The Body in the Blitz by Robin Stevens is an excellent GAD style crime story for younger readers. Set, as the title suggests, during the Second World War, it evokes the period well. I think, too, that the characters are well-drawn, and I can just about accept the premise of young children being trained up as spies. What I cannot accept, however, is that anyone would see the everlastingly annoying May Wong (yes, sister of Hazel) as a potential spy. She leaps off the page as a fully formed ten year-old, angry, loud, unsubtle and irritating to the enth degree. That's brilliant writing but unconvincing plotting for me.

I also struggled with Robin Stevens' need to include so many characters with disabilities and different sexual orientations. I agree that characters in books for children should be more diverse but not, perhaps, to such an extent in one book. And, if I'm going to be picky (which obviously I am), Mrs Mortensen is her granchildren's farmor, not mormor. But this is still an exciting, page-turning book - and I am not its target audience.

I loved the Wells and Wong detective series and the first book in this new series: The Ministry of Unladylike Behaviour, in which May, Eric and Finula (Finnuala) try to get taken on by the Ministry to do war work and find themselves solving a murder case in a country house instead. I wrote then: 'Robin Stevens has ended her Murder Most Unladylike series and The Ministry of Unladylike Activity is the first in a new series, set during the Second World War. Hazel Wong’s younger sister May is still at Deepdean, which she hates, and is cut off by the war from her home in Hong Kong. Her aim is to be a spy, so that the war will end quickly. She teams up with a bright boy called Eric and they then join forces with a girl called Nuala. May and Nuala take an instant dislike to one another, so it’s only towards the end of the book that the three really work together. Daisy and Hazel were already a team at the start of the first series and I think this new series will improve now that there is a team of three working as spies and detectives' I was right and the three are now a team. As a result of their success at solving mysteries, they have been taken on by the Ministry, where Daisy and Hazel have important jobs. The children (yes, it is unlikely) are set to work learning codes and how to decipher them. It’s important work and Eric is especially good at it.

While in London, in the middle of the Blitz, they are living in a mews house (Stevens’ nod to Agatha Christie’s Murder in the Mews). The end house in the row has been destroyed in the blitz, making the next house dangerously unstable. Breaking all the rules, the children enter the house and discover a body in the basement. But whose body? The house had been thoroughly searched by wardens after the bomb fell, so had been put there afterwards. Is it missing Anna, whose parents and brother live in the mews? Our heroes are not convinced. Their investigations involve a lot of dangerous crawling about in roof spaces and they both see and overhear some strange things. They conclude that the body is that of an unpopular woman who is said to have gone away to the country. As their investigations continue, they start to wonder if every person in the street is involved in some way and they’re not far wrong. The mystery is a good one, the street is full of interesting and suspicious characters and the three children are quarrelsome yet brave and supportive of each other. I loved it.

Caveat. I’m not sure about the morality of the book’s ending. Bad things happen in war and the children are told that sometimes a bad thing must be done so that good can come of it. But cold-blooded murder of someone who was not actually a traitor? I also found the author’s acknowledgements very irritating. I don’t need to be lectured about black, Jewish, disabled or trans people and read the book as a child might, just accepting all these carefully placed characters. After enjoying the book so much, I found all this very off-putting and wished I hadn’t bothered to read the author’s comments. I have to add that I discussed this with my daughter and she disagreed with me, so I guess I’m just too old.

I loved everything that Robin Stevens write and this one is no exception. May is as stubborn as ever and as always, I can never guess or predict where the story or characters are going and I am dying for her next release!

This is the second in Robin Stevens’ WW2-set mystery adventure series for middle graders and we find our intrepid trio in London in the Blitz to help the ministry and getting caught up in a mystery in the mews they are staying in. I liked the first book in this series better than this one but I think the premise of the new series is fundamentally a little harder for an adult to get on board with than Stevens’ Wells and Wong series was. But putting that aside, it’s a fun mystery in an atmospheric and scary setting and young readers who haven’t read or studied world war 2 will probably learn a lot from this by osmosis. I just wish the leads were a few years older to make it all seem a little more plausible. But then I’m a boring grown up! 😂

This is the second book as I belatedly realised, but it can be read as a stand alone novel, however, the first few chapters are taken up by explanations of the previous escapade, probably best to read these books in the order the author intended.
This book is full of spiky and incredible characters. Eric, May and Nuala are just children, but they show great determination and logic in this unusual detective story.
Children are always underestimated, as adults, we forget what little ears hear! They may not always understand the relevance of certain remarks, but these youngsters, ignore them at your peril.
Set in the Blitz, 1941, this is immaculately detailed and researched. Equal roles given to both boys and girls, this is a step up from the Enid Blyton books I used to read. Life is turned upside down when it is the adults who lie and the children taken on adult responsibilities, a real role reversal.
I loved the diary pages, a list of clues and events as the investigation progressed, and as each theory was disproved, the diary was updated. The reasonings were excellent, and I enjoyed trying to uncover the guilty party as much as the children did. Thanks to Napoleon Bonaparte, I managed to solve that one clue, it is a book that is easily addictive.
I found this to be an exciting and informative detective story, full of historical facts, but used lightly, these facts don’t swamp the story.
I hope my eldest Grandson will enjoy this book for his birthday, anything to get him away from superheroes ,and it might even help in his history lessons!
I gave this a five star rating, and hope this series will continue.
My thanks to Netgalley and the publishers, Penguin Random House UK, for my advance digital copy, freely given in exchange for my honest review. I will leave a copy of this review to Goodreads and Amazon UK.

Body in the Blitz is the second historic mystery adventure in The Ministry of Unladylike Activity series. Packed full of dark happenings, secret codes, government agents and suspicious characters, readers will adore solving the mystery of an unexplained dead body right along with Nuala, May and Eric.
It’s April 1941. Nuala and May are summoned to London to continue with their training as agents and coders. The war means many of the working agents are on missions or have gone missing. It’s time for the younger members of the ministry to step up and take their places. It’s exciting being a spy but even more exciting solving mysteries right around the corner!
Readers can always rely on Robin Stevens for a cracking mystery, fantastic young detectives and unexpected twists!

There aren't many things you can count on in this life, the weather is spiralling, political systems are crumbling, ACTUAL FASCISM is on the rise, minorities are being attacked. It all sucks and keeps changing.

What you can rely on is Robin Stevens. You know you will get a solid central mystery. You can expect characters you root for, and child protagonists who do act rashly and make mistakes, but outwit the adults anyway. Given the historical setting they always have a stunning amount of diversity, particularly for the LGBTQ+ community at the moment, but worked in and never incongruous to the time.

Body in the Blitz is great, expanding Nuala and Eric in particular, but with a cracking mystery - and given the new war time setting for this series it was super smart to have the first story be out in the country, and the second to put them in the heart of London in the Blitz, to really educate children on the day to day horrors and struggles faced by bombings, shortages and rations, but in an age appropriate way.

Great stuff, long may these series continue.

May, Eric and Nuala are back and this time they are in London, training to be spies at the Ministry. They are staying close by in Hogarth Mews, a street that was partially bombed during one of the blitz raids. However, when they discover a body in the basement of the bombed out house, there is something distinctly suspicious about it, especially when they find out that the body wasn't there when the house was searched just after the bombing. With Daisy away on a mission, May, Eric and Nuala decide to investigate the death themselves but things are proving trickier than expected.
It was great to be back with Nuala, May and Eric and to see the relationship develop between them. They are three very different characters but they work well together. Nuala is thrilled to have joined May at Deepdean and is loving lessons and the friendships she is forming; however, May is finding this frustrating: she wants Nuala all to herself. We definitely get to see May's impulsive and hot headed side in this book and I can imagine there will be readers who find her annoying. Me I enjoyed, the contrast. Then there is Eric, who is the steadying influence; a thinker, he enjoys the coding lessons they have at the Ministry and is quick with languages. Together they make a formidable team.

Robin has become synonymous with murder mysteries and is the Agatha Christie of the MG world. In The Body In The Blitz, she combines murder mystery with the gritty life of 1940s Britain, and does so brilliantly. Whilst the mystery will keep you guessing, the setting in 1941 London shines a spot-light on what everyday people experienced during WWII: the fear of being bombed is never far away, and the nightly raids and sirens bring home how exhausting and scary life was for Londoners of all ages.

With familiar characters appearing alongside new, The Body In The Blitz is another triumph of a book and one I know is being eagerly awaited by many (there is much talk in school about it already!).

I love these books, you would never guess the ending if you tried! Also a couple links to the first one, which I liked. Highly enjoyable. Would recommend. Happy Reading!

Robin Stevens is the best writer in the world according to one of my grandchildren ! That aside, we all enjoy Ms Stevens books and this is another worth addition to her catalogue. Her stories always have relatable characters, convincing settings and lots of excitement and mysteries. The stories have great Agatha Christie style mysteries which are more suitable for all of the family.

3.5* rounded up, but I would rather not give this a rating at all.

As a huge fan of the Murder Most Unladylike series as well as the first Ministry book, I thought The Body in the Blitz was just okay; the best way to describe it would be that I think this would have been a great book to binge read as part of a series. The characters and interactions were a delight - May was absolutely my favourite and I just loved how Nuala described her. I did enjoy the MMU character cameos but I thought the book relied too much on them. The mystery was alright, not one of my favourites as I'm not a big fan of mysteries where the characters work for the government, and maybe for this reason I felt this was just not as good as Robin Stevens' other books. However, I'm still really happy that I got to read this and I'm excited to read the next instalment.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing this book for review. All opinions are my own.

Starting a new series after bringing an enormously successful one to a close must be a challenge for any writer, let alone one working in middle grade fiction where readers are ferociously loyal. Robin Stevens has handled the transition from the Murder Most Unladylike series to the Ministry of Unladylike Activity series deftly: by centring a minor character (May, Hazel’s youngest sister) from the first series within the second.

This, the second book in the new series, worked much better for me than the first did, ironically by de-centring May (who I found an irritatingly irascible narrator in last year’s series opener, The Ministry of Unladylike Activity). Long time readers will enjoy glimpses of old favourite characters, while new readers will find much to enjoy in the Blitz setting and ingeniously confounding mystery.

Recommended for readers ages 9-14 (or adults who, like me, refuse to grow up).

Almost six months after leaving teaching, I was talking with a friend recently about what I am currently up to when they suggested that I combine my lack of employment with my love of reading to write my own book -something for children, or a murder mystery. Not having offspring of their own, their views on children’s literature are entirely based on their own reading – mostly, I suspect, fluffy books and Enid Blyton as a child – and when I told them how much I enjoyed reading murder mysteries for young readers, and that I would love to write one, they were genuinely shocked that such reads exist.

Sadly, they are not open to the idea of reading anything other than adult books but if they were my first port of call to recommend to them would be Robin Stevens’s Murder Most Unladylike series – one that I absolutely adore. These are the sort of high quality, engaging and inclusive reads that I loved to share when I taught Year 5 and I cannot begin to tell you how thrilled I was that this new spin-off series has continued in the same vein. Starring May – the younger sister of original Detective Society member Hazel – together with new characters Eric and Nuala, this is another original and highly entertaining series that refuses to patronise young readers as it leads them into a thrilling world of espionage and murder set against the backdrop of World War II.

After the adventure that brought the three of them together, Nuala has joined May at Deepdean – the school she detests – and our story opens with Nuala telling us that she will be narrating this story, as May feels she has done her bit. When Hazel contacts them to tell them they are needed in London, they are soon on their way and are met by Hazel and friend Alexander before being taken to Hogarth Mews, where they are to stay. Noting that one side of the close has been split into flats while the other has been left as houses, Nuala also notices that one of the houses has been hit by a bomb and Hazel tells her that it is empty, as is the one next door, as the occupants have all left for the relative safety of the countryside. Alexander then fills Nuala and May in on the residents of the street before they are joined by Hazel and Alexander’s friend George, together with Eric.

Soon, the three children find themselves at the nearby Ministry, where they are to be trained in codes and languages – something that annoys May enormously, as it reminds her of Deepdean, but to which Eric and Nuala soon settle themselves and it is not long before they learn that they have been drafted in to help as several agents are missing in action, including Hazel’s best friend Daisy.

Back at Hogarth Mews, May, Nuala and Eric start to acquaint themselves with the other residents and while visiting a family there May argues with the others and storms off to investigate the bombed-out house in the hopes of finding hidden gold, accompanied by the family’s dog. When the dog accidentally falls through a hole into the basement of the house, Nuala follows it down and is horrified to discover not gold but a body: a body that has been there for some time but was not there when the place was searched after the bomb hit. Wondering how it got there, May, Nuala and Eric quickly realise the body has not just been put there but was put there after being killed and the three of them start to investigate a murder – a murder that is linked not just to the Ministry but to the missing spies. With Daisy possibly in terrible danger, can the newest members of the Ministry of Unladylike Activity solve the case and bring her home?

Having been introduced to us in Book 1, May, Nuala and Eric are now well-established characters and it’s very interesting to see how the relationships between not just them but the adults around them develop here. All three of them share great intelligence but they are very different from one another, and do not share the same bond that Daisy and Hazel always have. While the founder members of the Detective Society have always had their differences, Hazel has generally tolerated playing second fiddle to Daisy but here, Nuala and May do not share that kind of relationship. May is impulsive, easily bored and struggles to accept that Nuala not only enjoys the opportunity to attend school but enjoys it and gets on well with her peers, while Nuala – who has spent much of her life surrounded by adults and travelling – relishes the routine and security that Deepdean brings her.

Eric is a steadying influence on both of them. Already personally affected by the ongoing war, he is a deep thinker and has a real flare for coding and languages, which frustrates May enormously. Together they complement one another perfectly and as the story unfolds, they all have their own valuable contributions to make to both solving the mystery of the murder and in the runnings of the Ministry, setting the reader up perfectly for Book 3.

An absolutely cracking read, this is perfect for upper KS2 into KS3 and would work perfectly well as a standalone if you haven’t read either the original Murder Most Unladylike series or The Ministry of Unladylike Activity. I adored it and cannot wait to find out what will happen next.

As always, my enormous thanks goes to publisher Puffin Books and to Net Galley for my advance virtual read. The Body in the Blitz publishes 12th October.

I'm a huge fan of Robin Steven's books so I was thrilled to get an early read of The Body in the Blitz. The first book in the Ministry of Unladylike Activity was a brilliant introduction to a new cast of characters alongside a cracking mystery but with this book takes the series to a whole new level. As fully established members of MUA our plucky trip are spirited away from school to help with the war effort and the desperate need for more code crackers. The girls find themselves living in a street where things are not quite as they seem. When a body is found in an abandoned house damaged by a bomb, they find themselves caught up in another murder mystery. This is a really powerful and insightful read to the harsh realities of WW2. Scattered throughout the book we meet some familiar faces from the Murder Most Unladylike series who are now barely adults but find themselves seeing terrible things and experiencing danger that no young person should have to face. The fact that you've watched these characters grow up makes the whole situation even more shocking. All of this is in the background, not given centre stage. In fact the children barely even seem to notice the terrible things that are happening all around them as they've become used to the constant bombing and warning sirens screaming. The mystery is tricky and completely unexpected, keeping the reader guessing until the end. It has now established itself as my new favourite Robin Stevens book. Loved it! I can't recommend it enough for fans of MMU and those who are new to Robin's writing.

The sequel in this new series by mega mystery author Robin Stevens is as brilliant as you might expect. May, Nuala and Eric have been called back from school to London for further spy training. They are billeted with z George and Zoshra, in Hogarth mews, a tiny street hiding in plain sight.

The training can be long and boring but the three detective friends are so happy to be back together. When a body is discovered in the basement of one house, the trio get embroiled in a huge murder case. First, they need to figure out who the body is, as some time has passed and they do not know who it is. Second, there is a growing list of suspects, some in the ministry itself!

Their first case was contained within Elysium Hall but this is larger, with an entire street with potential motives and plenty of secrets being squirrelled away.
Can our favourite baby spies crack the case?

These characters were fantastic, really loveable an endearing. The story was engaging and I loved every second.

I read the first one in record time and have such fond memories of reading it! The second in the series, Body in the Blitz was a fantastic follow on from the first. It’s not absolutely vital to have read the first one as the second one one sets itself up well enough for you to slip into it and pick up everything you need to. But I’d recommend it, because it’s awesome.

I loved being back with our fearsome trio - May, Eric and Nuala and this time, they’re spies in training! They still find themselves wrapped up in a mystery with a dead body on their hands. Or rather, in the rubble of a bombed out house but the dates don’t quite match up and that body shouldn’t be there…

They really are a formidable team and I always enjoy reading how they work together. They all balance each other out so well- the always cautious and meticulous Eric, the clever and confident Fiona and May, the hothead whirlwind who sometimes lets her mouth run quicker than her head. They all really are fab characters!

The plot was so compelling and I couldn’t stop reading. They’re so exciting and you truly get embroiled into the tale.

I’ve loved this series so far and can’t wait for the next instalment!

I had bought the first book of this series ages ago and just hadn't got round to reading it. I started it a few days ago, reading a few pages here and there, and then I saw that the second one was up for review. So I zoomed through it ready for this one. Which meant the two books felt like just one big story.

As with all kids books, I'm considerably older than the target audience, but at over 450 pages long, there's plenty for adults to get their teeth into.

I hadn't heard of Robin Stevens before and so therefore hadn't read any of her books before, but she's opened my eyes on how to write such a detailed and complex story but still make it fun and entertaining for children to read.

Yes I know it's a fictional book just for entertainment purposes. But by writing a book aimed at kids about the war, we ensure that it is not forgotten. With each generation, the memories fade, and we run the risk of forgetting altogether. So yes it is a piece of kiddy fun, but it carries an important message.

I know the 'detectives' are children, but there is an element of Agatha Christie about it, a bit Miss Marple, which was a nice touch.

I am sorry but I really don't like the character of May. She is well written, and I know it's part of her characterisation, which I suppose means Robin has done a good job here, and I know she's only meant to be 11 but she is so annoying. So self-centered and rude and uppity. I wasn't a fan in the first book and I'm still not. I really liked Eric. He is such a sweet character and I'm glad he gets more of a role in this book. Nuala...she grew on me. By the end of the first book, I liked her. And I think she improves in this sequel. There are other characters, adults mainly, but for once it is the children that are front and centre, they run the show and they're important, the adults are just there prop the story.

What I will say is that you know they are children. Yes they're the key players and they're obviously trying to do an adult's job, but they're obviously kids. Robin hasn't been afraid of showing their youth and naivety and inexperience. Yes they make mistakes, they're innocent, they're rough around the edges. She hasn't made them grow up too much and compete with the adults. They provide their own merits away from the adults.

I suppose you could read this one without the first, as it does quickly explain what happened by the end of the first chapter or so, but I don't think you'd get the same impact. I found the first one just a little slow to start with, but this one gets stuck in straight away. It has more about the actual ministry and what they do, and I really enjoyed that.

I do feel at times she has been ab it try hard, trying to shoehorn a number of topics that end up overshadowing the main story. I can't fully explain it, but I hope that if you read this you'll know what I mean. I felt my focus should have been more on the crimes, rather than what was happening in the background, which was a little bit of a shame.

I know it is a kids book, but I've read many kids books as an adult that really thrilled me. If I'm being brutally honest, I did enjoy this, I really did, it was interesting, but it doesn't have a whole lot of depth to it. It's very much a "telling the reader" what is happening rather than showing, but maybe that's what children want from their books.

Having said all of that, I say this is a well written book, much like the first, and is enjoyable and thoughtful and adventurous, with just a few things (I personally think) that need to be ironed out.

Reading this book I was reminded how in the days following the publication of Death in The Spotlight (or, Murder Most Unladylike #7), Robin Stevens got complaints about making her lead character gay. It stuck to my head how bigoted people can be, therefore never did I imagine queer representation, so lacking in books aimed for children, would be the source of my own grievance. But this book was overly suffocated with it that it not only eclipsed the narrative but also felt coerced (three lesbians relationships, one hinted at gay relationship, and one trans character whose trans identity was not integrated to the mystery). This was accentuated by the author's remarks at the end, that the inclusion of trans and disable characters in the book was done at readers' request. I appreciate authors who listen to readers and adjust their representation to reflect a large scope of diversity, but in this case it was too excessive it marred the reading experience.

Nevertheless it was a solid, enjoyable read, with an extensive historical research behind it.