Quid Pro Quo

Unable to afford a babysitter, Cyril Floyd MacIntyre’s single mother, Andy, brought Cyril along to law school as she pushed through her degree, beginning when he was 10. Now he is an adolescent and his mom is a lawyer for the disenfranchised, working at a hole-in-the-wall firm. Byron, a mysterious veteran from Andy’s homeless past, blackmails his way into their small apartment and, annoyingly, takes over Cyril’s room; even more troubling, Andy suddenly disappears. To find his mother, Cyril uses his lawyerly prowess to try and piece together clues from one of her cases. Cyril is sarcastic and hard on his young mother, who has worked hard to leave a life on the streets and provide for her son, and his comments about her and her clients are often off-putting (“I’m 14... She’s 29. You do the math. Pretty nasty, eh?”). But investigation and legal components—each chapter starts with a definition of a legal term that relates to the chapter’s events—will engage fans of straightforward mysteries. Ages 9–12. [em](Aug.) [/em]