Who Killed Darius Drake?

Name: William Joseph
Price range: $

by Rodman Philbrick

Interest age: 9 to 12
Reading age: 9+

Published by Usborne, 2018

About this book

When he receives a mysterious letter written in blood asking, ‘Who Killed Darius Drake?’, Darius – who is very much alive – is determined to find out who sent it and why. Recruiting schoolmate Arthur’s help, the first clue leads them to a creepy old abandoned house across town. But what they find there is not what they expected.

With its strange, underhanded threat, the letter is a catalyst that leads the boys into a deep plot involving a mysterious town legend, a family tragedy, and clues to finding the priceless, long-lost Dunbar Diamonds. Can Arthur, Darius, and Arthur’s step-sister Deidre solve this hundred-year-old mystery for good – and escape those who’d kill for the treasure?

A crime mystery with a treasure-hunting twist, readers are kept guessing right up to the end. Does someone want Darius dead? Who’s lying and who’s telling the truth? Can anyone be trusted? Meanwhile, Rodman Philbrick cleverly turns character stereotypes inside out – Arthur, stocky and obsessed with food, isn’t the dim bully everyone’s decided he is, and Darius, orphan and science nerd, is perfectly happy living in a children’s home.

A pacey, page-turning read with a dramatic conclusion.

Read an extract from Who Killed Darius Drake?

About the author

Rodman Philbrick was born in Boston, Massachusetts and grew up in a small town on the coast of New Hampshire in the United States of America. He has been writing since the age of sixteen and had published more than a dozen novels for adults before the publication of his first book for younger readers, Freak the Mighty in 1993. Since then, he has won numerous awards and honours, and had Freak the Mighty adapted into a Golden Globe-nominated film starring Sharon Stone, Gillian Anderson and James Gandolfini in 1998. He worked as both a longshoreman and a boat builder in his younger years and is still an avid fisherman, practicing what he describes as the fine art of angling as frequently as possible.