Amanda Lester, Detective Box Set Read online

  Boxed Set: Amanda Lester, Detective, Books 1-4

  (Legatum Continuatum Year 1)

  Paula Berinstein

  The Writing Show

  The books readers are calling “Sherlock Holmes meets Nancy Drew meets Harry Potter”

  Amanda Lester and the Pink Sugar Conspiracy

  (Amanda Lester, Detective #1)

  Paula Berinstein

  Copyright © 2015 Paula Berinstein

  All Rights Reserved

  Amanda Lester and the Orange Crystal Crisis

  (Amanda Lester, Detective #2)

  Paula Berinstein

  Copyright © 2015 Paula Berinstein

  All Rights Reserved

  Amanda Lester and the Purple Rainbow Puzzle

  (Amanda Lester, Detective #3)

  Paula Berinstein

  Copyright © 2015 Paula Berinstein

  All Rights Reserved

  Amanda Lester and the Blue Peacocks’ Secret

  (Amanda Lester, Detective #4)

  Paula Berinstein

  Copyright © 2016 Paula Berinstein

  All Rights Reserved

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s twisted imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  All rights reserved. Thank you for not scanning, uploading, or sharing any part of this book electronically without permission. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact the author at [email protected].

  The Writing Show

  P.O. Box 2970

  Agoura Hills, CA 91376-2970

  www.amandalester.net

  ISBN: xxx (ebook)

  ISBN-10: xxx (ebook)

  Cover design: Anna Mogileva

  Amanda Lester

  and the

  Pink Sugar Conspiracy

  PAULA BERINSTEIN

  The Writing Show

  Table of Contents

  The Legatum Garage Parking Area

  Houses and Common Rooms

  Legatum Floor Plans

  Chapter 1: The End of the Stick Dogs

  Chapter 2: The Secret Detective School

  Chapter 3: A Detective’s Mystique

  Chapter 4: Mysterious Shapes

  Chapter 5: The Inimitable Simon Binkle

  Chapter 6: Funny Desserts

  Chapter 7: The Monster Mash

  Chapter 8: The Class Project

  Chapter 9: Pink Powder

  Chapter 10: Amanda the Spy

  Chapter 11: Explosion!

  Chapter 12: Cutting Class

  Chapter 13: A Ticking Clock

  Chapter 14: Holmes Productions

  Chapter 15: The Garage

  Chapter 16: Gluppy Things

  Chapter 17: The Secret Room

  Chapter 18: Slime Mold

  Chapter 19: Thinking Like a Criminal

  Chapter 20: Snow Globe

  Chapter 21: Counting Calories

  Chapter 22: Secret Room Redux

  Chapter 23: Threats

  Chapter 24: A Kick in the Nose

  Chapter 25: 3D Printing

  Chapter 26: Body Snatching

  Chapter 27: Putting Two and Two Together

  Chapter 28: Bunch of Nut Jobs

  Chapter 29: Stowaway

  Chapter 30: Monkeyshines

  Chapter 31: The Sugar Factory

  Chapter 32: Schola Sceleratorum

  Chapter 33: Trapped

  Chapter 34: Acting

  Chapter 35: Confrontation

  Chapter 36: The Class Project Explained

  Chapter 37: More Questions Than Answers

  Legatum Continuatum Class Descriptions

  Some Famous Detectives

  Discussion Questions for Your Reading Group

  Q and A with Author Paula Berinstein

  Grab a Free Ivy Story!

  Houses and Common Rooms

  Holmes House. The Holmes House dorms are located on the second floor of the main building. (In English terms, the second floor is what Americans think of as the third floor. An English first floor is an American second floor.)The common room is on the ground floor in the east wing outside the dining room.

  Father Brown House. The Father Brown House dorms are also located on the second floor. The common room is on the ground floor in the north wing past the dining room, toward the chapel.

  Van Helden House. The Van Helden House dorms are located on the first floor. The common room is on the ground floor under the boys’ dorm.

  Dupin House. The Dupin House dorms are also located on the first floor. The common room is on the ground floor between the Holmes House common room and the Police Procedures classroom.

  The Legatum Garage Parking Area

  Sharp image available at amandalester.net.

  Legatum Floor Plans

  Sharp images available at amandalester.net.

  1

  The End of the Stick Dogs

  Amanda Lester was so tired of hearing about the great Sherlock Holmes she could scream. Mr. La-di-da boring detective, whoop-de-doo. Night and day, day and night, he was all her parents talked about. “It’s time to get serious, Amanda. When I was your age, I had already memorized Sherlock Holmes’s complete memoirs.” “Darling, that will never work. You must do it like Sherlock Holmes.” “Did I tell you what Mergatroyd Thumbwhistle said about Sherlock Holmes?” She loved her parents but they were so clueless.

  Why couldn’t they see that she wasn’t interested in becoming a detective and never would be? Just because the profession ran in her family, so what? Sure, her dad was descended from Inspector G. Lestrade of Scotland Yard—the police detective who worked with Holmes—but that didn’t mean she had to be like him. Genes weren’t destiny. At least she hoped they weren’t. The man was a disaster, an inconvenient fact that seemed to escape the Lesters, who fervently believed that Holmes and Lestrade were equals.

  No, she had more important things to think about. She was a filmmaker. She’d discovered her passion at the age of three, which meant she’d been at it for nine years. That was practically a decade! “Lunchpail,” the film she’d written and directed when she was seven, was her masterpiece, although “Mynah Bird,” which she’d produced at ten, came in at a close second. Of course “A Distant Snail” was good too, but she should have animated it rather than trying to film actual snails, which hadn’t been very cooperative, especially during the racing scenes.

  Now, at twelve, all that was behind her. She was practically an adult. It was time to get down to business—if she could just clear a few teensy eensy hurdles, like the fact that no one would work with her anymore because she was too bossy, and that thing about her parents threatening to send her to boarding school if she didn’t drop that “frivolous hobby.” So she had to keep her meetings with the Stick Dog Filmmakers Club and Production Company a secret. If Herb and Lila Lester found out she was still making movies they’d ruin everything.

  Of course there was another minor problem. The Stick Dogs weren’t actually producing anything. They’d been meeting for months and had got nowhere. It seemed that even after all this time, Amanda and her friends Laurie Wong and Jill Javor couldn’t agree on a concept. With the deadline for entering the Kangaroo Egg Film Festival rapidly approaching, they were headed for disaster and she was as nervous as could be. If they didn’t make it this time, they’d have to admit defeat and disband. Amanda had already lost everyone else she’d worked with. Without Jill and Laurie she’d have no actors, no crew, and no help, and her career would be over.

  She glanced at the time. Three-fifty. O
nly a few minutes till the meeting so she’d better scoot.

  She turned back to the email she couldn’t believe she’d received and had already read seventy-three times. Darius Plover, her favorite director, had actually answered her! It had taken a couple of months, but here the message was, in all its glory—three short but dazzling paragraphs from the man who’d made “Scaffold,” “Night of the Turkey,” and “Dirigible.” She’d never expected him to get back to her. She was in heaven.

  Dear Miss Lester,

  Thank you for your lovely note. I am honored that you’ve enjoyed my films.

  Regarding your question about the best way for directors to work with actors, the most important thing is to respect them. They are artists, just like you. Don’t try to micromanage them. That way they will enjoy working with you and your films will shine.

  Please keep me posted on your work. I’d love to hear from you anytime.

  Sincerely,

  Darius Plover.

  He was so nice! Maybe geniuses weren’t all nasty and weird. And his advice was perfect. Now that she thought about it, it was obvious she’d been doing it wrong. She’d let her ambition get in the way and had driven her actors crazy. No wonder they’d all quit. From now on she’d be more patient.

  But what if being patient didn’t fix the problem? Maybe she was just no good, or too weird, and that was why they had all left her. Maybe the culprit was those Lestrade genes. Not that Holmes was any better. In fact in some ways he was worse. Sure, he was smart, but he was creepy and didn’t have any friends. Detectives never did. Actually, she might be well suited to being one after all. She didn’t have any friends either. Jill and Laurie were just colleagues.

  Amanda clutched her phone to her chest and held it tight. If she weren’t so afraid of her parents’ reaction, she’d print the email, frame it, and accord it a place of honor over her desk, right between her pictures of Ang Lee and Charlie Kaufman. Unfortunately she’d have to keep it to herself. She could never tell anyone about it for fear that it would get back to them. If that happened she’d never hear the end of it, especially from her mom.

  She threw the phone in her bag and walked the two long, shady blocks from Ysidro Middle School to Laurie’s big white colonial house. The formal structure looked out of place among the warm, inviting hacienda-style homes that surrounded it. Not that most people cared. She did, though. It made the street look like the set designer had goofed.

  When she arrived the girls were hanging around in Laurie’s lemon yellow room with the emerald green carpet (not good for shooting scenes—the light was awful—but okay for planning them) with cups of cocoa, talking animatedly. That wasn’t new, but the subject was.

  “We’ve got it,” said Jill, her braces reflecting the afternoon light and flashing patterns on the wall. With those green eyes and purple-streaked blonde hair she looked like a human color wheel.

  “Got what?” said Amanda, slurping a marshmallow.

  “The best idea for the film,” said Jill.

  Amanda was excited to hear this. Maybe their problems were finally behind them. She leaned forward, which was not such a wise idea when you were trying to manage a hot drink.

  Jill beamed at her and Amanda could see bits of cookie between her teeth. Apparently the girls had already been partaking. “Let’s forget all about the psychological thriller. We’ll make a detective story!” She sat back and waited for a response.

  Amanda practically choked. No, no, no! They were going to make a serious drama. They’d already agreed, although it had taken them two months to come to the decision. They’d floated the idea of a horror movie (easy because it didn’t cost much, but not really them), then a comedy (a problem because none of them was that funny), and then a quirky movie about a restaurant, but they could never get the script right. Well, she couldn’t get the script right, since Laurie and Jill didn’t actually write. They kind of hovered. But this time she would nail it. She was absolutely sure. What didn’t they like about the idea all of a sudden?

  Of course it wasn’t much of an idea yet, and that was a big problem. They’d settled on the type of movie it would be, but that was all. It didn’t help that everyone was teasing them about it—at least the kids who knew what they were up to.

  Of course everyone in L.A. was writing a screenplay. The stick dogs were a cliché. As if Delia Toother in Amanda’s history class weren’t one herself, with her retro clothing and sixties hair. Or Lloyd Supper, that smug kid from algebra, with his eleventy billion apps. They were hardly ones to talk. Well, she didn’t care what people thought. They were going to nail it if it was the last thing they did. Then they’d all go on to exciting careers and leave the naysayers in the dust. Life would be perfect and her parents would forget all about Sherlock Holmes.

  Amanda turned back to her fellow stick dogs. She’d have to be diplomatic or they’d bail, just like all the actors and crew members who’d ever worked with her. The director’s words “Don’t micromanage” rattled around in her head. She could do this. I will not butt in, I will not butt in, I will not butt in.

  “A detective story?” she said. There. That wasn’t so bad. No flame throwing.

  “Yeah,” said Laurie, her wide mouth topped with a neat little cocoa mustache. From where Amanda was sitting she could see her friend’s reflection in the dressing table mirror. She watched as two spectacled girls with long black hair gushed with excitement. “It’s perfect! Everyone loves detective stories. It would be easy to write, and we’d have no trouble getting actors.”

  “Right,” said Jill. “We think a drama’s too hard. This will finally get us on track. We’re tired of sitting around trying to think of things. Detective stories are all the same. It’s impossible to mess them up.”

  Amanda could feel her blood begin to boil, although she didn’t like to think of blood. It reminded her of Sherlock Holmes. They’d discussed the idea of detective stories before and rejected it. Why were her friends bringing it up again? But when she thought about it, maybe Jill had something. Detective stories were all the same. She’d never thought of them like that before, but Jill’s pronouncement did go a long way toward explaining why she hated everything to do with detectives.

  “If they’re all the same, why do you think we could win the festival?” Amanda said, trying to keep her voice calm.

  “Because no one else will do one,” said Laurie. “Too obvious.”

  “Yeah,” said Jill. “And you could totally do this, Amanda. With your family background and all.”

  Argh! Jill couldn’t have said anything worse. To remind Amanda of her heritage, to embarrass and shame her like that, was not the way to convince her of anything. More likely it was a way to get her to fire them. Wait, what was she thinking? She wasn’t that person. Not anymore. Patience.

  She wanted to be patient. She wanted to be the director everyone was dying to work with. But it was one thing to think something and another to act on it. Try as she might, Amanda didn’t feel patient. She felt frustrated. Before she knew it she had put the cocoa down (it was a good thing, because her hands were shaking), drawn herself up to her full height of five feet, pushed her thick, dark hair off her face,, and uttered a big, fat “NO.”

  “What do you mean ‘no’?” the girls said in unison.

  “I said, uh, no?” Her voice was weaker now.

  “You can’t just veto our ideas like that,” said Laurie. “You didn’t even think about what I said. You know, we used to like you—you were a lot of fun—but you’re getting too bossy. You’re becoming a big dork.”

  “I’m not a dork. You’re a dork,” said Amanda with a face as red as a baboon’s butt, a color—and an image—that did not suit her warm brown eyes. This was not Plover-like behavior but she couldn’t help herself. Why didn’t her friends get it?

  “No, you are,” said Jill placing her hands on her hips. “You always try to tell us what to do. Who do you think you are?”

  “I’m the director!” yelled Amand
a at the top of her lungs. Oops.

  “Well you can just boss yourself,” said Laurie, “because I quit.”

  “Me too,” said Jill.

  “You can’t be a one-man band, Amanda,” said Laurie. “Sometimes you need to be a part of something bigger than yourself. Think about what someone else wants for a change. Come on, Jill. Let’s go.”

  “Er, this is your house, Laurie,” said Jill.

  “Go away, Amanda,” said Laurie. “You’ll never be a real filmmaker. No one will ever work with you. You’re stuck up, dictatorial, closed-minded, fat, and—”

  But Amanda was already out the door and on her way down the steps. She’d heard that part about fat, though. It just added insult to injury. So she was a little overweight. So what? Everybody was these days. Maybe not in L.A., but most other places. She was always seeing fat models on Web sites, and some of those actresses in BBC productions were huge. Anyway Laurie was one to talk.

  It was over. That much was clear. But now what would she do? No more stick dogs. She’d have to make the serious drama alone, and she didn’t even have a script. How would she get it together by the deadline? Maybe she should go back to the idea of the horror movie, but ugh. Horror movies never won awards. They were so schlocky! She’d never be able to write a comedy. It took forever to think up jokes. The restaurant idea? She’d have to give it some thought.

  Amanda ran and ran. She was so upset she didn’t know where she was going, but her body did. She went where she always did: the ice cream store at the mall, which was located just a few blocks from Laurie’s house. There was almost nothing sweets wouldn’t fix, and ice cream was one of her favorite ways of getting sugar into her system. A cup of chocolate turtle and apple butter chip from Piggetty’s would be just the thing.