A few weeks ago, I was browsing in the bookstore (big surprise, I know!) and a particular cover caught my eye. It was black with the title – Jane-Emily – in white Old English-style font. I read the back cover, intrigued by this ghost story I’d never heard of. I was tempted to buy it, but being a good girl, I wrote the title down in the notebook I carry around for such purposes and instead requested a copy through my library.

I’ve been a bit of a slacker in the blogging department lately, as I actually read the book one evening a couple weeks ago. I decided Jane-Emily would be the perfect first pick for Carl’s RIP Challenge and was in the mood for something spooky. One thing different about my library copy that I didn’t notice until I’d finished it was that it was cataloged as Juvenile Fiction. The copy at the bookstore was in the regular fiction section, so I was expecting and hoping for a scary tale ala The Woman in Black, a book I read for the first time last year and loved, or Comes the Blind Fury, a book that scared the bejesus out of me around age 13.

What I got was a mildly creepy story, one that I read in a couple hours, so not much time spent on it, and it certainly didn’t have me looking over my shoulder or wanting to sleep with the light on. Emily is the menacing spirit of a girl who was pretty rotten when she was alive, and whose temperament hasn’t improved with death. To her home comes Jane, another young girl who becomes preoccupied with Emily’s life, and Jane’s older cousin, Louisa – and then the somewhat tame frights ensue. I can see the appeal of it for a young reader, but unless it holds some sentimental value for you, I don’t think adults would be that entertained by it. Now, if you’re in the mood for some scary movie-watching with some freaky kids, rent the quintessential evil-wrapped-in-sweetness flick, The Bad Seed, or The Other, based on the novel by Thomas Tryon – which I probably should have read instead of Jane-Emily.

And I have an announcement to make. We recently broke one of our household cardinal rules – the one that states that cats must not outnumber the humans – by adopting another black cat. This little kitten was up for adoption at my vet’s, and because he looked and acted so much like Mojo, I couldn’t resist. Thus, we now have Jack, short for Jack O’Lantern, or Blackjack – depending on whether you ask me or my husband. The two have become fast friends and make quite the pair.