Shaky rhyme and illogic earn this ghost story a boo.
What’s a ghost to do when her usual haunting ground is slated for demolition?
A ghostly apparition’s normal haunt, a multistory rural library, is currently closed and will be knocked down for reasons unknown. The spirit, who presents as White, is out of sorts until she makes an unlikely ally in a young girl who isn’t frightened of the ghost and wants to save the building. The girl, who has light tan skin and brown hair, works with the Lady to devise a series of plans that will draw attention to the library, including stacking up a winding line of books and then toppling them like dominoes, creating a spectacular slide from unused shelving, and holding ghost-story–telling sessions. Their work pays off, leaving everyone happy. Backmatter connects the story to the Willard Library in Evansville, Indiana, and while the book will most likely be haunting the shelves of Willard for many years to come, it most likely will gather dust elsewhere. The internal logic of the story will have astute readers scratching their heads: Can the girl see the ghost but no one else can? Why are the construction workers who are tasked with demolition terrified of the ghost while other people are not? It’s all related in rhyming couplets that strain for scansion. The illustrations do a lot of heavy lifting, giving the book heaps of visual appeal, but that may not be enough. (This book was reviewed digitally with 11-by-18-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Shaky rhyme and illogic earn this ghost story a boo. (author’s note, resources) (Picture book. 7-10)Pub Date: March 15, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5341-1102-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sleeping Bear Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 24, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
Lighthearted spook with a heaping side of silliness—and hair.
Fifth graders get into a hairy situation.
After an unnamed narrator’s full-page warning, readers dive right into a Wolver Hollow classroom. Mr. Noffler recounts the town legend about how, every Oct. 19, residents don fake mustaches and lock their doors. As the story goes, the late Bockius Beauregard was vaporized in an “unfortunate black powder incident,” but, somehow, his “magnificent mustache” survived to haunt the town. Once a year, the spectral ’stache searches for an exposed upper lip to rest upon. Is it real or superstition? Students Parker and Lucas—sole members of the Midnight Owl Detective Agency—decide to take the case and solve the mustache mystery. When they find that the book of legends they need for their research has been checked out from the library, they recruit the borrower: goth classmate Samantha von Oppelstein. Will the three of them be enough to take on the mustache and resolve its ghostly, unfinished business? Whether through ridiculous plot points or over-the-top descriptions, the comedy keeps coming in this first title in McGee’s new Night Frights series. A generous font and spacing make this quick-paced, 13-chapter story appealing to newly confident readers. Skaffa’s grayscale cartoon spot (and occasional full-page) illustrations help set the tone and accentuate the action. Though neither race or skin color is described in the text, images show Lucas and Samantha as light-skinned and Parker as dark-skinned.
Lighthearted spook with a heaping side of silliness—and hair. (maps) (Fiction. 7-10)Pub Date: Aug. 31, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5344-8089-6
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Aimed straight at proto-Goosebumps fans, this formulaic series opener pits two 9-year-olds against a great white shark with legs. Having lost his bike in a lake thanks to the latest hare-brained scheme of his impulsive cousin Henry, bookish Keats reluctantly agrees to finance a replacement by earning some money taking on odd jobs at a spooky local mansion. The prosaic task of weeding the garden quickly turns into an extended flight through a series of magical rooms after a shark monster rises out of the ground and gives chase. Dashing from one narrow squeak to the next, the lads encounter a kitchen with an invisible "sink," a giant vomiting bookworm in the library, a carpet pattern in the hall that (literally) bites and, most usefully, a magic wand that they get to keep (setting up future episodes) after spelling the monster away. Tilted points of view give the occasional illustrations more energy than the labored plot ever musters, and the characters rarely show even two dimensions. Fledgling readers will do better in the hands of Jim Benton’s Franny K. Stein series or Bruce and Katherine Coville’s Moongobble and Me books. (Horror. 8-10)
Pub Date: April 26, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-375-86675-3
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2011
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