Release Date: November 10th 2015
Publisher: Smashwords Edition
Format: Paperback
Genre: Middlegrade – mystery
Source: blog tour
Author: Website | Goodreads
Buy it: Amazon | The Book Depository
Add it: Goodreads
Holly
Spinatsch, a curious and rebellious tomboy, was forewarned by her siblings that
if she didn't make her bed, she would be taken away to The Children’s Horrible
House...and indeed she was.
On her
search for kinship in this seemingly haunted jail like mansion, she discovers a
mystery lurking and breathing, crying out for discovery.
However,
when she and her friends attempt to solve the mystery, they are only left with
more questions.
Holly Spinatsh is warned that she will be taken The Children’s Horrible House if she
does not make her bed like her mother has asked. She isn’t worried though because
her mom always tells her to make her bed but she never does. She doesn’t start to
get worried until her brother and sister start singing the song and even
calling them!
“The Children’s Horrible House
The Children’s Horrile House
Where you work all day and never, never play…
The Children’s Horrible House.”
She frantically tries to find some way to clean her messy room.
She ever tries to write a note to one of her sisters to do it. When it doesn’t
work and she has come to terms that it won’t get done by the time they will get
to her. Then the bus shows up and off she goes.
When she gets there she finds out that the school is just how
the song describes. You make beds over and over and over again until they
decide it looks good. If you don’t eat your lunch then they bag it up and you
have it each day until its gone. They also go to classes. There are many children there and Holly seems
to not fit in with anyone. She quickly finds out who her bullies are going to
be. Though she makes some good friends too.
The story is also intertwined with the back story of the house,
The North Star Estate. The house had originally belonged to Hawthron North
Star. He lived there with his ill-behaved daughter Saffron. Saffron’s mother, Sings-in-the-meadow, had
gone away when she was little. Saffron was very bitter about that and did not
have a good relationship with her father because of it.
I enjoyed that part of the story more than the actual story. I’m
not sure why. It was just a chapter stuck in here and there. It did a good job
of filling in the questions about the house though. One thing that I can’t decide
if I like or not were the names of everyone at the school. Ms Pankins, Mr. Ree,
Major Whoopins…. Get it? This definitely made it more of a children’s book to
me. I enjoyed the drawings that were placed throughout the book also.
Overall it was a cute story and I think my son would like to
read it. Maybe if I get him to read it he will clean his room!
(maybe a 3.5)
About the Author:
N. Jane Quackenbush is a graduate of Palm Beach Atlantic University. She lives in a horrible house filled with mystery and fun in St. Augustine, Florida, a place she finds a lot of material by which she is inspired. Many places mentioned in her books are based on actual haunted buildings, star-filled planetariums and magical gardens deep within The Nation’s Oldest City.
N. Jane Quackenbush has also written the following Children’s Picture Books:
The Rocket Ship Bed Trip
The Pirate Ship Bed Trip
The Afternoon Moon
and many more books in the works!
The Rocket Ship Bed Trip
The Pirate Ship Bed Trip
The Afternoon Moon
and many more books in the works!
