Here are 80 books that The Children of Green Knowe Collection fans have personally recommended if you like
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I was five when we moved to Australia, and soon after I discovered two things: I am the seventh child of a seventh child, with magic powers including the ability to see ghosts. My mother’s brother Dennis drowned when he was six. Naturally I started talking to him. Mind you, Mum also told me if the wind changed my face would stay like that, so the ghost thing probably wasn’t true either. Technically she only brought two of us to term. Dennis and I still talk, but we don’t have much in common anymore. With that in mind, please enjoy my ghosty best friends book recommendations.
I found this one in a charity shop and read it in a day. It was a while after that I saw the tv series, and a while after that the movie. And it’s another one I still have in my bookshelves.
It’s another story about finding your place in the world, but at the same time, it’s about a timid widow, mother of two, finding herself through the mentorship of the ghost of a well travelled sailor. One who’s there waiting for her at the end of her life, not her bloody husband!
The basis for Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s cinematic romance starring Gene Tierney and Rex Harrison.
Burdened by debt after her husband's death, Lucy Muir insists on moving into the very cheap Gull Cottage in the quaint seaside village of Whitecliff, despite multiple warnings that the house is haunted. Upon discovering the rumors to be true, the young widow ends up forming a special companionship with the ghost of handsome former sea captain Daniel Gregg. Through the struggles of supporting her children, seeking out romance from the wrong places, and working to publish the captain's story as a book, Blood and…
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
I’ve always been a big fan of ghost stories where, for some reason, the ghosts reveal that they are stuck here. Something happened to them during their earthly life so that, instead of going to wherever you’re supposed to go when you die, this means they can’t. Not until they have ‘undone’ or put right something they did or had done to them. In these stories, we meet spirits who, usually with the help of some human, are doing exactly that. I find such stories deeply satisfying. Which is probably why I try and write them as well…
It’s not quite clear at first whether the two children who appear one day out of the mist asking for help are ghosts, or whether the word is better used to describe the children who go back in time, as requested, to help them. Either way, this is a cracking story with a very satisfactory solution for all of them. And the amazing Mr. Blunden? For me, he is the best and the most moving part of the story. An old gentleman who made a terrible mistake in the past, but who has now been given a chance to put it right, and earn forgiveness and peace.
A CHRISTMAS SKY ORIGINAL FILM, STARRING MARK GATISS, SIMON CALLOW AND TAMSIN GREIG
AN ENTHRALLING GHOST STORY WITH A TIME-TRAVELLING TWIST
'When you come to the house, you will hear strange tales. They will tell you in the village that it is haunted, but you must not be afraid. When the time comes ... you will know what to do.'
Mr Blunden's words echoed through Lucy's ears as she explored the house. It was such an old house that it seemed to Lucy as if all the past was gathered up inside it as if in a great box; as…
My interest in ghosts is partly due to growing up in York, which is one of the most haunted cities in the UK. In that city, I think that pretty much every pub has its own ghost, and if you’re unlucky (or lucky) enough, you stand a good chance of spotting long-dead Roman soldiers, plague victims, or ghostly dogs as you walk the streets. This atmosphere has seeped into my fiction; I have written two novels of the supernatural and am currently working on a third. I’ve also made a study of the grim and gothic in fiction; my Ph.D. thesis was largely about vampires (especially Dracula) but also strayed into other monsters and uncanny stories over the past two centuries.
Oscar Wilde gave us a genuinely chilling gothic tale in The Picture of Dorian Gray, but in this short story, the supernatural is a source of fun.
The Otis family, pleasant, sensible, and up-to-date Americans, move into a haunted English manor and immediately antagonize Sir Simon de Canterville, the house’s resident spectre. Sir Simon has a theatrical flair for haunting, pulling out all the stops to terrify his victims into gibbering wrecks, but it’s all wasted on the Otis family, who are hilariously unbothered by the spookiness.
If you’re staying in a haunted house, I highly recommend channeling your inner Otis.
Despite warnings from Lord Canterville that their new home is haunted and that several family have fled form it in the middle of the night the Otis family chooses to go forward with their relocation. Almost immediately the Otis Family discovers that the stories are true and that their house is haunted by the ghost of Sir Simon. It is Sir Simon's intent not to share the house with anyone, but the Otis family is not like previous families that Sir Simon has scared off in the past. Narrated by the ghost himself, this Gothic ghost story takes the reader…
I have loved gothic and ghostly tales ever since my grandmother showed me a haunted house and told me stories about fairies and changelings. You can often find me browsing in vintage markets and bookshops searching for the perfect find. I have published two gothic middle-grade novels. Welcome To Dead Town is about 12-year-old Raven McKay, who is put into foster care in the town of Grave’s Pass when her parents disappear. But Grave’s Pass isn’t an ordinary town. It’s a town where the living and the dead live side by side. Read below to find out about the next book in the series.
I loved this lyrical, finely-observed story and its many bloodcurdling moments. I felt nothing but sympathy and love for James Harrison as he settled into his new home in the village of Ledsham and was blamed for things he didn’t do.
The ghost of Thomas Kempe a 17th century apothecary truly haunts these pages and gave me a serious case of goosebumps. It’s also a gripping mystery as James tries to put the ghost to rest.
The classic ghost story from Penelope Lively, one of the modern greats of British fiction for adults and children alike.
James is fed up. His family has moved to a new cottage - with grounds that are great for excavations, and trees that are perfect for climbing - and stuff is happening. Stuff that is normally the kind of thing he does. And he's getting blamed for it. But it's not him who's writing strange things on shopping lists and fences. It's not him who smashes bottles and pours tea in the Vicar's lap. It's a ghost - honestly.…
While one-off stories are fantastic, I love that children's series lets readers return to trusted characters. Series allow children to see a wider arc of character development and decision-making—often imperfect and in transition—when they are trying to figure out how to identify and connect with the world themselves. That shared experience over time is why I only write series myself—to let kids evolve alongside their favorite characters.
Most know VE Schwab for her YA Series, though she's also written some exemplary middle-grade books.
Her City of Ghosts series is one of my favorites, mainly because of the relationship between Cassidy and Jacob. I find there are few books for kids with great boy-girl friendships, and this one is made even better by the fact that poor Jacob is dead—or caught into the veil between life and death—or something.
Readers of the three books will learn why and travel deep into the spooky shadows of the most haunted cities in the world.
Ever since Cass almost drowned (okay, she did drown, but she doesn't like to think about it), she can pull back the Veil that separates the living from the dead . . . and enter the world of spirits. Her best friend is even a ghost.
So things are already pretty strange. But they're about to get much stranger.
When Cass's parents start hosting a TV show about the world's most haunted places, the family heads off to Edinburgh, Scotland. Here, graveyards, castles, and secret passageways teem with restless phantoms. And when Cass meets a girl who shares her "gift,"…
I was five when we moved to Australia, and soon after I discovered two things: I am the seventh child of a seventh child, with magic powers including the ability to see ghosts. My mother’s brother Dennis drowned when he was six. Naturally I started talking to him. Mind you, Mum also told me if the wind changed my face would stay like that, so the ghost thing probably wasn’t true either. Technically she only brought two of us to term. Dennis and I still talk, but we don’t have much in common anymore. With that in mind, please enjoy my ghosty best friends book recommendations.
Okay, so this one is a cheat, because the ghost isn’t actually dead, only wishes he was dead. When I was a teenager I borrowed this one from one of my mother's friends, not long after it was published, and “forgot” to give it back I liked it so much.
Regency romances can be a little overwrought, but I read it again recently, and it holds up to the passage of time. But, it tells us, that no matter how bad things seem, there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. Life is what you make it, even if it takes all your courage, you have to keep adjusting and moving forwards.
The fascinating stranger who visits a young lady in the dead of night is no ghostly spirit in this spellbinding Regency romance by award-winning author Elizabeth Mansfield
After scandalizing London with her improper behavior and jilting two suitors, Nell Belden is about to do it again. This time she rejects the very wealthy, utterly insufferable nobleman her financially strapped guardians have been pressuring her to marry. Banished to their isolated Cornwall estate, Nell is awakened one night by an unusual apparition.
But her midnight visitor is no phantom. He is Captain Henry Thorne, sixth Earl of Thornbury. The new…
An Heir of Realms tells the tale of two young heroines—a dragon rider and a portal jumper—who fight dragon-like parasites to save their realms from extinction.
Rhoswen is training as a Realm Rider to work with dragons and burn away the Narxon swarming into her realm. Rhoswen’s dream is to…
Growing up, I devoured books from two authors, the grande dame of mystery, Agatha Christie, and the science fiction great, Isaac Asimov. Luckily for me, both were prolific. That combination explains what I write, best described as the sleuth story meets speculative fiction. As a reader, when it comes to mysteries I’m always on the lookout for the out of this world. Which doesn't necessarily mean murder on a spaceship, though it can! What breaks the mold could be an unlikely detective, an inventive premise, an unusual setting, a narrative that surprises… Here are five such tales.
Rob Hart’sThe Paradox Hotel is bursting at the seams with interesting characters. The hotel of the title serves the needs of wealthy time tourists on their way to and from the nearby Einstein port. Working security is one January Cole. Her only friend an AI drone, January is grieving a lost love and fast succumbing to a time-travel illness that has her becoming unmoored from the present. Things go from bad to worse when she stumbles on a dead body that only she can see—turns out, it’s quite tricky to solve a murder that hasn’t happened yet. Surprisingly poignant, with moments that made me laugh out loud, and some inventive time travel shenanigans.
“Time travel, murder, corruption, restless baby dinosaurs, and a snarky robot named Ruby collide in this excellent, noir-inflected, humor-infused, science-fiction thriller.”—The Boston Globe
An impossible crime. A detective on the edge of madness. The future of time travel at stake. From the author of The Warehouse . . .
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: NPR, Kirkus Reviews
January Cole’s job just got a whole lot harder.
Not that running security at the Paradox was ever really easy. Nothing’s simple at a hotel where the ultra-wealthy tourists arrive costumed for a dozen different time periods, all eagerly…
I grew up listening to my family’s "true" ghost stories, each creepy tale ending with a declaration that "there are no such things as ghosts." As a teenager, I devoured books of folklore, with all their tales of ghosts, witches, and long-legetty beasties: and also many books about paranormal research. As an adult, I’m a complete unbeliever but still very fond of both reading and writing ghost stories!
I once made the mistake of reading several of James’ ghost stories, one after another, while alone in the house.
I was making a cup of coffee when something started scratching stealthily at the inside of a cupboard door. I had to lower myself from the ceiling before I discovered that some scrunched carrier bags hung inside the cupboard had unscrunched, causing the ghostly scratching. But that’s why I love James’ ghost stories.
The second in a series of republished classic literature, The Ghost Stories of M. R. James collects the tales that best illustrate his quiet mastery of the ghost story form. Running through each of these stories is a slowly escalating sense of unease and dread, which ultimately shifts into the wildly uncanny. James' characters exist in a world of ancient objects whose atrocious histories begin to repeat when they are disturbed, and the blinkered repression common to James' narratives only amplifies the shock of the spectral appearance.
I write historical fiction about real people, and I found the subject of a medium who faced off against Harry Houdini altogether irresistible. Still, writing about a medium presented unique challenges. I had to ask myself: Did I believe it was possible to summon the dead? Would readers be skeptical if I pushed this belief on them? Or would readers who didn’t believe in spiritualism think I’d gone too far in representing otherworldly events? So I read many books and studied how other authors handled these questions. I hope this list of stories about mediums, seances, and ghosts will chill and thrill you.
I loved the complexity of this novel, which grapples with so many themes—poverty, family ties, women’s hardships in a male-dominated society, and the tension between falsehood and sincerity.
Nairna, a young Scottish girl, travels the countryside with her father, who is basically a conman. But Nairna has real talent, and when she comes to the attention of Edinburgh Spiritualists, she is drawn into a dangerous circle.
But the novel brings in another thread, that of a widow who lost her husband in the coal mines. I had empathy for both of these characters, who are united by their experience with mesmerism.
As spiritualism reaches its fevered pitch at the dawn of the 20th century, a Scottish girl crosses the veil to unlock a powerful connection within an infamous asylum in this thrillingly atmospheric, exquisitely evocative exploration of feminine rage and agency for readers of Sarah Penner, Alice Hoffman, and Hester Fox.
Leaving behind a quiet life of simple comforts, Nairna Liath traverses the Scottish countryside with her charlatan father, Tavish. From remote cottages to rural fairs, the duo scrapes by on paltry coins as Tavish orchestrates “encounters” with the departed, while Nairna interprets tarot cards for those willing to pay for…
A poisonous maiden, a Daoist sex cult, and a violent insurgency.
The polyandrous Yan family in China's rural Shaanxi Province takes in two carpenter brothers. When one brother is convicted of murder after killing their neighbor in a dispute, a constable threatens to expose the family's rumored polyandry and extorts…
I was a political consultant for much of the first half of my nearly 30-year career in communications. Having run statewide and local political campaigns, I experienced many of the personalities I write about today. What is behind the political decisions elected leaders make? Can you truly be a dedicated public servant in politics today? If you only play to win, how do you keep from becoming your own worst enemy? My writing and the works I gravitate towards explore these challenging issues, which are as prevalent today as they were analyzed by the Greeks, Shakespeare, and 20th-century writers.
O’Connor’s expose on old-time politics was an inspiration for my first novel.
Set in the mid-1950s, O’Connor describes the transition from machine politics to the modern political system that dominates American politics today. For a true glimpse and understanding of the political world, I recommend starting with The Last Hurrah.
"We're living in a sensitive age, Cuke, and I'm not altogether sure you're fully attuned to it." So says Irish-American politician Frank Skeffington-a cynical, corrupt 1950s mayor, and also an old-school gentleman who looks after the constituents of his New England city and enjoys their unwavering loyalty in return. But in our age of dynasties, mercurial social sensitivities, and politicians making love to the camera, Skeffington might as well be talking to us.
Not quite a roman a clef of notorious Boston mayor James Michael Curley, The Last Hurrah tells the story of Skeffington's final campaign as witnessed through the…
