The Ghost Children

by Eve Bunting

Book Overview

When Matt and Abby go to live with Great-Aunt Gerda in Sierra Madre Canyon after their mother dies, Matt is put off at first by the life-size wooden dolls whom Aunt Gerda talks to and calls her "children." However, when someone vandalizes the dolls and two are stolen, it is Matt, with the help of his new friend, Kristin, who foils the would-be thief and returns the dolls to Aunt Gerda.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0618604774
• ISBN13: 9780618604777
• Release Date: October 2005
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
• Length: 176 Pages
• Weight: 0.39 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.2" x 7.9"
• Age Range: 8 to 12 years
• Grade Range: Grades 3 to 7

Customer Reviews

A great read!

I used this book each year as a read aloud in my fourth grade classroom. The children LOVED it!! It has just enough creepiness to keep readers on their toes, but not too much. There is also a theme of family and belonging as well as "being new in town." Overall it's a terrific book, and I'm glad to see it back in print as it was out of print for several years.

a mystery with ghostly wooden children

The Ghost Children,by Eve,Bunting is about two children who are left orphaned after their mother dies and leaves all of her paintings for them to sell.They have to go live with their aunt and she has children that are life- like dolls and are very ghostly. Neighborhood kids throw trash at them. The author, Eve Bunting, got the idea for this story from a newspaper it was about a widow and how she lived all alone except for her life- like wooden dolls. One reason readers might like this book isbecause it is a good mystery and it has an unexpected ending. A really good scene is when the children go to Mr. Steingle's office and discover something that had been stolen from their aunt.Another good reason why readers might enjoy this book is, that the dolls have a voice to talk to people and they scare the neighbors to the point that they will do just about anything to get her to move away or to get rid of her dolls.