London Eye Mystery

Dowd, Siobhan. The London Eye Mystery. New York: Yearling, 2007. Print.

In The London Eye Mystery, Salim, a cousin of Kat and Ted Sparks is coming to visit along with his mother before they move to New York City.  While in London, the kids decide to go to London’s Eye, a gigantic ferris wheel on the Thames River.  Salim gets on the wheel but does not appear to get off.  The cousins look for him, but there is no sign of him.

From this point on, the novel is a search for Salim, using pictures, recreating events, theories (of varying believability) and and any other clues they can discover.  Ted and his unique way of looking at the situation slowly unscrews the bolts of the mystery and discovers that Salim, his friend Marcus and his cousin Christy were in on a disguise plot that would allow Salim to go back to Manchester and not New York City.  After more tinkering with the known facts, Ted is able to track where Salim is and he deicdes to give New York a six month introduction to see if he likes it. 

After reading The London Eye Mystery, I felt this was book meant for a seventh or eighth grader.  I say this because metaphors, sarcasm and figurative language were firmly present. If a student is a struggling reader or english language learner these tropes would prove to be hurdles that may impede comprehension.  Also, the amount of reasoning and ordering of events requires a high level of understanding and reasoning to fully appreciate the story.  In the same beath, I think that in order to relate to the storyteens could see themselves in Ted’s place in the book and how he is viewed (awkward, odd, unique).  In order to fully appreciate the emotional relationship and struggles of each character, an older reader is necessary. 

Reflecting on The London Eye Mystery, the characters face issues that are believable and interesting to the reader.  Every day we hear about someone who has gone missing and occasionally about how one clue or one person allows finds a solution.  The fact that there are thousands of mysteries concerning people, especially in a big city, shows this is a plausible plot. 

The story offers unique characters, especially Ted, Marcus and Salim.  Ted probably has Aspergers and sees the events in a different light, like some early teenagers may see the world.  Marcus and Salim are going through an identity crisis and unsure of where life will take them.  All of these characters question authority and go over the heads of their superiors to attain their results.  These traits are hallmarks of growing up. 

This novel made me use higher thought processes and making inferences about the story, characters and clues.  The clues were all present and I was trying to figure them out as the story went on, but reaching dead ends.  This examination of the clues and information presented was a thought process and a sort of sub-plot going on in the reader’s head.  Ted’s mystery solving is amazing and inspirational to the reading audience.  Based on his success I think he inspires others to look at problems or mysteries differently to find a solution. 

There were no visible stereotypes in the book except Marcus being called “Paki-boy” by his classmates.  This was only briefly mentioned in the last forty pages of the book.  Otherwise, the characters were represented culturally even-handed. 

Several literary elements I found while reading the text were characterization, person against person and setting as a mood.  Ted was the most interesting character in the text because of his way of looking at the evidence and eventually finding a solution to the mystery.  Characters such as Marcus and Salim had an ace up their sleeve in their disguising and sneaky tricks.  Ted carried most of the character’s weight with his thoughts, theories and personality.

Person vs. person conflict was on full display with all the characters supporting one another but still becoming angry, usually out of concern.  One example of this is Salim and his mother.  They obviously love one another, but Salim went over her to try and escape and she was furious when she found out his plan.  Love was the base of their relationship, but on the surface they were disagreeing and not on the same page about moving to New York City.  Finally, setting as a mood was highlighted throughout the text.  The setting of the London Eye, the motorbike show, the Sparks house and Barracks were all described in detail and central to the plot. 

One mini lesson that could be conducted from the text is to pull up a map of London Manchester and the other specific places mentioned in the novel.  With the intricacies of programs like google maps you could re-trace Salim’s journey.  This would take some research from the class and teacher, but it would make the book and Salim’s journey come to life.