A Bad Case Of Ghosts

Barnes and The Brains #1

by Kenneth Oppel

Giles Barnes’ new house creaks and rustles, and fluttering sounds fill his bedroom. His mother insists there are no such thing as ghosts, but Giles enlists the help of his new neighbours, “local geniuses” Tina and Kevin Quark, and their “ghostometer.” Together Barnes and the Brains solve the mystery—and get rid of the ghosts for good!

72 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

I was born in 1967 in Port Alberni, a mill town on Vancouver Island, British Columbia but spent the bulk of my childhood in Victoria, B.C. and on the opposite coast, in Halifax, Nova Scotia...At around twelve I decided I wanted to be a writer (this came after deciding I wanted to be a scientist, and then an architect). I started out writing sci-fi epics (my Star Wars phase) then went on to swords and sorcery tales (my Dungeons and Dragons phase) and then, during the summer holiday when I was fourteen, started on a humorous story about a boy addicted to video games (written, of course, during my video game phase). It turned out to be quite a long story, really a short novel, and I rewrote it the next summer. We had a family friend who knew Roald Dahl - one of my favourite authors - and this friend offered to show Dahl my story. I was paralysed with excitement. I never heard back from Roald Dahl directly, but he read my story, and liked it enough to pass on to his own literary agent. I got a letter from them, saying they wanted to take me on, and try to sell my story. And they did.

Reviews

[Steven R. McEvoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

These books are fun, light, easy reads, intended for children who are growing out of picture books but not yet ready to tackle full-length novels. Coming in at around 60 pages they can easily be read in a session or two. This story revolves around the beginning of the friendship of Barnes and the Brains. Giles Barnes has just moved and he finds the house, old, musty and creepy. On his second day in the new home, he notices two kids across the street staring at his house with some sort of electronic instrument. When he goes to meet them they say they are listening for ghosts and his house is haunted. Giles soon realizes this is the truth and his house if full of Ghost birds. That is when the fun really begins.

These stories seem to revolve around themes of friendship, self understanding and self worth, all wrapped up in fun and mysteries. Kenneth Oppel has created a great series with something to teach us all. The six books currently planned in this series were originally published by Scholastic between 1994 and 2004. Now they are being reissued by Harper Collins, in new editions with new cover art. Now to be honest, I prefer the original Scholastic covers, but that is just a matter of personal taste. Yet we can only hope that more books will soon come out in this grand series.

[Tommy Verhaegen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Giles Barnes moves into a new house. He is not too happy about it, certainly not when his bedroom is infested with the ghosts of birds.
Het meets his young neighbours who present themselves as geniuses. By using a ghostometer Tina proves that the house is full a ghosts. Including the ghost of an old woman who used to live there. She was known to be batty.
Giles' mother is a mathematician who does not believe in ghosts and refuses contact wiht aunt Lilian, who does. Not believing in ghost becomes a bit difficult when a ghost parrot perches on her shoulder.
The children, especially Tina, try to come up with a device to get rid of the birds. This fails miserably.
Finally Giles has an idea although he feels not very confident about it, him not being a genius.
A short story, the first out of a series of 6. We meet the Barnes and Quark family and participate in their first adventure. Although it is about ghosts, the story is very funny, almost hilarious.
This could easily be filmed or turned into a cartoon.

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great little story about Giles and his new friends Tina and Kevin getting rid of ghosts in Giles’ new (to his family) house. I would read more in this series - and I think it would be a great book to read aloud to kids who are too young to read it themselves.

[Anne Patkau · Rating 4 out of 5]

Boy moves into new house. Whispery wing swish, parrot, sibling geniuses. Smart females.

[Nikki in Niagara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Giles Barnes moves to into an old fixer-upper house just at the beginning of the summer. He founds the house creepy and is not looking forward to going all summer with no friends. He hears all sorts of noises in his room at night, even what sounds like bird wings. Then one day, right outside his front step he meets Tina and Kevin Quark, geniuses, studying his house with a strange machine Tina has invented. Seems it's a ghostometer and Giles house has heavy readings of ghost activity. It isn't long before the ghosts show themselves and with the help of Tina and Kevin, Giles try to get rid of the ghosts once and for all. Easy to read and short, therefore pretty much all action and plot. But still one can see Oppel's unique storyline. These are not just your average ghosts! Well written and an intriguing story that kept me interested. Despite the short length the author has managed to give the characters distinct identities and there is plenty of humour to go along with the adventure. Young readers are sure to enjoy!

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had to read two early reader books for LIBR 2410 -- not my favourite genre, but at least it was by Kenneth Oppel, which made it a little bit better.