Behind the Attic Wall

Margaret Ann Turner. She had been in various foster homes and had been thrown out of each one. She's now going to stay with some great aunts of hers.

She is going to live at Adelphi Hills Academy. Very big, very old, very dreary-looking building. The rules relate to the things she should eat, how much water she should drink, how much sleep she should get, and no television.

She has an Uncle Morris who say the most odd things. Maggie's has a room all to herself, complete with bed and dresser. She checks other rooms and there is no one in them. There's a schoolroom, but no one is in that, either.

She realizes that where she is isn't a school at all, and there are no other children there; only her two aunts and her uncle.

Maggie is going to be attending an actual school. The place she's at used to be a school, but something happened and people talk of a ghost being there.

A girl comes to visit, but they don't get along. Maggie doesn't want any friends. the aunts try to bring other kids to play with Maggie but they finally give up. Maggie is disliked by the other student at school, something she has undergone time and time again.

Maggie starts to hear voices in the house. It also seems that her Uncle Morris can hear them (or at least when he's asleep he can).

One day the aunts are gone and Maggie discovers a hidden room off the attic. She finds two dolls in the room, and one of them moves. The male doll then moves, and both dolls speak, even addressing her directly.

They want her to do a number of chores, and finally they scare her enough that, when they get close to her, she attacks, knocking both of them away. They end up saying that she is not the one.

Maggie plans to have a party for the dolls (after she makes nice with them), but her bossy aunts have scheduled their own party for the same day.

Then she and the dolls get discovered by her mean aunts. Maggie is going to be sent away, and Uncle Morris dies.

On her last day Maggie visits the dolls one final time, making a rather shocking discovery.

This is a very, very spooky book. People will be of two minds; either Maggie was just making every single thing up (she does have a very active imagination), or people's spirits can live on after them in a very unusual way. Actually, the book is almost like an episode of the old Twilight Zone.

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