The Girl in the Castle Inside the Museum by Kate Bernheimer, pictures by Nicoletta Ceccoli, 2008.
In this story, there is a little girl who lives in a castle in a museum, inside a big, glass globe.
Children love to come to the museum and look at her in her castle. The girl also likes it when the children come to see her.
Although the girl in the castle has other creatures to play with and things she likes to do, like making music, she sometimes gets lonely when the museum closes, and all the children go home.
When the girl in the castle dreams, she dreams of the children who come to visit her at the museum, imagining their journeys to come see her.
When the children are visiting or when she’s dreaming about them, the girl isn’t lonely, but when she wakes up from a dream and there aren’t any children, she gets lonely again.
However, the girl gets an idea. If you, the reader, want to be her friend, you can give her your picture. When she looks at your picture, she won’t be lonely anymore!
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive (multiple copies).
My Reaction
I love the surreal, fantasy pictures in this book! We don’t know exactly what the girl is or why this tiny girl lives in a miniature castle in a museum. The book says that people claim “she’s lived there forever.” She is alive and has feelings, but she seems to be surrounded by fantasy creatures as companions in her castle rather than other people. She doesn’t seem to have parents or family. My theory is that she is a magical, living toy because the museum seems to be filled with other toys, the fantasy creatures in her castle seem to be toys with little wind-up keys in their backs, and the castle itself incorporates little toys and odd-and-ends, like buttons and marbles. However, the girl’s backstory is left up to the imagination of the readers.
This book breaks the fourth wall of the book, with the girl inviting readers to put their own pictures into the book and saying that the girl can see them through the book when they read it. Readers looking at the book keep the tiny girl company when she doesn’t have visitors to her museum. It’s not the first book that I’ve seen that uses the concept of readers keeping a book character company through their books. There is a book from the 1930s called The Tale of Corally Crothers, where a lonely girl with no brothers and sisters goes in search of a friend and finds you, the reader. (I haven’t found a copy of it myself, but you can see some pictures of this book on this site.) Books that involve the reader and invite the reader into their world are charming, and I found the fantasy elements of this particular book delightful!
At St. Martin’s Orphanage, there are usually about 30 children at a time, and the matron does her best to nurture her parentless charges. Mandy is a ten-year-old girl who has lived in the orphanage her entire life. She is intelligent, and she loves reading and daydreaming. She is allowed to work part time at a grocery store, and she spends most of her money buying books. She also loves nature and taking walks by herself. She enjoys spending time alone because she likes to daydream and admire flowers and other beauties of the natural world.
However, Mandy isn’t really happy, either. Even though the orphanage is kind to her, she gets along well with the other orphans, and she has her books and other things to keep herself busy, she is lonely and still misses having parents and the family life she’s never known. Because she has no memory of these things, it’s difficult to say whether she truly understands what she’s missing, but she definitely feels the lack of them in her life. As she gets older, she begins to feel more and more melancholy about it. She knows only that something is missing from her life, and she becomes more desperate about it. She craves a place that she can call her own, a place where she really belongs.
There is a wall behind the orphanage, and Mandy, with her vivid imagination, becomes increasingly curious about what’s on the other side of the wall. She asks Ellie, the maid at the orphanage about it, but as far as Ellie knows, it’s just more of the countryside. She’s never actually explored it herself. Mandy likes to imagine that there might be a castle and a unicorn beyond the wall.
One day, Mandy decides to try climbing over the wall to see for herself. What she sees is an apple orchard and a path through it. When she climbs down from the wall and follows the path, she finds an old, disused cottage with the remains of a garden. The cottage is empty of furniture. Mandy lets herself into the cottage and finds it dusty and in need of repair, and there’s no sign than anyone has been there for years. However, there is a marvelous room in the small house that is decorated with real seashells! Mandy is fascinated, and she wonders who used to live there.
The idea comes to Mandy that she could “adopt” the house and care for it as if it was her own. Obviously, nobody has been there for a long time, and nobody would know or care if she cleaned it up, but she would feel good, having a place of her own and something to care for. When she returns to the orphanage, Ellie tells her that she asked the matron what was on the other side of the wall, and she says that it’s a large, old estate, where nobody lives anymore. Mandy is pleased with that because, if no one lives on the estate where the cottage is, there will be no one to notice when she goes to visit the cottage.
She asks for gardening advice from the gardener at the orphanage without telling him exactly why she wants to know, and he even lets her borrow some tools. Mandy loves tending to her very own garden, and she uses some of her pocket money from the grocery store to buy seeds for the garden and some things for the house. Mandy loves seeing how the cottage and garden improve under her care, but her roommate, Sue, begins to wonder where she keeps disappearing to, and the adults begin to wonder what she is doing with the things she buys and borrows.
The matron tells Mandy that she’s worried about what Mandy is doing because it could be dangerous for her to go off alone where nobody knows where she’s going. Mandy lies to her, saying that she had a project of making a garden for herself but that she gave it up because it was too much work. The matron says that she understands why she would want to have a place to call her own and offers her a spot in the orphanage garden to tend as her own. Mandy feels terrible about lying to the matron, but the thought that the matron might make her give up the special place she’s found because it doesn’t really belong to her or because it’s too dangerous for her to go there alone is just too much.
As the seasons change, Mandy enjoys slipping away to her cottage whenever she can, working in her garden and watching the animals that live nearby. However, the matron has become increasingly suspicious of Mandy’s odd behavior, Sue is angry with her for keeping secrets from her, and there are signs that someone has been at the cottage while she wasn’t there. There are footprints outside the cottage and the hoofprints of a horse, and there are signs that someone has been fixing things. Fortunately, this mysterious person doesn’t seem to mind her being at the cottage. Her mysterious friend leaves little presents and notes for her. More and more, Mandy fears that her secrets will be discovered, but when she becomes ill and needs help at the cottage, she becomes grateful for the help of a friend who knows where she is. Having a place to call your own is good, but having friends and a family who care make a place a real home.
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive (multiple copies).
Update: A site reader pointed out that I should have explained that Julie Andrews Edwards is the same Julie Andrews who played Maria Von Trapp in The Sound of Music, Mary Poppins in the Disney musical, and the queen in The Princess Diaries movies. When I was younger, I didn’t realize that she also wrote children’s books. She is also known for writing The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles, which I haven’t covered yet. Julie Andrews’s early life was difficult because her parents divorced and each married other people during WWII. At various times, Julie Andrews lived with each of her parents and stepparents and traveled around as she began performing with her family as a child. Her family was poor, and she later described her stepfather as being a violent alcoholic. Her chaotic early life may have been a factor in this story about a lonely girl looking for a place to belong and a real sense of family.
My Reaction and Spoilers
This is a sweet story about having a place to call home and a real family. Mandy craves for these things, even before she truly understands what it means to experience them. Parts of the story are sad and sentimental, but others are just enchanting. This book fits well with the Cottagecore aesthetic. The cottage in the orchard is charming, and Mandy’s care for it reminds me of other children’s books, like Dandelion Cottage, where children have their own secret places to fix up and care for.
Mandy gets wrapped up in her special secret place, tending the garden and watching the animals there, but it gets her into trouble with her friend and roommate, Sue, and with the matron of the orphanage because of the secrets she’s keeping and the way she keeps helping herself to things she really shouldn’t take and slipping away to spend time at the cottage without telling anyone where she’s going. Mandy loves the cottage because she can imagine it as her own home, a place that belongs to her and where she belongs, but Mandy needs people, too. Sue’s friendship for her helps her when she gets into trouble, the matron turns out to be more understanding than Mandy feared, and Mandy’s adventures with her cottage bring her into contact with people who become the family Mandy really needs. Once Mandy has the family she needs, she no longer feels compelled to keep the cottage all to herself, and she decides to share it with the other girls at the orphanage. Mandy’s new home with her new family is every bit as charming and magical as her cottage. It’s a big, old house with secret passages that she explores with her new brother.
However, I think that it’s important to note that not everything in the story is easy and happy for Mandy. All through the story, she struggles with her emotions, experiencing sadness and loneliness and trying to understand what they mean. Her new family doesn’t fully accept her immediately, either. They are never mean or rejecting of her. They are friendly and helpful people from the first time they meet Mandy, but it takes some time of them getting to know her before they decide that they want her to be a permanent part of their family. There isn’t a lot of high drama, and her new brother is never jealous of her or mean to her. However, the family does take some time to make their decision after Mandy spends Christmas with them, and that adds to Mandy’s inner distress.
There are points in the story when Mandy’s fate seems uncertain, and she considers running away from the orphanage. The headmistress becomes concerned about Mandy because of her melancholy and tells the family considering her that Mandy has begun asking her questions again about her parents and how they died, something that she hasn’t done for years, showing that she has become preoccupied with the concept of family life and her lack of it. The family is concerned for Mandy and understanding of her feelings, but I thought that having the family take time to get to know Mandy and to consider what having her join their family would mean was realistic. I think the drama was softened a little to keep the gentle feel of the story, but there’s enough emotion and inner turmoil that it doesn’t feel like Mandy’s problems resolve too easily.
Sue and Mandy bring up the question about whether Mandy’s discovery of the cottage and her new family was a matter of luck. Sue is envious because it seems like everything happens to Mandy. Mandy asks her new father if that’s a matter of luck, but he says that Mandy is special and that things happen to her because she is brave and goes looking for them. She is a quiet person, but she takes her life into her own hands and pursues what she wants, where other people might be too timid to do it. Technically, Mandy broke rules and took some risks to care for her secret cottage, but she did it because it was important to her, and it worked out in the end. Her new father seems to appreciate Mandy’s spirit and determination.
Not long before Christmas, the lighthouse keeper at Tern Rock, Byron Flagg, approaches Martha Morse, asking her if she would be willing to temporarily take the job of tending the lighthouse while he takes a vacation. The lighthouse can never be untended because ships rely on that light, and it can be difficult for Mr. Flagg to find someone to take over his duties for an extended period of time, especially so close to Christmas. Mr. Flagg wants to hire a substitute with experience tending the lighthouse. Mrs. Morse lived there for 14 years while her late husband was the lighthouse keeper. Although many people would be daunted by the isolation of the lighthouse, Mrs. Morse actually loved it because she enjoyed the beauty of the sea and nature. She knows that she would enjoy staying there again. However, she hesitates to take the job of temporarily tending the light because she is caring for her young nephew, 11-year-old Ronnie. Ronnie might enjoy the adventure of staying in a lighthouse, but he would have to miss some school.
Mr. Flagg appeals to Mrs. Morse’s sense of nostalgia about the lighthouse and points out that Ronnie could bring along some of his schoolwork to study during their stay. Mr. Flagg says that their stay will only be for two weeks, and that he’ll return and relieve them on December 15th. Mrs. Morse points out that the weather around Tern Rock can be unpredictable and that he might not be able to return when he says he will, but Mr. Flagg says he is confident that he can. They talk to Ronnie about it, and Ronnie says that he would like to see the lighthouse, but he wants to be home for Christmas. Mr. Flagg assures them that won’t be a problem and that they will enjoy their stay at the lighthouse, so they agree to go.
When they arrive at the lighthouse, Ronnie is awed by rugged environment of Tern Rock and daunted by the isolation of the lighthouse. His Aunt Martha says that she understands how he feels, that he wonders if they’re up to the task, but she assures them that they are. The job they will do is a necessary one because, without the light, the rocks in this area are a danger to ships.
As they settle in, Ronnie becomes fascinated with the lighthouse. The interior is comfortable and designed to be compact, almost like the interior of a ship. His Aunt Martha establishes their schedule, teaching Ronnie what they need to do. She turns off the light at sunrise and lets it cool down while they have breakfast. Then, they clean the lamp, polish its lens, and do other chores to keep the light in working order. Ronnie does his schoolwork in the afternoon, and they turn on the light when the sun goes down. They spend their evenings doing quiet activities, like reading and playing games. Although Aunt Martha wasn’t sure that the quietness and monotony would appeal to an active boy like Ronnie, Ronnie finds the newness of the environment and the change in his usual routine fascinating.
Ronnie’s feelings change when December 15th arrives, and Mr. Flagg doesn’t. The weather is good, so there’s no reason why a boat shouldn’t approach Tern Rock, but Aunt Martha says that there may have been some other problem that delayed him. She doesn’t think an extra day or two at the lighthouse will hurt them, but the days go by, and still, Mr. Flagg doesn’t come. They are still comfortable in the lighthouse and there haven’t been any problems with the light, but Ronnie is angry because he realizes that Mr. Flagg lied to them. Christmas is approaching, and it becomes clear that Mr. Flagg never had any intention of being back at the lighthouse in time for Christmas.
Ronnie has trouble understanding and excepting Mr. Flagg’s lies and broken promises. Ronnie and Aunt Martha discuss the importance of honesty and the meaning of broken promises. Ronnie thinks that Mr. Flagg has been wicked. He has certainly been unfair, but Aunt Martha says that there are worse kinds of wickedness, and before they jump to conclusions about what has happened, they need to know the reasons for it.
Aunt Martha says that the Christ Child visits every home on Christmas, and no place is too distant for Him to reach, so they should make the lighthouse ready and prepare for Christmas. Ronnie doesn’t see how they can because they didn’t bring any decorations or anything for Christmas. Ronnie considers firing the cannon that would signal an emergency to bring someone out to the lighthouse, but Aunt Martha firmly tells him no. The cannon is only for serious emergencies, when there are lives in danger, not for mere disappointment and self-pity. However, Mr. Flagg has left some special surprises for them.
It is true that he intentionally deceived them about being back in time for Christmas. When Ronnie finds a sea chest with a Christmas message, he knows for certain that Mr. Flagg was lying to them the entire time, which makes him angrier. However, a letter that Mr. Flagg left explains his reasons, which earns their sympathy. To soften the blow of his deception, he has also left them some special presents and treats gathered from exotic places. This still isn’t the Christmas that Ronnie and Aunt Martha had originally planned, and being lied to doesn’t feel good. Still, in the end, this Christmas is pretty special and memorable, and they both realize that they are exactly where they need to be.
The book is a Newbery Honor book. It is recommended for ages 8 to 12 years old. It is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive. The author, Julia L. Sauer, also wrote Fog Magic.
My Reaction
I wasn’t familiar with this story when the Coronavirus Pandemic started, which is a pity because this would have been a great book for the type of Christmas we had in 2020. Still, this is a lovely Christmas story, and the pandemic isn’t quite over yet. Things have improved considerably since 2020 because people have been vaccinated, but for those who still need to be cautious and are disappointed that things aren’t completely back to normal or anyone who has hard feelings toward someone or is having a rough Christmas for any other reason, this story is a useful reminder that disappointments are still temporary, and sometimes, the place where you find yourself is exactly where you need to be. Also, disappointments and inconveniences can come with compensations, if you’re open to experiencing them.
Mr. Flagg shouldn’t have lied to Mrs. Morse and Ronnie. He acknowledges in his letter that this was a hurtful thing to do, and he explains his reasons. Basically, he was lonely and desperate. As a lighthouse keeper, he is what we might call an “essential worker”, someone who can’t easily take time off from his work because he does a necessary job that can only be done in a particular place. People’s lives depend on the light from the lighthouse, so Mr. Flagg can’t leave his job for any length of time unless he finds someone qualified who is willing to take his place. This story is set during a time before lighthouses became automated, so there must be a human in this role.
Mr. Flagg is in his 60s, and he explains in his letter that he has spent most of his Christmases either alone or with other adults because of his life as a sailor and lighthouse keeper. He has a niece who has several children and who would be happy to have him for Christmas, but he has never managed to find anyone who was willing to relieve him from his duties during Christmas before. He was desperate to spend at least one Christmas with his family, so he resorted this deception out of desperation, but he left all the presents and special treats for Aunt Martha and Ronnie because he didn’t want them to be miserable.
Aunt Martha is getting older herself, and she understands how Mr. Flagg feels, having lived a similar sort of life. When she lived at the lighthouse, she and her husband were together, but Mr. Flagg has never married, and he was desperately lonely. Ronnie has more trouble understanding the feeling because he is younger and hasn’t experienced this type of loneliness before. Aunt Martha points out that Ronnie will have many more Christmases before him, more than either she or Mr. Flagg have left. One disappointing or just bizarre Christmas won’t mean that much to him in the long term. With maybe 50 or more future Christmases to come as well as the ones he’s already experienced, this strange Christmas in the lighthouse is just one more memory or story to tell other people in Christmases to come.
Part of this story is about forgiveness, but they don’t use that word at all in the story. People have different views about what forgiveness entails, but I think it’s important that Aunt Martha and Ronnie don’t excuse Mr. Flagg’s actions. They come to understand his motives, and they feel pity or sympathy for him for the kind of rough and lonely life he’s lived, but that doesn’t make lies to them good or right. He did something hurtful by betraying their trust, and there will probably be some kind of reckoning between them when Mr. Flagg eventually shows up. Mr. Flagg acknowledges that in his letter, that the knowledge that he betrayed their trust will keep him from fully enjoying Christmas with his family, even when he’s finally getting the kind of Christmas he has wanted, and he can’t blame them for whatever they’re feeling as they read his letter. So, the story never says that what Mr. Flagg did was okay or that it didn’t hurt that he lied to the people who were helping him. Lying was wrong, and it was hurtful, and the characters are honest about that. They don’t try to pretend that they’re not hurt, which I think would have made their feelings worse in the long run. Instead, it’s about looking past that hurt to something better and finding things to be happy about even in a situation where they didn’t want to be.
Aunt Martha sees that what’s really preventing Ronnie from enjoying Christmas as they happen to have it is his anger, disappointment, and bitter feelings and the way he broods about them. Brooding about the angry things he wants to say to Mr. Flagg when he sees him isn’t making his Christmas any better. Aunt Martha compares cleaning out negative emotions to cleaning house before the holiday. You have to clear out all the dust and negativity to let in something better. They will eventually see Mr. Flagg, and there will probably be words between them, but those words can wait while they enjoy themselves as best they can for this Christmas. By then, each of them will probably have a better sense of just how they really feel about the situation and what they want to say about it anyway.
Once Ronnie works through his feelings and is able to put aside his anger, he realizes that this Christmas is something special. He does miss the class Christmas party the rest of his school is having, but in return for that sacrifice, he is experiencing something truly unique that his school friends will probably never experience. He doesn’t fully consider how unique this experience actually is at first, but he senses that there is a unique feel to Christmas in the lighthouse, with its giant light. Ronnie considers the tradition of putting candles in windows at Christmas, to guide the Christ Child or other travelers. (They emphasize candles as welcoming the Christ Child in the story, but when I first heard of the tradition, it was to welcome travelers or absent family members.) He realizes that, by tending the lighthouse, he and his aunt are doing the same thing, but they’ve got the biggest candle of anyone!
Whatever your Christmas happens to be this year, wherever you’re spending it, and whoever you’re spending it with (even if it’s just yourself), don’t forget to do the little things to make it special and enjoy it for whatever it is! Merry Christmas!
The Children of Green Knowe by L. M. Boston, 1954, 1955, 1982, 1983.
Seven-year-old Toseland is traveling by train to stay with his great-grandmother Oldknow at the old family home, Green Noah, for Christmas. His mother is dead, and his father now lives in Burma with his new wife, who Toseland doesn’t know very well. He has no brothers or sisters, and he spends most of his time at boarding school, so he is often lonely, wishing that he had a family outside of school, like the other boys. His great-grandmother is the only other relative he has, and he has never met her before. He is a little nervous at the idea of meeting her because he knows that she must be very old.
When Toseland arrives at the station, it’s raining, and there has been flooding, but there is a taxi-man waiting to take him to the house. When he arrives, he is immediately fascinated by the large, old house and all of the things in it. It reminds him of a castle, and he marvels at how his great-grandmother could live in such a place. He is surprised at how at home he feels there and how easily he likes and gets along with his great-grandmother. For the first time in his life since his mother died, he really feels at home, and when he asks if the house partly belongs to him, too, his great-grandmother reassures him that it does.
The two of them talk about what to call each other. Toseland’s great-grandmother asks him to call her Granny (although she is still often called Mrs. Oldknow throughout the book), and she asks him if he has any nicknames. Toseland says that the boys at school call him Towser and his stepmother calls him Toto, but he doesn’t like either nickname. Granny Oldknow says that Toseland is a family name and there have been other Toselands before him. The last one was his grandfather, and his nickname was Tolly, so Granny asks him if he would like to be called that also. Toseland says that he likes that nickname better than the others, and his mother used to call him that, so he is called Tolly from that point on.
Granny Oldknow shows Tolly to his room and helps him begin to unpack. It’s a wonderful room with many old toys that used to belong to the other children who have lived in the house in the past. Among the toys is an old dollhouse which Tolly realizes is a miniature version of the house they’re in. When he finds the miniature version of his room, he notices that there are four beds in it instead of one. He asks Granny Oldknow if other children stay at Green Noah, and she cryptically says that they do sometimes, and he might see them, but they come when they want to.
Tolly becomes fascinated by a portrait of three children in old-fashioned clothes with their mother and grandmother. Granny Oldknow tells him that those three children lived in the house long ago. The oldest boy was an earlier Toseland, who was nicknamed Toby. His younger brother was named Alexander, and their little sister was named Linnet. Granny Oldknow had been an orphan when she was a child and was raised at Green Noah by an uncle. Because she was an only child, she often lonely and liked to pretend that the children in the picture were her siblings, so Tolly decides that he’d like to do the same thing.
Tolly asks his great-grandmother questions about Toby, Alexander, and Linnet and learns details of their lives. Toby had a sword because he was going to be a soldier when he grew up, a pet deer, and a horse named Feste who loved him. Alexander had a book in Latin that he loved to read and a special flute. Linnet used to keep birds in a wicker cage that is still in Tolly’s room, along with the toy mouse that used to belong to Toby. Sometimes, Tolly thinks that toys in his room move when he’s not looking, and at night, he hears children moving about and laughing, and he thinks that it’s the three children from the painting.
Tolly comes to the conclusion that the three children are still around Green Noah and that they’re playing hide-and-seek with them. He tries to play with them, too, and the children apparently give him a twig in the shape of a ‘T’. Granny Oldknow tells him that she used to play hide-and-seek with the children when she was young, and they would give her an ‘L’ twig because her first name is Linnet, like the little girl in the painting. Later, he hears the children singing Christmas carols. Tolly becomes frustrated that the children tease him and never really show themselves to him, but Mrs. Oldknow tells him that “they’re like shy animals” and that he has to give them a chance to decide that they’re ready to come to him.
He finds the key to the old toy box in his room, and inside the box, he finds more things that belonged to the three children. When he shows them to Mrs. Oldknow, she talks about how things were when the three children were alive at Green Noah. Tolly is shocked when he realizes for the first time that Toby, Alexander, and Linnet are all dead. Mrs. Oldknow gently tells him that they lived at Green Noah centuries ago and could not be alive now. Sadly, the children all died young in the Great Plague during the 17th century. Their illness was sudden and brief, and they all sickened and died in one day along with their mother. Tolly and his great-grandmother are descended from the children’s older brother, who wasn’t at home when this happened. However, the children never left Green Noah, which used to be called Green Knowe years ago. Tolly still loves the children, even though they’re ghostly and elusive. He craves the sense of family he gets from them, having been deprived of family feelings for so much of his young life.
Mrs. Oldknow continues to tell Tolly stories about the three children and other members of his family. As his connection to his ancestors grows, Tolly begins to catch glimpses of the children more and more, and eventually, he’s able to see them and talk to them. He asks the children about their mother, and the children say that she’s in heaven but doesn’t mind them coming back to visit their old home from time to time. The children don’t seem sad at being dead, enjoying the freedom of playing around their old home with the animals and the spirits of their old pets, who keep them company. Their final illnesses had only lasted a few hours before they died, and their deaths happened so long ago that they say that they hardly remember the Great Plague and what it felt like. Tolly is still sad and frustrated that the children appear and disappear so suddenly, but his attachment to them grows and so does his attachment to Green Noah itself. As Christmas comes, Tolly develops a bond with his family, both living and dead, and a realization that the old family home that connects them is also his home, a place they can all return to.
The book is the first in a series and is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive (multiple copies).
My Reaction and Spoilers
This is a ghost story, but it’s not a scary ghost story. There’s nothing frightening about the three ghost children. It’s sad that they died so young, but at the same time, they’re not very sad about it themselves. They seem to enjoy playing together endlessly with the animals around their old home and seeing the new relatives who inhabit the house, their older brother’s descendants. Even their former pets are no longer sad at the children’s passing because they are also spirits who continue to play with them through the centuries. There is one semi-scary part of the story involving a witch’s curse placed on an old tree called Green Noah, which is how the name of the house was changed from Green Knowe, but Tolly is protected by the ghosts of his ancestors.
There is never any desire for the characters to rid Green Noah of its ghosts. They are family and are part of the place, as much a part of it as the living are. The ghosts do not feel trapped there, either. They are just revisiting the home they loved and the family members who now live there. They can come and go as they please, and the ghost children often do.
This also is not the kind of story where a child knows that a place is haunted but can’t convince the adults or tries to hide the ghosts’ presence from the adults. Mrs. Oldknow is fully aware that the ghosts are there and has known about them since her own childhood. Generations of children in the family have probably known about them and played with them, and they are also not the only family ghosts who inhabit the old house. At one point, Tolly and Mrs. Oldknow hear a woman singing and the rocking of a cradle, and Mrs. Oldknow says that she’s heard it before around Christmas, a grandmother singing to a baby. Tolly is confused because even little Linnet wasn’t a baby when she died, and Mrs. Oldknow says that this isn’t the children’s grandmother but somebody from generations earlier than the three children. This grandmother ghost has been around so long that Mrs. Oldknow doesn’t know who she or the baby are supposed to be, although we are told that they are about 400 years old, where the three children died about 300 years earlier. Generations of the same family have lived in the house and have all left their mark on it, and part of them is still there. Now, Tolly has also become part of this family home, and it’s also a part of him. The ghosts are hesitant to fully show themselves to Tolly at first and seem more attached to Granny Oldknow, probably because she’s lived there longer, since she was an infant. The ghosts know her, and she knows all of their stories. However, they are all family, and Tolly develops a new connection to his family as his great-grandmother tells him the stories about them, and he can hear and see the ghosts more often.
Really, that feeling of connection and connectedness is the primary focus of the story. In the beginning, Tolly is lonely, feeling like he doesn’t have a family and doesn’t belong anywhere or to anyone. His father lives far away in Burma with his new wife, and Tolly doesn’t feel connected to them. His mother is gone, and he spends most of his time at school, even having to remain there during the holidays when other students are going home to their families. His great-grandmother inviting him to Green Noah is the first time that Tolly feels a real connection to anyone in his family since his mother’s death, and through her stories and his encounters with the ghosts, he comes to see that he really is part of a much larger family, going back ages. Just because most of his family is now dead or scattered doesn’t mean that they’re not his family. They still love him, and he loves them, even across the centuries. Green Noah really is a family home, and it’s a place that family can return to, even those who seem to be gone forever. It’s a place that has known both the joys of a happy family and the tragedies of loss that families experience from time to time. Through it all, it’s still home, and importantly, it becomes the home that Tolly has been wishing for.
The story takes place in the days leading up to Christmas, and by Christmas, Tolly has received important presents. First, the ghostly Alexander grants him the give of his special flute, which had been a reward from King Charles II for singing so beautifully for him when he was alive. Tolly also has musical talents, and his great-grandmother decides to switch him to a different school so he can develop his talents and so he can stay at Green Noah during his school holidays. On Christmas, Tolly also receives his own pet dog, very much like the one that the ghostly Linnet owned, and he names his dog after hers, just as he has been named after all the other Toselands who have gone before.
In some ways, the story reminds me a little of When Marnie Was There (some people might know the story from the Miyazaki movie version), which has similar themes of family and belonging and ancestors reaching out across time to remind children that, while life is brief and often complicated, love is eternal and everyone belongs somewhere and to someone. However, The Children of Greene Knowe is a much gentler story, and it also contains some shorter stories about Tolly’s family.
Jemmy is an orphan who lives in the royal castle as the prince’s new whipping boy. Prince Horace, or Prince Brat, as the prince is commonly called, is known for constantly misbehaving, playing mean pranks, and refusing to do his lessons (he tells his tutor that he doesn’t need to learn how to read because he could always get someone else to do his reading for him). However, in their land, it is illegal for anyone to use any kind of physical force or punishment on a prince. Instead, the royal family employs a whipping boy to take the prince’s punishments for him. As you can imagine, seeing someone else whipped in his place does little to correct the prince’s bad behavior. In fact, the prince usually likes the spectacle of the whipping boy yelling. He doesn’t like it that, unlike the others, Jemmy never yells when he’s whipped.
Jemmy
was recruited for the role of whipping boy off the streets, where he survived
by being a mudlark and rat catcher.
There are benefits to living in the palace, even if his purpose in being
there is to take the prince’s punishments.
Jemmy gets food to eat and nice clothes to wear and attends the prince’s
lessons with him, where he pays attention when the prince does not. Jemmy actually loves the books and learning
he receives.
After
about a year, though, the prince suddenly comes to Jemmy in the middle of the
night and tells him that he’s running away from home and wants Jemmy to come
with him as a manservant. When Jemmy
asks him why he wants to leave, the prince says that he’s bored. Jemmy wonders why Prince Brat wants him to
come along instead of a friend, but then he realizes that, as nasty as he is,
Prince Brat doesn’t have any real friends.
When the two of them are outside of the palace, Jemmy is tempted to run off and leave Prince Brat to fend for himself, but before he can make up his mind about it, the two boys are taken prisoner by bandits, Cutwater and Hold-Your-Nose Billy (named for all the garlic he eats).
Prince
Horace tries to pull rank on the bandits, telling them who he is and ordering
them to go away. It’s a mistake. When the bandits see the royal crest on the
saddle of the horse that the boys are riding, they decide that they can
probably get a good ransom for the prince.
Since neither of the bandits can write, they try to make the prince
write his own ransom note, but of course, Prince Brat can’t write because he’s
refused to learn.
Jemmy, seeing an opportunity to turn the situation around, offers to write the note instead. As Jemmy suspected, when the bandits realize that he can write and Horace can’t, they start assuming that he’s actually the prince and that the two boys have switched places. After writing the note, Jemmy suggests that they let the “whipping boy” (Horace) take it to the castle, thinking that not only will Horace get safely away but that he’ll be rid of Horace after that.
To
Jemmy’s surprise, Prince Horace ruins the whole scheme by refusing to return to
the castle. Jemmy tries to reason with
him, but Horace says that he won’t go home until he’s ready. The boys to manage to slip away on the
bandits, and Horace insists on following Jemmy even though Jemmy wants to be rid
of him.
Although Jemmy can’t understand why, Horace says that he’s having the time of his life. For once in his life, he doesn’t have people fussing over him and telling him to keep his clothes clean. Horace has found palace life stifling and boring, and he feels like his father hardly notices him or cares. Part of the reason why Horace acts up is to get his father’s attention. Jemmy is surprised by these insights into the prince’s life and character, and he is also surprised that, when he finally gets the chance to slip away and leave Horace behind, he can’t do it. He knows that Horace isn’t used to life outside the palace, and Jemmy worries about what might happen to him if he’s left alone, although he tells himself that Horace could always return to the castle.
Before their adventures are over, Horace gets to experience what it’s like to do chores for himself and even to be whipped by the bandits, when they think he’s the whipping boy. Being whipped himself shows Horace what he has subjected others to on his account. Jemmy is surprised that Horace bears the punishment without crying or complaining, something which Horace says that he learned from watching Jemmy, who made it a point to take whippings with quiet dignity. Horace also learns what other people really think of him when a woman at a fair comments on the prince’s disappearance, using the “Prince Brat” nickname and saying that the young prince is a “terror” and bound to be a terrible king when he’s older. Usually, people are careful about what they say in front of the prince, and Horace is shocked to find out how disliked he is because of his bad behavior. However, Horace’s new experiences and realizations bring a change in his outlook and personality that make him more sympathetic and likeable. There is also the realization that what Horace really needs in his life isn’t a whipping boy to take his punishments for him but someone who can be a real, honest friend with him, like Jemmy.
In the
end, Jemmy becomes the prince’s companion, not his whipping boy, so that the
prince will be less lonely and stop acting out to get attention. The king promises that Horace can keep Jemmy
as his companion and his responsibility as long as Horace himself can behave responsibly
and do his lessons as he should.
Although the country and characters in the story are fictional, the practice of keeping a whipping boy so that princes wouldn’t have direct physical punishment was a real practice. Even today, the term “whipping boy” can stand for a person who takes blame or punishment in the place of someone with higher rank or authority, even when the person of higher rank is the one at fault. For example, if a business manager or CEO makes a bad decision and orders one of his employees to do something they shouldn’t and the employee gets the blame for it as if what they did was their idea and not the boss’s, that employee can be considered the “whipping boy.” Another example would be if a stepchild in a family was given blame or punishment in place of a biological child because of favoritism on the part of the punishing parent (similar to the crude saying “beaten like a red-headed stepchild“). In fact, depending on the circumstances, a “whipping boy” might not even be a person, but a thing or a concept that is blamed instead of the person or thing that is the true cause of a problem, such as blaming “modern society” or “kids these days” for an individual’s bad habits or behavior, “the government” or “the system” for a business’s bad decisions or policies, or “millenials” for practically everything they’ve been blamed for by older people. It is similar to the concept of the “scapegoat” or “fall guy” but with the connotation that the person who is really at fault, the one who is trying to avoid blame or punishment, succeeds because of higher rank, authority, seniority, or some other form of favoritism among those who will assign blame or punishment.
This book is a Newbery Medal Winner and is available online through Internet Archive (multiple copies).
There is also a movie version of the book, sometimes called Prince Brat and the Whipping Boy. The movie follows the concept of the original story pretty well, but it elaborates more on Jemmy’s life before he became the whipping boy and on how Horace feels neglected by his father. In the movie, Jemmy is pressed into service as whipping boy by the king’s soldiers, who don’t bother to find out if he has any other family. Although Jemmy is an orphan in both the book and movie, in the movie, he also has a younger sister he looks after, and part of what he wants to do when he leaves the palace is to find her. The boys together learn that the younger sister was arrested for attempting to steal a handkerchief in Jemmy’s absence, and they have to rescue her from prison, a side adventure that didn’t occur in the book. In the movie, Horace also explains to Jemmy that his mother died in a riding accident when he was young and that his father pays more attention to affairs of state than he does to him. Horace is shown multiple times trying to get his father’s attention, only to be brushed off because his father is too busy. In the movie, the king almost declares war on another country, thinking that Horace was kidnapped over a border dispute, something that didn’t happen in the book. In both the book and the movie, Jemmy’s new friendship with Horace brings about a change in the prince. At the end of the movie, both Jemmy and his sister are taken in to the palace as companions for Horace. Sometimes you can find this movie or clips of it on YouTube. Although it was originally released on VHS, it is currently available on DVD.
Who’s Afraid of Haggerty House? By Linda Gondosch, 1987.
Kelly McCoy is eager to begin selling greeting cards for the Bismarck Greeting Card company because she wants to earn extra money for Christmas shopping. Her best friends, Jennifer and Adelaide are selling cards, too, and Kelly is looking forward to teaming up with them. However, she soon finds out that Jennifer and Adelaide have already finished their selling. While Kelly was visiting her grandparents for a couple of days, the other girls hurried right out and started selling their cards. They were worried about other kids beating them to the neighborhood houses. By the time Kelly is ready to begin, the others are done and tired of going door-to-door, and many of the houses in the area have already bought all the Christmas cards they want.
Angry and hurt, Kelly has a fight with the other girls, and they mention that one house they didn’t visit was Haggerty House, which is supposed to be haunted. Although the house spooks Kelly, she decides to go there and try to sell her cards. When her brother, Ben, followers her and hits her with snowballs, further angering her, she dares him to come to Haggerty House, too. Ben might be annoying company, but he’s still company.
Usually, the only time that kids in the neighborhood go to Haggerty House is on Halloween, and old Mr. and Mrs. Haggerty give good treats for the kids who are daring enough to visit, usually candied apples and nickels. When Kelly and Ben approach the house to sell Christmas cards, Mrs. Haggerty invites them in for hot chocolate. Mrs. Haggerty buys one of Kelly’s cards, and Kelly and Ben learn that Mrs. Haggerty is very lonely. Her husband is ill and in the hospital. She invites the garbage men in for hot chocolate, too, but is disappointed that they can’t stay very long because they have to finish their rounds.
Kelly and Ben can’t stay very long, either, much to Mrs. Haggerty’s disappointment. However, Kelly later accepts an invitation from Mrs. Haggerty to visit again. Mrs. Haggerty shows her some Christmas cards that people have given her previous years and tells her about her son, Tyler, who is a filmmaker in Los Angeles. Tyler doesn’t visit very often because his work keeps him busy. Mrs. Haggerty plays the piano, and she’s writing a song for Tyler for Christmas. Mrs. Haggerty enjoys Kelly’s visit and wishes she could stay even longer.
Mrs. Haggerty becomes closer to Kelly’s family. Ben helps Kelly to take Mrs. Haggerty’s picture and record the song she’s writing for Tyler so she can send it to him for Christmas. Mrs. Haggerty also comes with the McCoys when they go shopping for a Christmas tree, and she comes to see Kelly as the Ghost of Christmas Past in her school’s A Christmas Carol play.
Then, while the kids are helping Mrs. Haggerty decorate at her house, an eccentric woman from the neighborhood, Malvina Krebs, comes to the house to ask if Mrs. Haggerty would like to participate in one of the seances that she holds regularly with friends. Actually, they are hoping that she will let them hold a séance at her house because her house has such wonderful atmosphere and “vibrations.” Mrs. Haggerty agrees because she’s never seen a séance before, and the séance group will be additional company. Kelly asks if she could come because she’s curious to see what a séance looks like as well, and the ladies agree.
The séance is a very strange experience, although Kelly later discovers that some of what happened was a prank by her brother and his friend. It occurs to Kelly that what she likes about visiting Mrs. Haggerty is that, unlike her friends right now, Mrs. Haggerty is always glad to see her and the interesting things that they do take her mind off of her fight with her friends. However, she has come to miss talking to people who really understand her. She can imagine what Jennifer would say about the séance and how she would find it interesting and how she would understand how Kelly felt about it. Kelly’s earlier anger at her friends wasn’t really about how they made money with their cards and left no customers for her so much as they were having a good time without her and how they no longer seem interested in spending time with her. She confides a little in Mrs. Haggerty how she feels about her friends, and she says that friends don’t always act like friends should. Mrs. Haggerty herself doesn’t have as many friends as she used to because many of them have passed away.
Kelly does make up with Jennifer and Adelaide, inviting them to a Christmas party at Mrs. Haggerty’s. There, she learns that some of their stand-offishness and secretiveness was because they’ve been planning a special Christmas present for Kelly. The Christmas party is fun with a lot of old-fashioned games, but the best part is when Tyler finally comes home for Christmas!
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
Friendship is a large part of the theme of this story. Kelly comes to understand Mrs. Haggerty’s loneliness partly through her quarrels with her friends. At this point in their lives, each of them needs the other because they don’t really have anyone else. Kelly’s time with Mrs. Haggerty gives her a new perspective on her relationship with her friends, and she also comes to understand some of the difficulties that Mrs. Haggerty faces because she is elderly. Mrs. Haggerty’s song for her son is what makes him realize that he needs to spend more time with his aging parents, and Kelly and her friends decide that they will continue to visit with Mrs. Haggerty regularly.
It’s 1914, and Blossom Culp is just starting high school. Although the principal of her old school tells her that this is a chance for her to make a fresh start, it looks like Blossom’s future is going to be very much a continuation of her immediate past. In high school, she’s still a social outcast, looked down on by girls from better-off families, like Letty, the class president. Also, despite her principal’s assertion that Blossom’s previous forays into the occult were imaginary, the product of the mental confusion that accompanies puberty, and that she is bound to grow out of them, Blossom knows that her psychic abilities are a natural gift and will not be ignored.
Blossom begins high school friendless because Alexander Armsworth has been ignoring her lately because of his important new position as class vice-president, his infatuation with Letty, and his friendship with a couple of local hooligans, Bub and Champ. Alexander is looking forward to his role in planning the school’s Halloween Festival, telling Blossom that he’s over their earlier, childish occult escapades and the Halloween pranks he used to pull. Meanwhile, all of the other girls in school are infatuated with their handsome history teacher, Mr. Lacy, and so is the girls’ gym teacher, much to Blossom’s disgust. Blossom thinks that Mr. Lacy is full of himself and denies that she has any such silly crush on Alexander.
Blossom makes an unexpected friend in a girl called Daisy-Rae, a girl from the country who has brought her younger brother into town to attend school and hoped to get an education herself but has been too afraid of the big town to actually attend classes. Daisy-Rae hides in the school during the day and lives alone with her brother at night in the old chicken coop at the abandoned Leverette house. It is through Daisy-Rae that she learns that Alexander and his friends aren’t so above childish pranks as they claim to be. Blossom also discovers that Mr. Lacy has been romancing her old principal. Mr. Lacy isn’t quite what he appears to be and has some unsavory secrets in his past.
Matters come to a head when Alexander (at Letty’s urging) tries to persuade Blossom to dress up and become the fortune teller for the haunted house that the freshmen class is doing for the Halloween Festival. The haunted house is also a fundraiser, and Letty figures that they can get extra money from people if they’re willing to pay to have their fortunes told, and who would be better for the job than Blossom? However, Blossom isn’t one to go out of her way to please others, especially Letty, and it turns out that they’re holding the haunted house in the Old Leverette place. For some reason, that old house makes Blossom’s mother uneasy. She seems to think that it’s haunted, but in an unusual way. Blossom tells Alexander that she will not agree to be their fortune teller until he agrees to check out the house with her before Halloween and find out what’s wrong with it. She figures that, since both of them are psychic, they can learn what’s so unusual.
As Blossom learns, her abilities don’t confine themselves to the past and people who have died but extend to the future and the people who haven’t yet been born. Inside the Old Leverette house, Blossom suddenly finds herself entering the distant future, the 1980s. In the 1980s, the Leverette house is once again lived in, and Blossom meets a boy named Jeremy who is a lonely social outcast, like herself. Jeremy is a computer nerd, living with his divorced mother. He takes Blossom on a tour of their town as it is in Blossom’s future, much larger than it used to be and with many familiar landmarks missing. However, what Blossom sees in the future gives her the inspiration she needs to solve her problems in the past and hope that things will improve. In return, she also proves to Jeremy that he is far from alone and has had a friend for longer than he ever imagined.
The time travel to the 1980s comes off as being a little corny (or so it seemed to me), but the writing quality of the book is excellent. The author has an entertaining turn of phrase, and the book, like others in the series, is humorous and a lot of fun to read.
Besides being a kind of fantasy story, there are some interesting tidbits of history in the book, showing how people lived in the 1910s. Blossom explains about the things she and her classmates did at school, like wearing beanies on their heads to show which year they were (freshmen, future graduating class of 1918). At one point in the story, Blossom takes Daisy-Rae and her brother to their first movie, a silent film with an episode of The Perils of Pauline serial. While Blossom worries about the future, readers can get a glimpse of the past!
As for what Blossom learns about her own future, she avoids finding out too much because she’d rather not know the details. However, there are implications that she and Alexander may eventually marry and live in his family’s old house.
The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.
Mr. Whiskers is eager to talk to Seth, the owner of the General Store, about this year’s Easter egg hunt. Seth hosts one every year, and Mr. Whiskers is full of plans. However, Seth tells him that he’s thinking of closing the store and moving. He’s been lonely in Cranberryport since his wife died, and he’s thinking that he might want to retire and move to a warmer climate.
When Mr. Whiskers tells Maggie’s Grandmother what Seth said, she says that he’s not the only one thinking of moving. A couple of her friends say that they can’t handle living alone on their farms in the winter anymore, and because they haven’t been able to find rooms to rent in town, they are thinking of moving to a warmer climate, too.
Then, Maggie comes up with a possible solution. She reminds them that the building that the General Store occupies was once a hotel. There are rooms above the store that Seth hasn’t been using. If he cleaned up those old rooms, he could rent them out to Grandmother’s friends. Seth is reluctant at first because the rooms need a lot of work to clean up, but with a little urging and help from his friends, they soon manage to turn the old hotel rooms into nice-looking apartments.
Grandmother’s friends love the apartments because, with rooms right over the store, they won’t even have to go out for groceries when the weather is bad. The arrangement works well for Seth, too. When members of the community help to clean up the old rooms, it reminds him that he has friends in town, and with some of them living right above his shop, there will be no need for him to feel lonely anymore.
Of course, when Seth decides to stay in town and hold the Easter egg hunt after all, Mr. Whiskers has to follow through on his promise to dress up as the Easter Bunny.
Like other books in the series, this book includes a recipe in the back, for Cranberry Cobbler.
April Hall has come to live with her grandmother (the mother of her deceased father) because her actress mother is touring with a band as a singer. April’s mother isn’t a big star, although April likes to brag about her and their Hollywood life. Really, her mother is mostly a vocalist who occasionally gets parts as an extra, hoping for that big break. April is sure that when her mother gets back from her tour, she will send for her, and they will live together in Hollywood again. Although, from the way her grandmother behaves, it seems as though April may have to prepare herself for living with her for the long term. April resents her grandmother’s apparent belief that her mother has dumped her because she is unwilling or unable to take care of her.
April is homesick and misses her mother. To hide her feelings, she tries to act grown-up and ultra-sophisticated, which makes most people regard her as a little weird. In spite of that, she makes friends with a girl named Melanie, who lives in a nearby apartment and sees through April’s act to her insecurity and creative side. April has never had many friends (partly because of her mother’s chaotic lifestyle), but Melanie appreciates April’s imagination. The two girls realize that they both like playing games of pretend and they both have a fascination with Ancient Egypt. They go to the library and read everything they can find about Egypt, and it sparks the best game from pretend they’ve ever played. Along with a few other friends, they start pretending to be Ancient Egyptians, building their own Egyptian “temple” and holding rituals in the old junk yard behind a nearby antique shop.
On Halloween night, the adults try to keep the children together in groups for safety, but the “Egyptians” sneak off alone to conduct one of their “rituals.” It’s a dangerous thing to do because a child has been murdered in their area. A young girl who was apparently abducted was later found dead, and people are frightened that other children could be in danger. Fortunately, the only thing that happens on Halloween is that the Egyptians recruit a couple of new members when some boys from school find out what they’re doing.
However, the game starts taking on a life of its own when it seems that some other, unknown person has also joined in. As part of their game, the children make up a new ritual and write messages to their “oracle,” asking questions that they want answered. To their surprise, someone starts writing replies. Whoever is playing oracle and answering their questions, it doesn’t seem to be a child.
The children are uneasy about this unexpected game player because frightening things are happening in their neighborhood. The kids wonder if the mysterious messages could be from the crazed killer who murdered the young girl. People have been looking suspiciously at the loner who owns the antique store, an older man who everyone calls the Professor. However, the kids have become too enmeshed in the Egypt game to give it up in spite of their fears.
When April slips out one night to retrieve a text book she left in “Egypt,” she comes frighteningly close to being the killer’s next victim.
This is a Newbery Honor Book. It is currently available online through Internet Archive (multiple copies). There is a sequel called The Gypsy Game.
My Reaction
Although there are mysteries in the story (who killed the girl and who the unknown player of the Egypt game is), the development of the characters, especially April, is really at the heart of the story. All through the story, what April wants most is for her mother to come for her and take her home again. April fears that her mother doesn’t love her or want her, and at first, that keeps her from even trying to love the grandmother who took her in and really wants her. However, she finds comfort when she realizes that she is creating a new life with her grandmother and friends, who really care about her. Her mother does write to her later about coming to stay for a brief visit with her and her new husband (her acting manager, who she married on short notice without even telling April or inviting her to come to their wedding), but by then, April has started to feel at home in her new home and wants to share Christmas with the people who have been sharing in her life and adventures more than her mother has. She never even tells her mother about her brush with death.
The characters in the book are diverse, representing different racial backgrounds, ages, and family situations. Melanie and her younger brother are African American. Melanie understands more about human nature and how the world works than April does, partly because her mother talks to her about people and explains things. Melanie realizes from the way that April behaves and how she doesn’t understand certain things, like the fact that there disturbed, dangerous people in the world, that her mother never really talked to her much or explained things when they were living together. Melanie helps to ground April’s more flighty, insecure personality. She joins in her imagination games eagerly, but she also helps to bring April more into sync with reality and other people.
The first new player they add to the game, Elizabeth, is Asian and lives with her widowed mother and other siblings. Like April, she is a little lonely and looking for new friends in her new home. Each of the kids, like April, have their own inner lives and personalities. The Egypt game binds them together and provides them with friendship and insights into their lives.
The Ghost of Windy Hill by Clyde Robert Bulla, 1968.
It’s 1851, and Professor Carver of Boston is living in an apartment above a candle shop with his wife and two children, his son Jamie and daughter Lorna. One day, a man named Mr. Giddings comes to see Professor Carver to request his help. For years, he has wanted to buy a particular farm with a beautiful house called Windy Hill. However, when he finally succeeded in buying the house and he and his wife went to live there, his wife became very upset. She said that she felt strange in the house and that she had seen a ghost. Now, she is too upset to return to Windy Hill. Mr. Giddings has heard that Professor Carver once helped a friend get rid of a ghost haunting his house, and he asks the professor if he would be willing to do the same for him.
At first, Professor Carver is reluctant to agree to help. He doesn’t believe in ghosts, and when he helped his other friend, he didn’t get rid of any ghosts. His friend had only believed that his house was haunted, and after the professor and his family had stayed there for awhile without experiencing anything unusual, his friend relaxed and was reassured that the house was alright. Mr. Giddings asks if the professor and his family would be willing to stay at Windy Hill for the rest of summer and see if they see anything unusual. If they don’t, perhaps Mrs. Giddings will feel better about the house and be willing to return there. Although the professor is still not that interested in the house, his family is, so he agrees to spend the rest of the summer there, about a month. His family can escape the summer heat in the city, and he can work on his painting while someone else teaches his class.
Jamie and Lorna are thrilled by the house, which is much bigger than their apartment in town. They can each have their own room, and there is an old tower in the house that was built by a former owner, who was always paranoid about Indian (Native American) attacks (something which had never actually happened). However, their new neighbors are kind of strange. Stover, the handyman, warns them that the house is haunted and also tells them about another neighbor, Miss Miggie. Miss Miggie is an old woman who wanders around, all dressed in white, and likes to spy on people. There is also a boy named Bruno, who apparently can’t walk and often begs at the side of the road with his pet goat, and his father, Tench, who is often drunk and doesn’t want people to make friends with Bruno.
The kids make friends with both Bruno and Miss Miggie. Bruno is unfriendly at first, but Lorna brings him cookies, and she and her brother tell him about life in the city. Miss Miggie brings Lorna a bag of scrap cloth so that she can make a quilt. Nothing strange has been happening in the house, so the family knows that they will be returning to the city soon, reassuring Mr. Giddings that the house isn’t haunted.
Then, strange things do start happening in the house. The quilt that Lorna has been making disappears and reappears in another room in the middle of the night. At first, the family thinks maybe she was walking in her sleep because she had done it before, when she was younger. However, there is someone who has been entering the house without the Carvers’ knowledge, and Jamie and Lorna set a trap that catches the mysterious “ghost.”
As Professor Carver suspected, there is no real ghost at Windy Hill, but this story has a double mystery. First, there is the matter of the mysterious ghost, who is not there to scare the Carvers away but actually to make them stay. Then, there is the question of what Mrs. Giddings saw that upset her so much, if anything.
The book is easy to read for younger readers and accompanied by black-and-white pictures. My only complaint is that some of the pictures are a little dark, and the artistic style makes them a little difficult to interpret.
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
The Dreadful Future of Blossom Culp by Richard Peck, 1983.
April Hall has come to live with her grandmother (the mother of her deceased father) because her actress mother is touring with a band as a singer. April’s mother isn’t a big star, although April likes to brag about her and their Hollywood life. Really, her mother is mostly a vocalist who occasionally gets parts as an extra, hoping for that big break. April is sure that when her mother gets back from her tour, she will send for her, and they will live together in Hollywood again. Although, from the way her grandmother behaves, it seems as though April may have to prepare herself for living with her for the long term. April resents her grandmother’s apparent belief that her mother has dumped her because she is unwilling or unable to take care of her.
The children are uneasy about this unexpected game player because frightening things are happening in their neighborhood. The kids wonder if the mysterious messages could be from the crazed killer who murdered the young girl. People have been looking suspiciously at the loner who owns the antique store, an older man who everyone calls the Professor. However, the kids have become too enmeshed in the Egypt game to give it up in spite of their fears.
It’s 1851, and Professor Carver of Boston is living in an apartment above a candle shop with his wife and two children, his son Jamie and daughter Lorna. One day, a man named Mr. Giddings comes to see Professor Carver to request his help. For years, he has wanted to buy a particular farm with a beautiful house called Windy Hill. However, when he finally succeeded in buying the house and he and his wife went to live there, his wife became very upset. She said that she felt strange in the house and that she had seen a ghost. Now, she is too upset to return to Windy Hill. Mr. Giddings has heard that Professor Carver once helped a friend get rid of a ghost haunting his house, and he asks the professor if he would be willing to do the same for him.
Jamie and Lorna are thrilled by the house, which is much bigger than their apartment in town. They can each have their own room, and there is an old tower in the house that was built by a former owner, who was always paranoid about Indian (Native American) attacks (something which had never actually happened). However, their new neighbors are kind of strange. Stover, the handyman, warns them that the house is haunted and also tells them about another neighbor, Miss Miggie. Miss Miggie is an old woman who wanders around, all dressed in white, and likes to spy on people. There is also a boy named Bruno, who apparently can’t walk and often begs at the side of the road with his pet goat, and his father, Tench, who is often drunk and doesn’t want people to make friends with Bruno.
Then, strange things do start happening in the house. The quilt that Lorna has been making disappears and reappears in another room in the middle of the night. At first, the family thinks maybe she was walking in her sleep because she had done it before, when she was younger. However, there is someone who has been entering the house without the Carvers’ knowledge, and Jamie and Lorna set a trap that catches the mysterious “ghost.”
Jestress's Forgotten Books and Stories 