This Is Not A Ghost Story

YA fiction 

     "'That's why it was such a stroke of luck that you came knocking, asking for the job.  A student such as yourself, matriculating at such a fine institution'--he smiles warily--'Of course, none of the sensational hogwash matters to you.'"

     How about a stroke of poor judgment on both sides?  A college professor is running 🏃‍♂️ off to join his wife on vacation after giving a total stranger the keys to the ancestral manse without even googling her.  She's agreeing to spend the summer solo in a house 🏠 in the woods that's the subject of rumors.  I bet you can think of at least a few things that can go wrong.

     Daffodil, narrator of Andrea Portis's This Is Not A Ghost Story, is starting the summer between high school graduation and the beginning of college.  In fact she's on her way to the school when she realizes that she needs a job to cover room and board at what she hopes will be her future alma mater.  She gets off the bus 🚌 in a small town and goes around knocking on doors 🚪 and asking about jobs, not a winning strategy, but a desperate one.  She's decided that her only two options are starting school 🏫 and getting run over by a vehicle.  She's determined not to return to Nebraska.

     Hints that the house is not a run of the mill abode show up early on.  Her first night solo she senses the presence of a malevolent entity watching her.  But when the feeling passes she tells herself that what she'd experienced was an impossibility, a figment of her imagination while realizing:

     "This is what you would tell yourself if you had a job that you couldn't leave and had to be here, in this place, by yourself, for the rest of the summer.

     This is what you'd have to tell yourself."

     Only this telling gets harder as the summer ☀️ progresses.  Items inexplicably move themselves.  At night 🌙 Daffodil hears scratching sounds like those of a very large animal trying to get in the house.  Daylight reveals enormous claw marks.  A chatty, eccentric friend of the professor arrives alive, well, and garulous...

     ...the night 🌙 after Daffodil killed her in self defense.

     So exactly what is going on in the creepy old 🏚?  Can you figure it out before the last page?

On a purrrsonal note, yesterday in the garden, even though things are still drying out from all the rain we've 🌧 had recently, we had perfect weather.  We did a lot of weeding and were able to harvest lettuce, spinach 😋, and turnips.  The children were enthusiastically tending to their garden.  It was such a lovely 😍 evening.  (Jules)

They should grow some cat 🐈 😻 🐈‍⬛️ grass.  (Tobago)

A great big shout out goes out to all our gardeners.

Tobago and Jules Hathaway 

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