The story: Orphan Mary is tormented at the Thornhill orphanage, and meets an unexplained death in 1982. Years later, Ella sees a mysterious figure in the overgrown grounds and abandoned house and is drawn in by the mystery of Mary's death. Who could be leaving the fragments of old dolls and puppets for her to find? As she draws closer to the truth, she doesn't realize she's drawing ever closer to danger for herself...
June Cleaver's ratings: Language PG; Violence PG; Sexual content G; Nudity G; Substance abuse PG; Magic & the occult PG-13; GLBT content G; adult themes (extreme bullying, suicide) PG-13; overall rating PG-13.
Liz's comments: Wow. Talk about a downer. I'll admit that I have a marked preference for happy endings, which this story doesn't exactly have; additionally, the unending bullying was a beat-down all the way through. The prose was easy enough for a 4th grader, and the pictures (in the style if not the upbeat content of "The Invention of Hugo Cabret") tell their own story--but the book's unrelenting starkness isn't for the ES crowd.
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