Posted on by TracyC

Haunting at Black Water Cove

Haunting at Black Water Cove by Norma Lehr, 2000.

Kathy is spending some time with her mother at the lake while her mother takes care of a friend’s lodge there.  Kathy’s great-grandmother and her brother used to live in the area, and her mother used to visit the lake regularly as a little girl.  Soon after she arrives, Kathy meets a new friend, Drew, a boy who lives with his older brother and is self-conscious about his asthma.  While the two of them are by the lake, Kathy thinks that she keeps seeing a raft that nobody else can spot.  Later, she sees the ghost of a young girl in a ragged dress with a blue aura around her. 

Drew writes a small local newsletter, and when Kathy accompanies him to interview an elderly woman, she learns that years ago, her great-granduncle, Duncan, was involved in the disappearance of the woman’s older sister.  Ruby Faye’s body was never found, but people believe that she must be dead, assuming that she must have drowned in the lake. They believed that Duncan must have somehow caused Ruby Faye to drown because he was with her at the time. Although Duncan had a reputation as being a bit of a hooligan, Kathy can’t believe that he would have harmed the girl, named Ruby Faye, or let her drown in the lake if he could have prevented it. Duncan himself lost the ability to speak because of whatever happened that day, so he could never explain to anyone what really happened, but it must have been something terrible to send him into such a shocked state. About a year later, Duncan died young of an illness without regaining the ability to speak.

Before Ruby Faye died, the water in the cove had been clear, and the place was called Sunny Bay. Since then, the water turned dark and cloudy, giving Black Water Cove its new name.  Kathy is sure that the ghost girl she’s been seeing is Ruby Faye, and she thinks the girl’s spirit is trying to tell her the truth behind her mysterious disappearance.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction and Spoilers:

I enjoyed this spooky book for the mystery it poses about the disappearance of a young girl many years before. Because Kathy has been seeing her ghost, readers know that she must have died, but there is still the mystery of how it happened and what left Duncan so traumatized. I love mystery stories, and this story was also interesting for me because it turns out that the secret of Ruby Faye’s disappearance relates to a real historical event. Duncan and Kathy’s other relatives lived in the area during the famous 1906 earthquake that struck Northern California. Ruby Faye disappeared the day after it happened. 

Spoilers

Ruby Faye and Duncan had been in love. Duncan had a raft that Ruby Faye helped him build, and when she disappeared, most people assumed that he had been goofing off on the raft and caused her to drown.  In fact, Ruby Faye did not drown at all; she died from a fall.  When Kathy goes to the spot by the lake where Duncan had left his raft years ago, she sees their spirits act out what happened that day.

Like Drew, Duncan had a handicap that made him self-conscious: one of his legs was shorter than the other, and he couldn’t walk without a crutch.  On the day after the earthquake, he and Ruby Faye were playing by the lake.  She was making a garland of flowers.  She decided to go up the nearby mountainside and get some more flowers.  Duncan warned her not to go because the place was dangerous, but she just laughed it off.  Shortly after she left Duncan, he heard her scream for help.  Duncan tried to go to her, but his crutch had fallen off the raft, and he couldn’t find it.  He tried to get up the mountainside anyway, but he couldn’t manage it.  There was no one else around to help.  While Duncan didn’t cause the accident that befell Ruby Faye, Duncan’s guilt and helpless anger at not being able to save Ruby Faye robbed him of his ability to speak. 

Kathy ventures up the mountainside herself to see where Ruby Faye went when she screamed and disappeared, and just as Ruby Faye did herself, falls into an open mine shaft.  The earthquake opened it up the day before Ruby Faye went there in 1906, but no one thought to look for her there because they were sure she had fallen in the lake.  Kathy manages to hang on until her dog alerts people to her danger, and they come to help her.  Drew is the first person to see Kathy’s dog, but like Duncan, he is unable to save Kathy himself because he gets upset and brings on an asthma attack.  However, he manages to get help from his brother and Kathy’s mother.  After Kathy tells Ruby Faye’s sister what really happened, the water in the bay clears, and Kathy sees the spirits of Ruby Faye and Duncan, happily floating together on their raft.

Posted on by TracyC

In the Sunken Garden

Kay Tracey

In the Sunken Garden by Frances K. Judd (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1952 (revised from 1941 edition), 1980.

Kay Tracey discovers that she has a doppelganger when she’s running some errands for her mother and some people in town act like they know her even though she’s never seen them before. As she heads home, a dog even follows her car, as if it thinks that she’s his owner. Kay is bewildered by this, but she decides to take the dog home with her until she can figure out who really owns him.

This is just the beginning of Kay’s entanglement with her mysterious double. Ronald Earle, the boy who likes Kay, gets angry because he thinks that he’s seen her out riding with someone else in his car after turning down a ride with him to attend her mother’s luncheon party. Kay straightens Ronald out only to be confronted with her cousin, Bill, who returns home, very upset because he has heard that Kay was in a car accident and is now in the hospital. Bill is relieved to see Kay perfectly fine at home, but that still doesn’t clear up the question of who this mysterious double is.

According to the hospital, the girl who was in the car accident told them she was Jane Barton, but she checked herself out of the hospital because she only had minor injuries. That isn’t the end of the matter, though. A man named Joe Craken shows up and accuses Kay of wrecking his car in the car accident. He says that the police identified her as the driver of the other car in the accident based on her physical description. With Joe Craken attempting to sue her for damages and the injuries done to a passenger in his car, Kay needs to find her mysterious double!

This mysterious double seems to have some connection to the old Huntley place, a mansion outside of town. The Huntleys were distant relatives of Ronald’s, and Kay learns about the family scandal from someone who used to work for the family. Years ago, Mrs. Huntley’s sister, Trixie Rue, was a dancer with a promising career, but she gave it all up to get married. Unfortunately, the marriage didn’t really work out, and she and her husband fell on hard times. Mrs. Huntley gave her sister some money to help her get by, but apparently, it wasn’t enough because the sister resorted to stealing to help support herself and her baby daughter and ended up having to leave town in disgrace. Does this local scandal have any bearing on the sudden appearance of Kay’s double? One night, while having a look at the old Huntley mansion, Kay sees a ghostly white figure dancing in the garden. Was it her mysterious look-alike or someone else? Before the mystery is over, Kay’s look-alike will need her help as much as Kay needs hers.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction

The various parts of this mystery fit together much better than the first Kay Tracey book I read. The first book I read in this series seemed rather awkward, but there is a more cohesive thread in this story. The mysterious double, the Huntley family scandal, and the ghostly dancing figure in the garden all fit together in a way that makes sense. However, there are two sets of villains in this story, and although Kay was not involved in the car accident, it turns out that, rather than her double trying to fob off responsibility on Kay, it’s actually the driver of the other car who was responsible for the accident and had always planned on trying to blame Kay for the accident to extort money from her. It was just his bad luck that he crashed his car into the car Jane was driving instead of Kay’s. This story also has a side plot involving a benefit show that Kay and her friends are putting on with others who are also taking dance lessons, and there’s more rivalry with Chris Eaton, the nasty snob they know from school.

I still find that the Kay Tracey books aren’t particularly good on readability, though. The language is a little old-fashioned, and at times, the plot seems to drag. I think this is one of the better books, plot-wise. The story felt more cohesive than the previous one and mystery stories with mysterious doubles, long-lost relatives, spooky mansions, and inheritance are pretty classic and compelling. However, I did get a little bored while reading it because I just didn’t find the writing style to be very engaging.

Posted on by TracyC

Miss Pickerell Goes to Mars

Miss Pickerell Goes to Mars by Ellen MacGregor, 1951.

This is the first book in the Miss Pickerell series, which was written to introduce scientific concepts to children in an entertaining way.

The story begins when Miss Pickerell is visiting her brother and her nieces and nephews. She takes the children to ride on a ferris wheel, but she refuses to get on it herself because she’s afraid of heights. Really, all she wants to do is take her pet cow home and start getting her rock collection ready for the exhibition at the state fair.

As she leaves, she offers a ride to a man when the bus he was waiting for didn’t stop for him. Although she isn’t anxious for conversation and would prefer silence after her visit with her noisy nieces and nephews, she does make a comment about the sound of a jet overhead. She explains that airplanes are her nieces’ and nephews’ newest obsession, and she’s glad because they were obsessed with flying saucers before, and at least airplanes actually exists. The man riding with her, Mr. Haggerty asks Miss Pickerell if she believes in flying saucers and space travel. Miss Pickerell says that she doesn’t believe in flying saucers and doesn’t think any intelligent person would, but Mr. Haggerty tells her that he will soon be traveling to Mars. At first, Miss Pickerell doesn’t believe him. He says that he works for a scientific expedition whose headquarters is nearby, but the captain in charge of the expedition wouldn’t want him to say too much about it too soon, just in case it doesn’t work out well.

However, Miss Pickerell can’t help but get involved in the project, considering that they’re doing it on her land. Miss Pickerell lets Mr. Haggerty out of the car in front of her farm, but when she enters her own house, she can tell that someone else has been there in the weeks that she’s been gone. Then, she spots the space ship at the end of her cow pasture.

Miss Pickerell marches up to one of the people working on the expedition and demands to know what they’re doing on her property. The man says that they thought that the house was abandoned because it had been empty for weeks and they wanted a quiet place to work on their project. Miss Pickerell threatens to call the governor and report them. She picks the governor to call because, since she lives in the country, there are no police nearby, and she’s met the governor before at the state fair, where he’s given her prizes for her rock collection.

When she calls the governor, he isn’t there, so she leaves a message with his wife and decides to talk to the men at the space ship again while she waits for the governor to call her back. Although she’s afraid of heights, Miss Pickerell climbs into the space ship to talk to the men – right before it launches.

Soon, Miss Pickerell is in outer space and headed for trouble because it turns out that, not only was she not supposed to be there but they’ve accidentally left Mr. Haggerty behind. Mr. Haggerty is important because he’s the one who’s supposed to do the calculations for the flight.

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction

I vaguely recalled my mother reading us one or two of the Miss Pickerell books from the library when we were kids. I think I liked them at the time, but it had been so long that I’d really forgotten what they were like.

I can definitely see the educational lessons in the book. After the ship launches, it takes awhile to impress on Miss Pickerell the seriousness of their situation and why they can’t just turn around and go back, during which they talk about Mars as a planet and how the ship’s course is programmed into the computer. A young man on the crew, Wilbur, shows Miss Pickerell how to drink water in outer space, and they talk about what gravity is and why there isn’t any in space. By accident, Miss Pickerell has caused further problems by bringing her hammer with her onto the ship because the hammer is magnetic, and the magnet is interfering with the ship’s equipment. Miss Pickerell’s first instinct is to throw the hammer out a door or window, but there are no windows, and Miss Pickerell is treated to an explanation about atmospheric pressure and oxygen in the space ship. Each event on the ship and on Mars itself requires explanation.

Fortunately, they do make it safely to Mars and back, and Miss Pickerell turns out to be surprisingly helpful and is actually glad that she made the trip. On their return, she finds out that Mr. Haggerty has been taking care of her cow, and the governor has invited her for a visit. The governor gives her an award, and she even brings back rocks from Mars with her and gives some to her nieces and nephews.

Posted on by TracyC

Twin Spell

Twin Spell by Janet Lunn, 1968, 2003.

This book was originally called Twin Spell but was renamed Double Spell in reprintings.

Elizabeth and Jane Hubbard, a set of twelve-year-old twins, can’t really explain what made them stop to look at the little wooden doll in the window of the antiques shop.  Ordinarily, they probably wouldn’t have noticed it at all, but something seemed to draw them to it while they were supposed to be going home to look after their little brother.  The woman in the shop wasn’t going to sell the doll to them, either, but for some reason, she said that she felt that she ought to do it because it seemed like the doll belonged with them.

Buying the old doll starts off a chain of mysterious events in the twins’ lives.  On impulse, still forgetting that they’re supposed to go home and baby-sit, the girls decide to visit their Aunt Alice and show her the doll.  Aunt Alice had been living in England, but she had recently moved back to Toronto to live in the girls’ grandmother’s old house.  Aunt Alice doesn’t know what to think of the doll, except that it might be worth something as an antique.  She shows the girls around their grandmother’s old house, but Elizabeth has a sudden fall down the stairs, breaking her leg.  Strangely, a week later, Aunt Alice suffers a similar accident, breaking her hip.

Because of her accident, Aunt Alice decides that the big old house is a bit much for her to handle, and she tells the twins’ parents that they can have it to live in instead.  With five children in the family, including the twins, they could really use the larger house, and the children are excited about going to live there.

The twins find themselves thinking of odd things, as if they were old memories.  They suggest taking a “sick basket” of goodies to their aunt, thinking that maybe their mother had done something like that for someone before or maybe they had dreamed something like it.  Their brothers can’t remember any such thing happening, and it would be pretty weird for both of the girls to have the same dream.

However, the children think that a basket of goodies for their aunt would be a good idea.  They put together some stuff from their kitchen and what they can buy with their money, and they decide to include a book that she can read while she’s recovering.  Unfortunately, the book they choose from their shelves turns out to be a rare copy of a book about the history of Toronto that their father was using for a research project, so they have to get it back.  They do, and Aunt Alice tells them that she enjoyed it and that she had forgotten that an uncle had written it.

As the family moves into Aunt Alice’s old house, the twins keep thinking that there is something strange about their doll, that it seems to be influencing them, giving them visions of the past.  Besides the “sick basket” dream they both had, they have visions of a house and a blonde girl in old-fashioned clothes.  They start to think that the doll, which they both have the impulse to call “Amelia,” might be magic or something.  Jane is the more sensible of the two, and she insists that there must be some other explanation, like imagination or coincidence.  Elizabeth, the dreamier twin, insists that it’s the influence of Amelia, that they’re somehow seeing Amelia’s memories of the past.

After the girls argue about the doll and the source of their odd visions, Jane starts ignoring Elizabeth.  Elizabeth continues thinking about what they’ve seen, and the blonde girl, who she is sure is called Hester and was the former owner of Amelia.  Eventually, Jane starts agreeing with Elizabeth about Hester being the doll’s former owner, but she is dubious when Elizabeth says that Amelia wants to find the house where she once lived with Hester.  Jane doesn’t know how the two of them can do that.

They ask their father for his advice, and he suggests that they start at the museum.  There, they learn by studying the styles of old clothes that Amelia is from the 1840s.  They find an area of town with houses similar to the one they’ve seen in their minds, where Amelia once lived, but they have trouble finding the exact house they’re looking for.

Jane becomes increasingly afraid, though.  More and more, she begins to feel like something is trying to take the doll away from them.  Something that is mean and doesn’t like her is in their attic.  Something like a ghost.  Jane has an awful feeling that something horrible is about to happen.

When the Jane looks at the history book her father has been reading, the one written by her great-great-uncle, Jane suddenly has a startling revelation. The house they have been seeking in actually their house, changed over the years by new additions. Amelia came from their house, and that is where she really belongs. Through the visions, they see an old tragedy in their family reenacted, a tragedy that puts Jane’s life in danger.

The book is available to read for free online through Internet Archive. There is no need to borrow this copy and no time limit; you can just read it in your browser.

Themes and Spoilers

The girls had made a mistake when they first started receiving their visions.  They had assumed that Hester was Amelia’s original owner, but she wasn’t.  The glimpses they got of Hester weren’t through the doll’s eyes, but those of the doll’s real former owner.  The doll was one of a set of two that originally belonged to another set of twins in the girls’ family, Anne and Melissa.  Hester was their cousin, and she was not a nice girl.  Both Jane and Elizabeth sensed it pretty early.  During an argument with Anne years before, Hester accidentally lit Anne’s dress on fire with a candle she was holding, causing Anne to die.  Hester hadn’t actually meant to harm Anne.  The whole thing was just an accident, but Hester’s guilt and Melissa’s anger and grief at her twin’s death had caused Hester’s spirit to linger in the house.  By learning the circumstances of Anne’s death and assuring Hester that they understand that she had not meant to kill her cousin, that it was all an accident, and that she couldn’t save Anne because she was just too frightened and didn’t know what to do, they help Hester’s spirit to finally rest and to reunite Amelia with her doll twin, which Hester had hidden years before.

The scene where the girls see Anne’s death is a little scary, but mostly sad.  Hester lived on after the incident, but it was not a happy life.  She ended up having to live in Anne and Melissa’s old room, where Anne died, because she never married and had to live with family.  Aunt Alice remembers knowing her as a young child, when Hester was a bitter old woman.  Perhaps if Hester hadn’t been carrying that guilt around for so many years, her life would have been much happier, although being a nice person had never particularly been her nature.  However, the twins’ acceptance of Hester’s tragedy and assurance that they understand and forgive her for what happened set her spirit at peace.

The genealogy in the story is a little confusing, partly because certain family names repeat through the generations, but there is a chart in the back of the book to help.  There are some other loose ends in the story which are also never completely clarified.  The girls admit that they will probably never know how the doll Amelia came to be in the antiques store, but it doesn’t particularly matter because Hester, Anne, Melissa, and Amelia all seem to be at peace now.

Posted on by TracyC

The Haunting of Cabin 13

Cabin13The Haunting of Cabin 13 by Kristi D. Holl, 1987.

Thirteen-year-old Laurie is looking forward to her family’s vacation. They’ve rented a cabin for a week, Cabin 13, by the lake at Backbone State Park (It’s a real state park in Iowa. Link repaired 10-19-22.), and her friend Jenny is staying there with them. Laurie’s mother isn’t looking forward to the trip. She hates dirt and bugs and doesn’t like the cabin when they arrive. As everyone starts unpacking, Laurie looks around the cabin and finds a note that warns them to leave because the cabin is haunted. Supposedly, it was written by the ghost herself. The note is signed “Eleanor.” Laurie’s mother thinks that they should leave right away, but Laurie and the rest of the family persuade her that it’s just a joke. At first, Laurie’s sure that’s all it is.

Then, the park ranger tells the family that the other families who have tried to stay in that cabin this summer also found similar notes. It might be just a prank, but it might not. He also tells them that a girl named Eleanor, the same age as Laurie and Jenny, drowned there the summer before, and strange things have been seen there since, like lights around the lake. Laurie’s brother, Ricky, thinks it sounds cool that they’re staying in a haunted cabin by a haunted lake. Like others, Laurie thinks that the notes are the product of a prankster, but what would be the point behind it?

The girls meet a pair of brothers who are staying nearby, Kevin and Matt. When they tell them about the note, Matt is eager to investigate. Jenny enjoys flirting with boys, and she’s mostly interested in flirting with good-looking, athletic Kevin. Matt is in a wheelchair, so Jenny doesn’t pay much attention to him. She just makes an awkward comment about cripples being able to contribute to society that makes everyone feel uncomfortable. Although Laurie knows that Jenny’s comment was inappropriately personal and callous, Laurie also underrates Matt’s ability to help with their note mystery at first, and she’s shy about talking to him because she’s often shy around boys. However, needing someone to confide her thoughts in when Jenny isn’t interested, Laurie talks to Matt about her theories about the mysterious notes. Matt turns out to be easy to talk to, helping Laurie get over her nervousness about talking to boys.

At first, Laurie tells Matt that she thinks that the prankster is trying to drive people away from Cabin 13 because something important is hidden there. However, as she starts asking questions about Eleanor, she learns that the notes haven’t just been directed at Cabin 13. Staff at the park have also received notes from “Eleanor.” Laurie also sees a figure in black sneaking around the park, who she is sure is not a ghost.

It isn’t long before Laurie receives more notes from “Eleanor,” hinting that she might be in danger, and she and Jenny see the mysterious lights that people have been talking about. Then, when the children are out in a canoe together, it develops a leak and sinks. Matt panics because his legs are paralyzed, and he can’t swim, but Laurie saves him with the help of some people in another boat.

Was that accident just an accident, or could it have something to do with Eleanor’s “accident” last year? There are plenty of suspects who might have reasons for playing ghost and stirring up trouble at the lake. Matt’s father blames the park ranger for the accident that paralyzed Matt. At a previous visit to the lake, Matt was crossing a road with his father and brother and was struck by a speeding car. Matt father says it wouldn’t have happened if the roads had been policed properly. Laurie realizes that he might have a motive for revenge. Then again, some people have been coming to the lake, drawn by the ghost stories and hoping to see the mysterious lights. Could the ghost be a publicity stunt to drum up business?

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction and Spoilers

When Laurie discovers that Eleanor’s half sister has come to the lake to investigate Eleanor’s death herself, she thinks that she has the mystery solved, but she’s only half right. It’s true that Eleanor’s sister has been responsible for some of the things happening at the lake, but not all of them.  She explains to the kids that Eleanor loved mystery stories and was always playing detective games, but she thinks that perhaps the game got too real for Eleanor the summer that she died.  There is something sinister going on at the lake, something that Eleanor also realized before her death, and there is more to Eleanor’s death than most people know.

At the end of the book, Matt gets a chance to be a hero and stop the bad guy from escaping, using his wheelchair to his advantage because a person on wheels can sometimes move faster than a person on foot.  Even before that, Laurie had gained an appreciation for Matt and his sensible thinking, realizing that a person who is impaired in one way can still have great abilities in other areas of life.  She also comes to think of Matt as being brave for coming back to the site of the accident that made him a paraplegic.  Matt says that he had to come in order to prove to himself that there was nothing inherently bad about the  place and to stop the nightmares he was having about his accident.  Matt and Eleanor’s sister both make Laurie realize that everyone has something difficult or frightening that they have to deal with in their lives; it’s just that some people’s problems are more obvious than others.  Everyone can see what Matt’s dealing with at first glance because he’s in a wheelchair, but no one knew about the pain and fear that Eleanor’s sister was carrying around with her until she admitted it.

I consider this story a pseudo-ghost story because the obvious parts of the haunting were caused by living people, for reasons of their own.  However, Laurie seems to feel that Eleanor’s spirit was there with them, waiting to see the mystery of her death solved.  It’s left open to interpretation, but if Eleanor was there, it was only seen in the odd feelings that Laurie had from time to time, not in any more obvious or physical way.

Something that confused me a little in the book is that, at one point, Jenny tells someone that Laurie already has a reputation for being an amateur detective, having discovered that Jenny herself had been kidnapped when the authorities thought that she had run away from home. Jenny gives full details of the time when she was kidnapped, including who kidnapped her and why and how Laurie figured out where she was. When I read that section of the story, I thought at first that the author was talking about a previous book that she had written with these two characters, but I had trouble figuring out which it was, if any.

Interesting fact: some of the children in the story are named after the author’s own children.