination ghost story/mean girls/slasher/whodunnit—up until the third act I was engaged but unenthusiastic, but the shift in the third act was hugely fun. I’d argue that the ending is pretty wobbly, and I’d advise to go in knowing that this is definitely one that you can’t poke too hard at if you want to enjoy it—because the second you start to ask questions, the entire thing unravels.

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Shot of the very very blue ocean and a very very blue sky, taken from the Marginal Way in Ogunquit.

I was out walking yesterday and I had one of those moments, looking at the ocean—there’s no filter on that picture, that’s really how absurdly blue everything was—where I was reminded that we are very very small and the world is very very big*, and it’ll all outlast us. And, I don’t know, that gave me a weird sense of comfort?

Talk soon,
Leila

*I mean, unless you look at it from space. But you know what I mean.