The Gold Dust Letters (Investigators of the Unknown, 1) - Softcover

Gr. 4-6. With an unusual blending of fantasy and reality, Lisle tells the story of Angela, who, much to her surprise, begins receiving letters covered in gold dust from a gray-eyed fairy, Pilaria. Angela's friends, Georgina and Poco, are skeptical but become believers when they see a golden light shimmering in Angela's living room. These magical goings-on are set against a backdrop of family discord. Angela's crusty father, to whom she's not close at all, and her mother seem on the verge of breaking up. So it's doubly surprising when Angela's father is revealed as Pilaria. He has written the letters and used a candle carousel to make the twinkling light, and he even metamorphoses part of the house into a fairy lair as a way to reconcile with Angela. As always, Lisle writes with the graciousness and charm that are the hallmark of her talent. This story has plenty of child appeal, and though there are some unraveled threads (Could Angela's father really have transformed the kitchen in the middle of the night and put it back together in the morning without anyone noticing?), the loosest thread is deliberate and welcome. Where did the gold dust come from that spilled from Pilaria's letters? Angela's father admits to everything but that. So Angela and her friends decide to become Investigators of the Unknown and discover more of the mysteries in everyday life--of which there will no doubt be many. Ilene Cooper

Proclaimed as Investigators of the Unknown: Book One, this accessible offering combines earmarks of a popular series--three neatly individualized girls in a lightly mysterious adventure in which magic may be involved--with Lisle's own delicate wit, care for language, and interest in the connections between painful reality and fantasy with the power to heal. Among these girls, Georgina is the organizer and skeptic; Poco has conversations with animals in which the others don't quite disbelieve; and, center stage, Angela is exchanging letters with ``the Faerie Pilaria,'' glimpsed by the others at a sleepover as evanescently whirling light. It turns out that the faerie is actually Angela's curiously distant father, poignantly attempting a connection with his daughter and with his own almost forgotten childhood. Even given Dad's coldly realistic relationship with Angela's nice mother--they bring out the worst in each other and are about to divorce--the contrast between his gruff exterior and imaginative secret behavior is only just plausible enough to sustain Lisle's ingenious plot. Still, the fact that he's not responsible for the gold dust that falls mysteriously from his letters hints that there was some magic--an intriguing possibility for readers who anticipate the next appearance of these lively and likable friends. (Fiction. 8-10) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.