The Ghost Collector

Ghosts aren’t meant to stick around forever... Shelly and her grandmother catch ghosts. In their hair. Just like all the women in their family, they can see souls who haven’t transitioned yet; it’s their job to help the ghosts along their journey. When Shelly’s mom dies suddenly, Shelly’s relationship to ghosts—and death—changes. Instead of helping spirits move on, Shelly starts hoarding them. But no matter how many ghost cats, dogs, or people she hides in her room, Shelly can’t ignore the one ghost that’s missing. Why hasn’t her mom’s ghost come home yet? Rooted in a Cree worldview and inspired by stories about the author’s great-grandmother’s life, The Ghost Collector delves into questions of grief and loss, and introduces an exciting new voice in tween fiction that will appeal to fans of Kate DiCamillo’s Louisiana’s Way Home and Patrick Ness’s A Monster Calls.

Fourteen-year-old Bing is upset with his father for forcing him to help him dig up the bones of Chinese men and women in order to send them back to China. After they discover a skeleton without a skull, Ba is haunted by the powerful ghost. Later Bing gets a job as houseboy for a wealthy family, where he finds another ghost haunting the family. Bing is finally able to find out what both ghosts want from the living and rescues his father from impending death.

"That's the first step, you know. Admitting you're afraid. But when there's love, there can be no fear." Davia is afraid of many things, and everything about her elderly great-aunt Mari and her spooky-looking plantation home terrifies her. When she encounters Emilie, the tortured ghost of a well-to-do adolescent girl from the nineteenth century, she is even more frightened. Davia gradually begins to learn from Aunt Mari secrets about Emilie and about her own family's past—stories of premature endings and regrets. As Aunt Mari's health deteriorates, she and Davia become closer. Together, they hope to release Emilie's spirit from the mansion and the world of the living. Author Sheri Sinykin has written a provocative tale of a young girl who learns to accept uncertainty and to come to terms with her fears. Readers will be mesmerized by the intriguing supernatural mystery that lies at the heart of the story.

A Choctaw boy tells in his own words the story of his tribe’s removal from the only land its people have ever known, and how their journey to Oklahoma led him to become a ghost — one with the ability to help those he left behind. Isaac leads a remarkable foursome of Choctaw comrades: a tough minded teenage girl, a shape-shifting panther boy, a lovable five-year-old ghost who only wants her mom and dad to be happy, and Isaac’s talking dog, Jumper. The first in a series, How I Became a Ghost thinly disguises an important and oft-overlooked piece of history.

For fifty years, ten-year-old Susie has waited for her parents and sister to come back. Each new family who moves into her home seems not to notice her, except for the young children. Susie likes children. She even likes baby-sitting, but can she baby-sit forever? Why can't she get anyone else's attention? Charlotte is looking forward to a great summer in her new home, despite her many baby-sitting duties. But someone else seems to be helping her watch her little brother. Someone only he can see. Gradually Charlotte realizes her all-too-normal house is haunted-by the ghost of a girl who doesn't or won't realize that she's dead. Set around the Fourth of July, this story offers two perspectives-one of the living and one of the dead-in a wholly entertaining and thought-provoking way.

From New York Times bestselling author Jodi Lynn Anderson comes a haunting and lovely small-town romance, perfect for fans of Gayle Forman, Lauren Myracle, and Laurie Halse Anderson. When Maggie’s parents move them from bustling Chicago to small, rundown Door County, Wisconsin, she thinks she’ll spend a year reading classics and killing time until college. That plan changes as soon as she meets Pauline and Liam. Soon the three are inseparable, stretching out the love between two childhood best friends to fit over all of them and all their grand dreams. But what starts as an uneventful year suddenly changes. Someone is killing teenage girls, and the town reels from each new tragedy. And as the dynamics between Maggie, Pauline, and Liam shift and collide in irreversible ways, they all will experience love and loss hand-in-hand—but only two of them will survive the winter.

Achim is eleven years old when he moves from the orphanage to the house by the sea. Here everything is strange and new. But one day he discovers an unusual door that leads to a circular room with walls made of rough stone. The light coming through the window is hazy, as if the room is under water. It is a magic room—which he calls “The Adopted Room”—belonging to another world. And on a bed in the room sits a boy who is waiting to take Achim with him into the realm of the powerful Nameless One. Achim learns that the boy, Arnim, is the long-dead son of Achim’s new parents. When he died in a car accident at the age of four, Arnim was supposed to have become a bird and flown free to the land of the dead, which can be seen through the window of The Adopted Room. But the Nameless One has somehow locked Arnim inside, so he cannot leave. Achim, however, finds he can turn into a bird, slip through the window, and fly across the strange land. And thus begins a journey in which Achim must fight the Nameless One and free Arnim so he can finally leave his parents and they can let go of their grief. Antonia Michaelis’s fresh voice helps to address the delicate issues of death, grief, and mourning, portraying them as an essential part of life. The Secret Room is full of humor and adventure, but also brings to light these difficult life issues in a way that young readers can understand. The first in a trilogy, with its sequel, The Secret of the Twelfth Continent, to follow next spring, this captivating mid-grade novel is sure to become a favorite series with young readers.

A spooky doll story filled with thrills and chills, for fans of Mary Downing Hahn and Neil Gaiman. Josie always liked visiting her grandmother's house. But when she's forced to move there, she starts to feel like something is a little . . . off. Her grandmother has some very strange rules:Never leave your windows open after dark.No dolls in the house.Never, ever go by the house in the woods.A little spooked, Josie is relieved to find that her school seems pretty normal. She even manages to make friends with a popular girl named Vanessa. When Vanessa invites Josie back to her house to hang out, Josie doesn't question it. Not even when Vanessa takes her into the woods, and down an old dirt road, toward the very house her grandmother had warned her about . . .The house that has been calling for her.