Best books...chosen by Octavia Spencer

The Academy Award winner has launched a series of young-adult novels starring an amateur ninja detective.

Octavia Spencer’s The Case of the Time-Capsule Bandit is the Academy Award winner’s first book and launches a planned series of young-adult novels starring an amateur ninja detective. Below, Spencer lists six works that inspired her.

Encyclopedia Brown: Boy Detective by Donald J. Sobol (Puffin, $5). My love of mystery began at the ripe old age of 8 with the Encyclopedia Brown series. I highly recommend it to parents who want to experience a touch of nostalgia or to help their children become better at deductive thinking.

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