Review:
Harry is a fourteen-year-old kid (or 13, on the back of the book) who lives with his grandmother, Elinor, since his parents' death in a plane crash. He compulsively cooks and bakes as a way to deal with his feelings, and he's currently seeing a therapist.
Since her fridge and freezer are overflowing, Elinor has Harry channel some of that energy into a summer vacation project to cook for Vancouver's unhoused population. It's through this arrangement that Harry meets Stanley, a fantastic cook with a somewhat worrisome habit of talking to his dog, Waffles, as though he's a person who talks back.
Shortly after Harry encounters a young man with a vast appetite for good food and several questions about a painting Stanley supposedly stole from his father, Stanley turns up murdered. It's then that Waffles speaks to Harry for the first time, and the two of them team up to find Stanley's killer.
This is intended for reluctant readers, which isn't an issue for me. The premise drew me in, though, and it turned out to be a lot of fun with a good amount of heart. Within Waffles was the soul of a grizzled private detective who turned out to be the perfect confidant for a kid who had trouble talking about his feelings and fears. (Although they weren't really that similar, I couldn't help but think of the movie Detective Pikachu.)
Some of the details of the mystery were overly convenient (Stanley, the man who never let his recipe book out of his sight, somehow knew he had to hide it that particular night), but Harry and Waffles were such an appealing pair that I didn't really mind.
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