In Out of the Wild Night, Balliett is trying something completely new– a ghost story, told by a ghost, that takes place on Nantucket, where a greedy real estate investor is buying up historic houses and gutting them to replace the original interiors with modern, updated ones, much to the consternation of some local children and, apparently, some very unhappy ghosts. Surely she couldn’t be speaking of a book by Blue Balliett? I picked this one up when a colleague told me she was unable to get more than 20 pages in. Since her first book, Chasing Vermeer, was published, a number of other children’s books that require the characters to solve puzzles and codes have come out, but hers remained an outstanding and unique voice, although her narratives have gotten more difficult to navigate, and some books have been better than others. Typically she writes what I would describe as puzzle-box mysteries– they have many complex and seemingly unrelated pieces that have to be pulled into place at the right time by their child protagonists to solve a crime that involves a literary or artistic work of some kind. Available: Hardcover, paperback, Kindle edition, audiobookīlue Balliett is a gifted writer with a lyrical voice and quirky tone to her books.
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