M. G. Leonard’s Clutch is the third Twitchers mystery for 9 year olds, and it starts with an empty falcon’s nest on a hilltop.<\/p>\n
Twitch has been watching a pair of peregrine falcons all spring. One evening he climbs his favourite hawthorn tree and sees police torches up by the nest. The eggs are gone. Someone has stolen them.<\/p>\n
Egg collectors don’t want chicks, just the shells. Twitch knows exactly what that means, and he’s heartbroken (and furious).<\/p>\n
So the Twitchers are back on the case. They’re a birdwatching club of seven friends who solve crimes together, and it’s the Easter holidays. Ava and her little sister Tippi arrive by train. Twitch’s best friend Jack has been reading up on criminal profiling. There’s a big fishing competition in town too, which means lots of strangers with waistcoats full of pockets.<\/p>\n
Could one of them be the thief? There’s a tall man with a fishing rod on his rucksack, and a man in a silver car watching the police. Both look like suspects.<\/p>\n
This is a book that’s bursting with birds. Twitch can name a bird just from its call, and Jack has a new microphone for recording them. You’ll hear about wrens and chiffchaffs and a nightingale that sounds like it’s playing war games. Your reader will probably come out of it knowing a lot more than they expected.<\/p>\n
It’s funny too. A girl who’s desperate for YouTube views water-bombs poor Terry at the station, and he ends up borrowing Ava’s purple trousers (he loves them). And a younger girl called Pippa keeps turning up wherever Twitch goes.<\/p>\n
Some chapters follow Twitch and some follow Jack, so you get both sides of a friendship where one boy feels things very deeply and the other one tries to cheer him up.<\/p>\n
As it’s the third book, the friendships are already made and the club already has two cases behind it. It still reads fine on its own, but the first two books fill in the gang’s story.<\/p>\n
The thought of chicks that will never hatch is quite sad, so a real animal lover might need a cuddle at the start. It’s what makes the chase matter so much, though.<\/p>\n
If they’d like another mystery from the same writer, try The Highland Falcon Thief. Hal is packed off on a steam train to Scotland with his uncle, just as a jewel thief is making the headlines.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
M. G. Leonard’s Clutch is the third Twitchers mystery for 9 year olds, and it starts with an empty falcon’s nest on a hilltop. Twitch has been watching a pair of peregrine falcons all spring. One evening he climbs his favourite hawthorn tree and sees police torches up by the nest. The eggs are gone. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":11893,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"lr_next_read_post_id":9120,"lr_next_read_anchor":"The Highland Falcon Thief","lr_seo_hook":"Stolen falcon eggs, a town full of strangers and seven friends on the case.","lr_series_id":103,"lr_series_name":"The Twitchers","lr_series_position":3,"lr_series_label":""},"book_tag":[1045],"age_group":[24],"book_type":[1044],"book_author":[657],"class_list":["post-7106","our-books","type-our-books","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","book_tag-adventure-books","age_group-books-for-9-year-olds","book_type-paid","book_author-m-g-leonard"],"yoast_title":"The Twitchers 3 – Clutch by M. G. Leonard | Little Reads","yoast_metadesc":"Stolen falcon eggs, a town full of strangers and seven friends on the case. For ages 9+. 3,000+ books in the Little Reads app. 7-day free trial.","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n