Paula Harrison’s Tiara Friends: The Case of the Stolen Crown is a palace mystery for 7 year olds about two best friends who swap places whenever they can.<\/p>\n
Millie is Princess Amelia. Jess works at the palace as a maid. They look so alike that nobody at Peveril Palace can tell them apart (except Cook, who’s in on the secret).<\/p>\n
So they swap. Millie gets to bake her baby brother’s birthday cake in Jess’s apron and mob cap. Jess goes to Millie’s dance lesson instead, and the teacher doesn’t suspect a thing.<\/p>\n
Then the Baby Diamond Crown goes missing. Every royal baby has worn it on their first birthday for hundreds of years, and Prince Edward’s party is the very next day.<\/p>\n
Just before it vanished, Millie saw a shadowy figure running from her mother’s room. Who was it? The butler, Mr Steen, is acting very oddly, and soon he’s hurrying out of the palace with a little wooden box under his arm.<\/p>\n
What follows is proper detective work that a young reader can follow along with. The girls measure a muddy footprint with a hair ribbon and a wooden spoon. They squeeze through a loose railing to trail a suspect into town. When someone wrecks the palace kitchen in the night, they find strange round marks in the spilt flour.<\/p>\n
Nearly every chapter adds a new clue or suspect, so there’s always something to puzzle over at bedtime. Is it the tutor with the enormous feet? Or the Lord Chamberlain with his walking stick?<\/p>\n
It’s a gentle sort of mystery, built on clues and disguises rather than scares. There’s a floppy-eared spaniel called Jax too, who charges into the lake at the worst possible moment (and has to be rinsed under the pump afterwards).<\/p>\n
The swapping is the best bit. Millie would honestly rather bake than dance, and Jess loves the dance lessons. Their secret pinkie promise, Double Trouble, will probably turn up in a few playgrounds!<\/p>\n
If this one goes down well, there’s more palace sleuthing in The Secret of the Silk Dress. Millie’s two squabbling cousins come to stay, and a dress goes missing before the wrong person gets the blame.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Paula Harrison’s Tiara Friends: The Case of the Stolen Crown is a palace mystery for 7 year olds about two best friends who swap places whenever they can. Millie is Princess Amelia. Jess works at the palace as a maid. They look so alike that nobody at Peveril Palace can tell them apart (except Cook, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":12765,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"lr_next_read_post_id":9580,"lr_next_read_anchor":"The Secret of the Silk Dress","lr_seo_hook":"A princess and a maid who swap places hunt a palace thief before a birthday."},"book_tag":[25],"age_group":[19],"book_type":[1044],"book_author":[787],"class_list":["post-9579","our-books","type-our-books","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","book_tag-friendship-books","age_group-books-for-7-year-olds","book_type-paid","book_author-paula-harrison"],"yoast_title":"Tiara Friends: The Case of the Stolen Crown by Paula Harrison | Little Reads","yoast_metadesc":"A princess and a maid who swap places hunt a palace thief before a birthday. For ages 7+. 3,000+ books in the Little Reads app. 7-day free trial.","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n