Return to Shadow School for the second installment of the spooky middle-grade series from J. A. White, the acclaimed author of Nightbooks and The Thickety series. Cordelia Liu’s first year at Shadow School was a success. She studied hard and made friends. She also sent hundreds of ghosts into the afterlife, because Shadow School isn’t a normal school, and Cordelia Liu isn’t a normal girl. But her second year is already different. Ghosts are refusing to move on, the teachers are acting weird, and Cordelia’s best friends, Benji and Agnes, aren’t as interested in rescuing the ghosts as they used to be. Benji is busy hanging out with the girl he befriended over the summer, while Agnes spends all her time building a machine that might be capable of dehaunting the school forever. Cordelia is the only one who believes that something sinister is happening right under their noses. But what if it’s even worse than she could imagine? Praise for Shadow School #1 Archimancy: “Just the right balance of humor, mystery, and scariness. Readers will be eager to see more of this smart and spunky trio in further spooky adventures.” —Kirkus “The story balances the spookier elements with the humorous and difficult going-ons of middle school. An easy quick pick for a just creepy enough read.”—BCCB “A well-paced thriller. Tension builds to a crescendo, and the ending promises more adventures to come for Cordelia and her friends.”—Booklist

From the acclaimed author of Nightbooks and The Thickety comes a spooky series, perfect for fans of Neil Gaiman, Adam Gidwitz, and Stranger Things! Cordelia Liu knew Shadow School was going to be different. Still, she didn’t expect the school grounds to be filled with ghosts. Cordelia soon realizes she’s not the only one who can see the ghosts; her new friend Benji can too. Together with super-smart Agnes, the trio are determined to find out why the ghosts are there, and whether there’s a way to set them free. But the school was created with more sinister intentions, and someone is willing to go to extreme lengths to ensure that the ghosts remain trapped forever. Check out the book that School Library Journal called a “delightful blend of friendship, suspense, and spectral sightings [that] belongs on most shelves!”

Cordelia’s last year at Shadow School brings readers back for the finale in the spooky middle grade trilogy by J.A. White, the author of the acclaimed Thickety series and Nightbooks. Cordelia must complete her quest to save the world of the living from the ghosts, and dangerous phantoms, who terrorize them. It’s her final year at Shadow School, and Cordelia Liu isn’t ready to move on. Which is funny, considering helping ghosts “move on” is sort of her thing. But Cordelia can’t bear to give up the rare ability to see and help ghosts. A field trip brings Cordelia, Benji, and Agnes face-to-face with a dangerous phantom—a ghost capable of reanimating dead animals—and a team of professional ghost hunters that disappear right after they capture the phantom. Cordelia can’t help herself—she needs to know more about the ghost hunters and the phantom. It’ll mean getting Agnes and Benji to join her and the ghost hunters at a strange village called Shady Rest where ghosts live peacefully in their own homes. But soon, Cordelia, Benji, and Agnes realize that Shady Rest is not quite what it seems. Ghosts are disappearing from their homes. Others start to glow and grow frighteningly long necks and extra teeth. And some of them look strangely familiar. Didn’t they save these ghosts already? In the creepy conclusion to the Shadow School trilogy, author J. A. White says a final farewell to this unique world of ghosts and phantoms even though some friends—and fiends—never truly leave you.

A spellbinding tale about a girl, the Thickety, and the power of magic. Fans of Neil Gaiman will love this thrilling world. A dark, forbidden forest. Vicious beasts. Deadly plants. An evil spellbook. Secrets. Mysteries. Witches, both good and bad . . . Welcome to the world of the Thickety. Full of action, set in an intriguing and dangerous world, and illustrated with gorgeous and haunting line art, The Thickety: A Path Begins is a truly stunning book. A Path Begins is the thrilling start of a middle grade fantasy series about a girl, a mysterious forest, and a book of untold magical powers. Kara and her brother, Taff, are shunned by their village because their mother was a witch. The villagers believe nothing is more evil than magic, except for what lurks in the nearby Thickety. But when Kara enters the forbidden forest, she discovers a strange book, a grimoire that might have belonged to her mother. The events she then sets in motion are both awe-inspiring and terrifying. And that is just the beginning of the story—there are three more adventures in the Thickety to explore after this first book in the series. Publishers Weekly Best Book IndieBound Indie Next List Publishers Weekly Flying Start Amazon's Big Spring Books Washington Post Summer Book Club

A boy is imprisoned by a witch and must tell her a new scary story each night to stay alive. This thrilling contemporary fantasy from J. A. White, the acclaimed author of the Thickety series, brings to life the magic and craft of storytelling. Alex’s original hair-raising tales are the only thing keeping the witch Natacha happy, but soon he’ll run out of pages to read from and be trapped forever. He’s loved scary stories his whole life, and he knows most don’t have a happily ever after. Now that Alex is trapped in a true terrifying tale, he’s desperate for a different ending—and a way out of this twisted place. This modern spin on the Scheherazade story is perfect for fans of Coraline and A Tale Dark and Grimm. With interwoven tips on writing with suspense, adding in plot twists, hooks, interior logic, and dealing with writer’s block, this is the ideal book for budding writers and all readers of delightfully just-dark-enough tales. * Summer 2018 Kids' Indie Next List * YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults Nomination * 2019-2020 Florida Sunshine State Young Readers Award * 2020 Rhode Island Children's Book Award Nominee * Bank Street Best Children's Book of the Year 2019 (9-12) * 2020-2021 Missouri Association of School Librarians Truman Readers Award Preliminary Nominee * Texas Bluebonnet Award List 2020-2021 * South Carolina Junior Book Award Nominee (2021-2022) * Plus return to the world of Nightbooks—if you dare—with J. A. White's follow-up, Gravebooks!

From Bruce Coville, the master of tween comic suspense, comes a tale of monsters, the bond between brothers, and saving the world. Jake's baby brother, LD, may be a monster (complete with fangs and fur!), but together with his best friend, Lily, Jake isn't going to let anything happen to that baby. Even if it turns out LD may be the key to saving the world—or destroying it. Soon Jake and Lily are on a perilous quest through Always October, a land populated with monsters. Perfect for fans of Bruce Coville's beloved books, such as Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher, the Unicorn Chronicles series, and My Teacher Is an Alien series.

Perfect for fans of Neil Gaiman, book two in the acclaimed Thickety series is the story of a good witch, a bad witch, and a forest demon, trapped together in a world that is both enchanting and dangerous. After Kara Westfall's village turns on her for practicing witchcraft, she and her brother, Taff, flee to the one place they know they won't be followed: the Thickety. Only this time Kara is magicless without her grimoire and Sordyr, the forest demon, is intent on keeping them there. Kara and Taff will meet other inhabitants of the Thickety in their search for a safe way out, including the infamous witch, Mary Kettle. But can they trust anyone—plant, creature, witch, book, or magic—to help them escape, to undo Grace's final terrible spell, and to stop Sordyr's horrible reach from spreading across the rest of the world?