MMGM: A Properly Unhaunted Place by William Alexander
ABOUT THE BOOK
Rosa Ramona Díaz has just moved to the small, un-haunted town of Ingot—the only ghost-free town in the world. She doesn’t want to be there. She doesn’t understand how her mother—a librarian who specializes in ghost-appeasement—could possibly want to live in a place with no ghosts. Frankly, she doesn’t understand why anyone would.
Jasper Chevalier has always lived in Ingot. His father plays a knight at the local Renaissance Festival, and his mother plays the queen. Jasper has never seen a ghost, and can’t imagine his un-haunted town any other way. Then an apparition thunders into the festival grounds and turns the quiet town upside down.
Something otherworldly is about to be unleashed, and Rosa will need all her ghost appeasement tools—and a little help from Jasper—to rein in the angry spirits and restore peace to Ingot before it’s too late.
REVIEW
So many fantasy novels these days are thick and detailed. This is great for avid readers, but makes it challenging for fantasy-loving reluctant readers. So, I am delighted to be able to highly recommend this less than 200 page fantasy. Rosa and Jasper make for delightful main characters who are faced with a rather large problem. At first it appears that Ingot doesn't have any ghosts, which troubles Rosa considering appeasing ghosts is what her mother does best, and something she has gotten involved with as well. But after her father's embarrassing death, maybe that's what her mother wants. But Rosa misses the business of the big city, including the hauntings.
Jasper, on the other hand, has lived his whole life in Ingot, a town without hauntings of any kind. But as he is showing Rosa around the town's famous Renaissance Faire, a haunted, upside-down tree comes stampeding through the fair. Rosa does her best to stop it, but without her tool belt, she isn't properly prepared for it. What is clear is that something is going on, and the Ingot may not be as unhaunted as everyone thinks. And it may be up to Rosa and Jasper, to appease some very angry ghosts before absolute disaster strikes.
This well-written book is entertaining with lots of interesting twists and turns, as well as a fantasy trope, turned on its head. In most ghost stories, the main characters are seeking to get rid of ghosts, but not in Rosa's world. In Rosa's world, hauntings are the norm, and a town without them is the anomaly. The story moves quickly with the kind of plot that works perfectly for young readers. A great addition for most libraries.
Aw, that sounds adorably topsy turvy! My daughter loves mysteries and spookies, but I haven't gotten her into fantasy much and she's reluctant because of the school guidelines stuff. I'll have to see if she'll take to this one.
ReplyDelete