Creepers

August 25, 2008
Pages tinted with green at the margins, monotone photos printed in green and simulated newspaper clippings and ephemera give a music video–like pop to Dahme’s first YA novel, a ghost story that is more atmospheric than scary. The first thing Courtney notices about the 18th-century house her parents have bought in historic Murmur, Mass., is the English ivy that climbs over everything. She’s also spooked that the house abuts the town cemetery—until she meets a father and daughter who awaken her interest in the 1712 tombstone of their ancestor, a 13-year-old girl who lived in Courtney’s house; the two of them tell Courtney, who is also 13, that the girl’s remains are missing and that her stone, inscribed with ivy, was carved by her father, the town stonecutter. That night Courtney finds carvings on her basement wall, “delicate vines of ivy... whose tendrils curled like baby’s hair”; the next time she looks, the carved ivy has grown and spread. Readers are likely to connect the clues before Courtney does, but on the other hand, they can enjoy Dahme’s New England–style hauntings without risking their sleep. Ages 12–14.