Calming Ritual

Book Cover: The Creeping Shadow by Jonathan Stroud

Making tea is a ritual that stops the world from falling in on you. Everything pauses while you do familiar things with taps and kettles; it allows you to catch your breath and become calm. I’ve made tea on camping stoves while Specters paced beyond my protective iron chains; I’ve brewed some while watching a Revenant claw itself free of its grave.

The Creeping Shadow by Jonathan Stroud

#MGCarousel – 20 Middle Grade Books About Ghosts

20 Middle Grade Books About Ghosts: Middle Grade books featuring friendly ghosts, ominous spirits, haunted houses, and invisible visitors!

Our #MGCarousel reading challenge this month is all about GHOSTS. If you’re unafraid to explore the afterlife, CJ and Elza have gathered 20 Middle Grade books that feature haunted houses, spooky spirits, ghost hunters, and plenty of paranormal activity!

Continue reading “#MGCarousel – 20 Middle Grade Books About Ghosts”

Local Haunting

Book Cover: The Creeping Shadow by Jonathan Stroud

He shuddered, then drew his shoulders in and fiddled with his collar as if he suddenly felt cold. “No one knows what it is, or what its nature might be. But it has a local name.” He took a deep breath, then spoke in a voice of guttural dread. “We call it … the Creeping Shadow.”

The Creeping Shadow by Jonathan Stroud

Top Ten

In many ways, the ghost in the jar had been a thorn in my side for ages….It was thoroughly, defiantly, exultantly reprehensible; in fact, if you wrote down the ten most unsavory character traits you could imagine, the skull possessed the nine worst on the list, and it only lacked the tenth because that one wasn’t quite bad enough.

The Creeping Shadow
Jonathan Stroud
Stroud, Jonathan - Creeping Shadow

Standard Equipment

An onlooker, recognizing us as psychic investigation agents, would have assumed that the bags were filled with the equipment of our trade: salt-bombs, lavender, iron filings, silver Seals and chains. This was in fact quite true, but I also carried a skull in a jar, so we weren’t entirely predictable.

The Hollow Boy
Jonathan Stroud

Stroud, Jonathan - Hollow Boy