My Brother's Ghost [Hardcover]

Allan Ahlberg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 19, 2001 | Age Level: 9 and up

As Frances Fogarty looks back at her childhood, she reveals the strange circumstances surrounding her older brother Tom's death. Did he really come back to look out for her and her younger brother-or is her memory playing tricks? This touching tale of loss, love, and endurance is not about endings, but about a new beginning in another place. Allan Ahlberg has once again taken an original perspective on a well-loved genre, unsettling common assumptions of what a ghost story should be.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 6 Up-Working-class England in 1956 is the setting for this story. The protagonist is 9 when the book opens, but she narrates the events from her 51st year looking back. Tragedy strikes orphaned Frances Fogarty when her 10-year-old brother is struck by a milk-float and dies. Then the boy appears at his own funeral, and only Frances and her three-year-old brother, Harry, can see him. Tom does his best to protect and to guide Frances past her strict, often mean aunts and a bully at school. However, after being punished for stealing, she runs away with Harry in tow and ends up sinking in the canal. Tom saves her and things improve at home. A few years later, Tom's dog dies and the two of them disappear together. So much happens that it is hard to cover all the bases. The writing is excellent, and the characters and time period are nicely constructed and skillfully evoked. However, the intended audience is difficult to define. The story is very short, but the vocabulary is intense. It's a ghost story that isn't scary and an affecting family tale that centers on the supernatural. It's likely to be a shelf sitter.
Timothy Capehart, Leominster Public Library, MA
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About the Author

Allan Ahlberg's many award-winning and best-selling children's stories include Peek-a-Boo!, Each Peach, Pear, Plum, The Jolly Postman, The Giant Baby, and The Better Brown Stories.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 9 and up
  
• Hardcover: 87 pages
• Publisher: Viking Juvenile (March 19, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670892904
• ISBN-13: 978-0670892907
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 4.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,832,618 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Emotionally moving, September 28, 2001

By 

Greta (Jackson, MI, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: My Brother's Ghost (Hardcover)

For those who like to cry, and for those who don't, this is a wonderful, emotionally moving, fictious, first-person story about what happens after the death of the narrator's brother.
I checked this small book out of the local library because I liked the cover design and title-it was something different. With that much to go on, I started reading. I had only planned to read the beginning-having a tight schedule that day-nothing more, but could not, would not put it down. The book was an amazing story giving readers a fictious glimpse into the afterlife on two fronts, not only some of the afterlife of the brother, but the afterlife of the narrator and how she copes with the loss of her brother. Having lost my dear father to death three years ago, I found myself sobbing by the end of the book. For me, the book stirred up forgotten grief as I identified with the narrator. More than that, I will not tell. Read it yourself and do remember the tissue.