Once Upon a Crime

By Michael Buckley

Rating: 4 stars

Reviewed by Noelle

This is book 4 in the Sisters Grimm series. Picking up where we left off in the third book, The Problem Child (see review, October 2006), Granny Relda, Mr. Canis, Mr. Hamstead, Daphne and Sabrina are all driving pellmell to New York City to find the fairies who live there in the hopes that they can cure the seriously injured Puck. The fairies take in the once-banished Puck to cure him, but the Grimms soon are embroiled in another mystery when Oberon, the King of the Fairies (and Puck's father), turns up dead with a red handprint on his body. The Scarlet Hand strikes again! The Grimms are hired to track down his killer, but as they run into the Everafters living in New York, they uncover another secret. Veronica Grimm, mother of the girls, was heavily involved with helping the Everafter community--and her family knew nothing about it. The news about her mother confuses Sabrina, just when she was deciding to give up fairy tale detective work. But as the family unravels the clues, running into Sinbad the Sailor, Mother Goose, the Seven Dwarves, the Wizard of Oz, and other new characters, Sabrina realizes she is doing just what she is meant to do. There are plenty of chases and escapes, and plenty of humor as usual, in this Sisters Grimm story. Fans will be happy to know book 5, Magic and Other Misdemeanors, will soon be available.