The best mysteries can only be solved with your best friends. The perfect summer read for fans of Stuart Gibbs. Paul Marconi has always thought that Bellwood was a strange town, but also a boring one. Not much for an eleven-year-old to do. Fires are burning nearby, Paul's parents are obsessed with winning a bratwurst contest, and his best friend, one of the founding members of their only-child detective club, the One and Onlys, is about to acquire a younger sister, sort of undoing their whole reason for existing. But then! Hundreds of rubber duckies have appeared on the lawn of poor Mr. Babbage without any explanation. Finally! There is something that Paul and his friends can actually investigate. In the face of all these bizarre occurrences, Paul is convinced that uncovering who deposited the duckies will finally bring some sense to what has become an upside-down world. Soon the three friends have a long list of suspects, all with their own motives, but no clear culprit. When everything comes to a head at the town's annual Bellwood Bratwurst Bonanza, Paul discovers that some things don't have an easy explanation and not every mystery can be solved. A perfect summer story about friends, amateur sleuthing, and a whole lot of rubber duckies. “The perfect mix of hilarious and heartwarming—kids won’t be able to get enough of Paul and his friends’ Bellwood adventures.”—Elsie Chapman, author of All the Ways Home "Delightful fun for budding mystery fans."-- Kirkus "A diverting mystery with clever misdirection that will keep readers guessing until the end."-- The Bulletin "The quirkiness of the premise and the light, punny humor give the narrative its momentum."-- Booklist "The One and Onlys seem primed to become a popular trio among readers who enjoy an old-fashioned whodunit."-- Publishers Weekly “ [A] feel-good middle-grade debut …. The quirkiness of the premise and the light, punny humor give the narrative its momentum.” — Booklist “A diverting mystery with clever misdirection that will keep readers guessing until the end .” – The Bulletin Doug Cornett received his MFA from Portland State University and in 2016 was awarded first prize for the William Van Dyke Short Story Contest from Ruminate Magazine. Finally, Something Mysterious was his first novel and he is also the author of Finally, Something Dangerous . He lives in Cleveland, Ohio, with his family. Follow him on Twitter at @MrDougCornett. 1 The First Weird Thing The weirdness in Bellwood all began with the smoke in the air and the ducks in Mr. Babbage’s backyard. After they showed up, a lot of other weird things started happening. Mysteries, you could call them. Some of them were scratch-your-head-and-say-hmm kind of weird, but a couple of them were big-time weird. Stare-up-at-the-night-sky-and-wonder-about-the-meaning-of-life kind of weird. And-hope-that-while-I’m-staring-up-there-a-bird-does-not-poop-on-me-cuz-that-would-not-be-a-good-sign-regarding-the-meaning-of-life. That kind of weird. The smoke was easy to explain: a wildfire was burning in a big state forest outside of town. When the wind shifted the wrong way, all of Bellwood smelled like a campfire. The ducks in Babbage’s yard were a different story. They appeared one seemingly normal Tuesday morning, scattered all over the grass. There must have been hundreds of them, their little yellow tails poking into the air, each duck with the same creepy look on its face: eyes wide open and vacant, like empty garages; bill curved upward in a kind of lipsticked maniac smile. I could picture the moment Babbage discovered them: he looks out at his backyard as he drinks his morning coffee, then boom —his mouth gapes open, his eyes go wonky, his coffee mug drops to the ground. Crash. Splash. Duckies? Duckies! These were rubber duckies—the kind you take a bath with. Nobody could explain where they came from. None of his neighbors had ducks in their backyards. But Babbage’s yard? Overrun with ducks. A mystery. News spread quickly in Bellwood. A dog could barf up an action figure on one side of town, and before it was mopped up, people would be debating the finer points of canine digestion on the other side of town. I know because that actually happened. Don’t believe me? Ask my dog, Ronald. But that’s what you get for living in such a small, out-of-the-way place. And so when rubber duckies invaded Babbage’s yard, everybody knew about it, and fast. By ten in the morning, the One and Onlys—that’s my two best friends and me—were racing our bikes up the cul-de-sacs of Bellwood, cutting through backyards, and trundling through woods, hoping to get there before the little visitors vanished. Shanks, Peephole, and I made the crosstown trek in exceptionally good time (apologies to Mrs. Hoover’s geraniums, may they RIP) and rolled up to a clump of stupefied Bellwoodians staring at the ducks with wary eyes. Mr. Babbage’s dog, a little white