Name: Maggie Mitchell
Title: Ghost in the Machine
Author: Patrick Carman
Publishing Company: Scholastic Inc.
Publishing Location: New York
Publishing Date: 2009
Setting: Skeleton Creek/ Sumpter, Oregon
Main Characters: Sarah Fincher, Ryan Mccray, Daryl Bonner, Gladys Morgan, Ryan's Dad, and Henry.
Description of Events: Ryan and Sarah are still locked in the centuries old dredge, as they were in the last book. Joe Bush shut the door of the secret, cube-shaped room, their only means of escape. The ghost comes back, and unlocks the door. Ryan and Sarah wait for a minute, hear nothing, and scramble out of the secret room, Ryan falling behind because of his broken leg. They reach the one and only exit, probably their only chance of survival, and find a threatening message scribbled on the old, wooden door in dripping, black ink. "Don't make me come looking for you." The only person who could've wrote this is the ghost of old Joe Bush, the only one set out to get Ryan and Sarah. This message could only mean one thing- don't tell anyone about the experience we had tonight, if you will, you will suffer the consequences. Ryan and Sarah eventually make it through the locked door, barely alive, Ryan's leg in excruciating pain, and run to Sarah's car, almost not making it back home in time. Ryan and Sarah go to sleep, just acting normal, and Ryan wakes up in the morning to find the threatening message from before scrawled on the wall above his bed. Ryan thought his parents would think he did it, so he covered it with a Pink Floyd poster, who he only listened to for about a week. Ryan gets an e-mail from Sarah, her giving him the new password for the videos she makes. It is crucial that Ryan deletes each e-mail and text message, because if Ryan or Sarah's parents find out that they are communicating, they will be in big trouble.
Ryan drags through the next few days, and his parents' friend, Henry, known for his classic rainbow suspenders, visits again from New York. The whole time Henry is there is spent fishing, playing card games, or making insane, immature bets with one another. Ryan's Mom and Dad ask Henry to keep an eye on Ryan, and make sure he isn't contacting Sarah while he is there alone with him. As Ryan is walking up the stairs to his room, Henry confesses that he really doesn't mind Ryan contacting Sarah, and that they would find a way around the no-contacting rule anyway. Little did Ryan know, Henry was playing a big part in the whole Skeleton Creek Gold Dredge mystery, and Henry's craziness almost cost Ryan his life in the first book.....
Sarah's videos keep coming, and Ryan wakes up in the dead of the night with a not-so-right feeling. He looks underneath the poster concealing the ghost's message, and finds a new one written underneath the first one. "The apostle will see you now".
After awhile, Sarah discovers a secret meeting group that gather in the dredge, called the crossbones. Sarah sets up a hidden camera in there, and find the 2 remaining crossbones members, Gladys Morgan, and Ryan's Dad, discussing something quiet enough not to be picked up on audio. They head out of the haunted dredge after burning a paper in a flaming candle. Sarah and Ryan do more searching, and find that a local doctor, Doctor Watts, may have some connection to the crossbones group, and sneaks into his huge, maze-like house to investigate. She walks into a room that appears to be a living room, and finds a murdered Dr. Watts lying on the couch, pale and limp. Sarah runs out, wondering whether the murderer was still in the house or not. It is also in this book where we are introduced to the blue rock, a special meeting place that Ryan and Sarah discovered when they were still little kids. They begin to send notes to each other from the rock, because texting and e-mailing has gotten too risky now that they're back in school.
Ryan and Sarah make a decision to go back to the dredge for the 3rd time, this time meaning business.They continue on to the secret room they discovered before, and open what they found to be the cryptex. This opens a hidden door. Ryan goes into it and shuts the door behind him. He turns around to find the ghost of old Joe Bush, or at least what he thought to be the ghost. The ghost comes to attack Ryan, and Ryan fights him off as long as he can. Daryl Bonner, the suspicious park ranger and soon discovered to be Joe Bush's son, comes and pulls the ghost off of Ryan, knocking him down to the ground, unconscious. The door opens, and Ryan's Dad and Sarah join Daryl and Ryan in the secret-secret room. They quickly realize that the ghost isn't actually a ghost at all, and quickly unmask him, only to find a crazy Henry. Ryan and Sarah go up to the floor and, using the information they gathered in the last few weeks, pry open the secured floorboards and find over 40 million dollars worth of gold that had been hidden for years. They pull it out happily, and everyone calls Ryan and Sarah the greatest detectives of all. Only one problem.... Henry has vanished. Follow the story from both Ryan's perspective, reading his journal, and Sarah's, by watching the videos she films. What makes this book even more mysterious is the fact that it could all be real.. pick up the next book to find out where the mystery of Skeleton Creek leads Ryan and Sarah next..
Did you like this book? : Yes, I liked the video/journal concept of it, and watching the ghost in videos makes it even creepier, I like that.
Would you reccomend this book to others? : Yes.
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