'This is England 1973, and fifteen-year-old Rebecca Budde is in love with Dave. After one glorious summer, Rebecca is forced to move with her family to Brightley, a village with a puddle for a pond, and no excitement at all. If only Dave were there.
'Very weird things are going on inside their new house, and even stranger things are happening in the village at night. Someone appears to be living in Rebecca's wardrobe. Someone else is on the balcony, trying to get in. Things don't make sense anymore as Algernon Keats steps from the shadows, his sister not far behind him. There's no Dave, two ghosts, a pub, a dog and Alex March, a dark and brooding artist, living in the Manor House down the road, whose interest in Rebecca is both puzzling and thrilling.
'What do Alex and Algernon want from Rebecca? What on earth does any of it mean? Is it possible to love a ghost? And what happens if he loves you back? The lights are out. Welcome to Brightley.
'Rebecca thinks love is forever, but sometimes it's not. And nor, sometimes, is death. The Word Ghost is a funny, moving story about what it means to find love, lose love and discover who you are when you live in a village with no street lights and a decidedly dark side.' (Publication summary)
Dedication: For Dad, Ali, Angie and Mary Paice
and Paul and Dorothy Whitcombe
Epigraph:
Home is where one starts from. As we grow older
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living
–T.S. Eliot, from 'East Coker', 'Four Quartets'
'Readers will be immersed in an engrossing caper about reading and the stories one can carve out from everyday weirdness.'
'Readers will be immersed in an engrossing caper about reading and the stories one can carve out from everyday weirdness.'
