By Saxby Smart, brilliant schoolboy detective

If you’ve read any of my collections of casefiles, you’ll know that as well as solving mysteries for the pupils and staff of St Egbert’s School, I’m also a great fan of detective stories. In fact, thinking about it, most of the books I read involve detectives in one way or another. There’s a small pile of them on my bedside cabinet right now. Books, I mean, not detectives!

A while ago, my great friend George “Muddy” Whitehouse (our school’s resident gizmo genius, and possibly the most oil-and-mud-stained kid in the whole of Europe) was helping me sort some notes out in my garden shed. It’s in the shed that I have my desk, my extensive files of casenotes, and my Thinking Chair, the battered old leather armchair in which I sit and ponder, detective-style, on whatever mind-mangling mystery has recently come my way.

We were re-organising the contents of my filing cabinet. Muddy was about to file my notes on The Case Of The Mexican Diamond under ‘Robberies’, when I said it ought to go under ‘Blackmail’ because that was the whole reason it was nicked in the first place.

“Y’know, Saxby,” said Muddy, scratching at some dried-up egg on his school pullover, “what you don’t know about detectives could fill a book. No, wait a mo, that’s not right… Err, what you know wouldn’t not be enough to make a… No, that’s not it, either… Umm, oh you know what I mean.”

I did. And it got me thinking. In the Sherlock Holmes stories, Holmes is always going on about how he’s going to write a textbook on detective work one day, but he never gets around to it. I thought to myself: no way am I going to make the same mistake!

So shortly after that, I got to work. And the book you’re now holding is the result.

There’s stuff about detectives in fiction, and there’s stuff about detectives in real life. There’s stuff about some of the most notorious events in criminal history, and there are lessons and practical guides covering aspects of How To Be A Detective Yourself (based on my extensive experience of crime-busting!)

Anyway, it’s taken me ages. Mustn’t forget to finish my Geography homework before tomorrow (groan groan)…

Best wishes


Saxby Smart

"The latest addition to the Saxby Smart collection is Saxby Smart's Detective Handbook. Not as colourful and illustrated as my beloved books from when I was a child, but no less enjoyable. This isn't a straightforward 'how to... ' book either, as it also includes case studies of notorious crimes from the past (including grave robbing, Jack the Ripper, Bonnie and Clyde, and many others); background information about fingerprints, blood and ballistics; and profiles of famous writers of classic detective fiction. This is a book that would have been a much-read part of my collection had it been published ## years ago. The blurb on the back of the book states that it is "The essential guide to solving mind-mangling mysteries"  and I think that many an 8+ boy will get as much enjoyment out of this as I did out of my long-lost detective books" - The Book Zone blog

"Simon/Saxby explains the history of crime from body snatchers via the Lindbergh baby to Watergate. The difference between peelers and the FBI. Stuff on blood, and also why the butler did it. The great names like Wilkie Collins and Edgar Allan Poe, Agatha Christie and hardboiled eggs all get a chapter... Great to find such a humorous book which takes crime seriously... And there is information for those of you who need to know how to rob a grave. Which is not the same as snatching bodies, btw. One has come further than the other" - The Bookwitch blog

"The essential guide to solving mind-mangling mysteries!" - Primary Times

"A standalone manual of detection for any would-be sleuth. Included are many cases from history as well as crime fiction characters and their authors, all leading into a section on 'How To Be A Brilliant Schoolkid Detective'. Simon Cheshire's series has many delights and this book is similarly inventive in approach, Saxby Smart has appeal across older primary into secondary ages" - School Librarian magazine

You can read a guest blog written 'by' Saxby about how to write a detective story at So Many Books So Little Time.

Below are PDF files to download - each is a module from the Saxby Smart Home Study Course, which forms part of the Detective Handbook. Learn how to be a brilliant schoolkid detective!

Click here to link through to this book on Amazon.co.uk