The Girl and the Ghost (Jacqueline Harvey, Penguin)

Jacqueline Harvey, author of the best-selling Alice-Miranda and Kensy and Max books, returns with The Girl and the Ghost, the first instalment in a new fantasy-mystery middle-grade series. When 12-year-old aspiring writer Josephine moves from Sydney to a crumbling castle in rural France with her dad and stepmum, she is thrilled to find a locket containing the ghost of an argumentative 14-year-old Louis XVII, prince of 18th-century France and a royal ‘pain in the bum’. Comedy, mystery and a sprinkling of romance follow as Josephine tries to keep Louis a secret, solve the mystery of how he died, and figure out why he keeps mistaking her for someone called Madeleine. Young readers will be desperate to escape to the whimsical French provincial life Harvey depicts. Her scrumptious descriptions of desserts, the beauty of the southwestern French countryside, and old chateaus are the novel’s highlights. Yet, while this book has all the ingredients for a great story, the main cast of characters –namely, Josephine and her family – lack development and nuance, rendering the emotional arcs of the novel unconvincing. However, with its dreamy European setting, handsome local boys, and further mysteries waiting to be unpacked in book two, The Girl and the Ghost is sure to find a solid readership, particularly among fans of R.A. Spratt’s Friday Barnes series and Judith Rossell’s Stella Montgomery books.

Books+Publishing reviewer: Charlotte Callander is a freelance writer who has worked as a bookseller and museum educator. Books+Publishing is Australia’s number-one source of pre-publication book reviews.

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