Calendar Mysteries – April Adventure

Ron Roy's April Adventure is an Easter treasure hunt for 5 year olds that begins with a secret note left on a pillow at six in the morning.

What happens

This one's number four in the Calendar Mysteries. Bradley wakes up the day before Easter because something has touched his ear. A shadowy figure is tiptoeing out of the room. On his pillow is a plastic egg with a note inside, signed The Shadow.

Brian, Nate and Lucy (who are sleeping over) all find eggs too. Put the notes together and it's a treasure hunt! There are twelve plastic eggs hidden around the park and the schools. And to win the treasure they need to find four REAL eggs as well.

So who's the Shadow? Brian reckons it's his big brother Josh, who has a computer and a sleepover of his own going on down the hall. But is he right?

The hunt itself is SO much fun. Eggs turn up in a fountain, up a tree, in the oven of a little playhouse and inside a wooden goat's mouth. Each one has a treat inside, like jelly beans, a cookie or a shiny dime (Brian thinks it's very unfair that Lucy gets money).

Then there's the problem of the real eggs. Nobody can find them anywhere. The suspects include a man out walking his dog, a family of raccoons and a big black snake with a very suspicious bump in its tummy. Who wouldn't want to solve that?

There's lots of nature mixed in, too. Two swans hiss at Bradley from the pond. A mother raccoon peeps out of a hole in a tree. Your reader picks up a few real facts along the way, like why some animals go looking for eggs to eat.

It's full of little jokes as well. Brian would like ketchup on his eggs, please. Everyone gets in on the egg puns (eggs-tra syrup, anyone?). And when Brian pokes a bees' nest on the baseball field, he and Nate come running back yelling BEES! The snake is the only part that gets a bit shivery, and it soon slides away into the weeds.

It's a sunny, kind story with a very happy feel at the end. If your reader likes a hunt with clues to follow and lots of running about, it's a great pick.

What to read next

If they enjoy the birds-and-nests side of this one, the big kids get a nature puzzle of their own in The Falcon's Feathers, where Josh, Dink and Ruth Rose find the baby birds have gone from a nest in the woods.