The Secret of the Haunted House
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My grandson goes to school in Albuquerque and is 14 years old. He was so enthused with your book, and so was I. I picked it up at about 8pm last night and couldn't put it down until I had finished it at almost midnight. What memories your book brought back! When I was about 10 years old, 69 years ago, I was a huge fan of The Hardy Boys, Frank and Joe. Kenny and James reminded me of them. Mike, Katie, their angry, overwhelmed mother, the old Navajo woman, Mrs Tsosie, and Deputy Foutz all seemed very real to me. Great job Jack! The story was very compelling, and the "red herrings" you threw in there really added to The Secret of the Haunted House. Your book is not just for preteens and teenagers though, us old grandpas can enjoy it also.
Bob Heaton, author
Bob Heaton, author
I just wanted to tell you how much my 5th graders enjoyed your story. I read a chapter a day during read-aloud time after lunch. We stopped along the way to discuss characters, plot line, use of transitional phrases to guide the reader through the adventure, and best of all...the cliffhangers at the end of every chapter. Almost every day my students would yell "NO, please don't stop reading, we want to find out what happens next!" They loved to make predictions as to what was going to happen next. They were able to predict some events, but there were many surprises, and they would just gasp at some of the surprises. It was quite fun as a read aloud!
When I asked the students to give me feedback about what they liked or didn't like about the story they made some insightful comments:
I can totally identify with the characters, they are just like my brothers and my sisters.
That mom is mean, well, I guess she has to be, those kids are ornery!!!!
I wish I lived with those kids, I'd love to sneak out at night and investigate a burned down house. My mom would kill me too!!!!
I didn't know that Navajo ladies would be friends with kids like that.
There was just enough suspense but not too much to make it confusing.
I loved the action, we don't usually get to read about real criminals, wait a minute....were those guys real???? Did they have real guns???
The vocabulary was okay, not too hard for me to read, but fun to hear you read it aloud because it sounded real, like a story that might just happen to me.
Those pranks were hysterical, I can't wait to try the Oreo trick on my sister.
I did some springboard activities with this book:
The students read their own Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys mystery novel. Their "book report" was to write 25 sentences that provided great clues using prepositional phrases.
They cut their sentences up and put them in a baggy.
With a partner they had to figure out each other's mystery story, using the prepositional phrases in each clue as a hint in the plot line.
This activity drove home the skill of writing detailed sentences using transitions and prepositions (we modeled them after many of your sentences in the book).
Thanks for sharing!!! They're looking forward to your next novel.
Debbie Kindschuh
5th grade teacher
Corwin International Magnet School
Pueblo, CO
When I asked the students to give me feedback about what they liked or didn't like about the story they made some insightful comments:
I can totally identify with the characters, they are just like my brothers and my sisters.
That mom is mean, well, I guess she has to be, those kids are ornery!!!!
I wish I lived with those kids, I'd love to sneak out at night and investigate a burned down house. My mom would kill me too!!!!
I didn't know that Navajo ladies would be friends with kids like that.
There was just enough suspense but not too much to make it confusing.
I loved the action, we don't usually get to read about real criminals, wait a minute....were those guys real???? Did they have real guns???
The vocabulary was okay, not too hard for me to read, but fun to hear you read it aloud because it sounded real, like a story that might just happen to me.
Those pranks were hysterical, I can't wait to try the Oreo trick on my sister.
I did some springboard activities with this book:
The students read their own Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys mystery novel. Their "book report" was to write 25 sentences that provided great clues using prepositional phrases.
They cut their sentences up and put them in a baggy.
With a partner they had to figure out each other's mystery story, using the prepositional phrases in each clue as a hint in the plot line.
This activity drove home the skill of writing detailed sentences using transitions and prepositions (we modeled them after many of your sentences in the book).
Thanks for sharing!!! They're looking forward to your next novel.
Debbie Kindschuh
5th grade teacher
Corwin International Magnet School
Pueblo, CO
This book is exciting and cleverly strategized. The story represents present-day a family with children raised by one parent, living in a modest community. The youngest brother of three, James has observation skills, curiosity, imagination and almost a conviction that a ghost exists in the neighboring burned, abandoned house. His brother Kenny, a computer freak, displays investigative nature, in evaluating footprints and poems. It is all guess work, perhaps the ghost of Old Lady Hampton or the fireman or the neighbor, Mrs. Tsosie’s cultural belief, the Skinwalker is creating that nightly light.
Yearnings of James and Kenny to check out the “ghost” led them to involve other siblings, Mike, and Katie into unplanned predicaments. Each episode ends in strong reprimands by their mother. The humor in family squabbles is sprinkled throughout the novel. The siblings’ pranks on each other have their mother threatening to trade her boys off.
As a Navajo reader, I especially appreciate the author’s inclusion of the neighbor, Mrs. Tsosie. She is an essential character who has lived the history of the location, thus a bystander and witness of what has happened to the Hampton house.
The author exhibits in Mrs. Tsosie’s communication the blended Native American speech derived from mingling her first language with the second. In Mrs. Tsosie’s cultural beliefs maybe a Skinwalker, Navajo witch with the ability to disguise themselves as an animal, is the culprit.
The strange and hazardous disease Hantavirus that was once prevalent on Navajoland appears in the story. Mrs. Tsosie’s experience and deep knowledge handily showed the boys how to destroy the spread of the deadly respiratory disease.
It is an excellent, thrilling read for young people, and anyone who enjoys suspense happening in the Four Corners Area.
Linda Taylor, Navajo student at San Juan Community College
Yearnings of James and Kenny to check out the “ghost” led them to involve other siblings, Mike, and Katie into unplanned predicaments. Each episode ends in strong reprimands by their mother. The humor in family squabbles is sprinkled throughout the novel. The siblings’ pranks on each other have their mother threatening to trade her boys off.
As a Navajo reader, I especially appreciate the author’s inclusion of the neighbor, Mrs. Tsosie. She is an essential character who has lived the history of the location, thus a bystander and witness of what has happened to the Hampton house.
The author exhibits in Mrs. Tsosie’s communication the blended Native American speech derived from mingling her first language with the second. In Mrs. Tsosie’s cultural beliefs maybe a Skinwalker, Navajo witch with the ability to disguise themselves as an animal, is the culprit.
The strange and hazardous disease Hantavirus that was once prevalent on Navajoland appears in the story. Mrs. Tsosie’s experience and deep knowledge handily showed the boys how to destroy the spread of the deadly respiratory disease.
It is an excellent, thrilling read for young people, and anyone who enjoys suspense happening in the Four Corners Area.
Linda Taylor, Navajo student at San Juan Community College