Karen's Ghost

Baby-Sitters Little Sister #12

by Ann M. Martin

From the bestselling author of the generation-defining series The Baby-sitters Club comes a series for a new generation!

"Haunted Birthday to you!"Karen thinks there’s a ghost in her house! But she’s never really seen the ghost of Old Ben Brewer--until now. Karen and her stepsister Kristy have found out that Ben Brewer and his spooky friends are going to have a birthday party in her attic on Halloween night! It used to be fun having a ghost around. But now Karen’s not so sure!

Genres: Childrens, Fiction, Halloween, Middle Grade, Juvenile, Contemporary, Ghosts

115 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 1, 1990

About the author

Ann Matthews Martin was born on August 12, 1955. She grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, with her parents and her younger sister, Jane. After graduating from Smith College, Ann became a teacher and then an editor of children's books. She's now a full-time writer.

Ann gets the ideas for her books from many different places. Some are based on personal experiences, while others are based on childhood memories and feelings. Many are written about contemporary problems or events. All of Ann's characters, even the members of the Baby-sitters Club, are made up. But many of her characters are based on real people. Sometimes Ann names her characters after people she knows, and other times she simply chooses names that she likes.

Ann has always enjoyed writing. Even before she was old enough to write, she would dictate stories to her mother to write down for her. Some of her favorite authors at that time were Lewis Carroll, P. L. Travers, Hugh Lofting, Astrid Lindgren, and Roald Dahl. They inspired her to become a writer herself.

Since ending the BSC series in 2000, Ann’s writing has concentrated on single novels, many of which are set in the 1960s.

After living in New York City for many years, Ann moved to the Hudson Valley in upstate New York where she now lives with her dog, Sadie, and her cats, Gussie, Willy and Woody. Her hobbies are reading, sewing, and needlework. Her favorite thing to do is to make clothes for children.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/annmma...

Reviews

[V. Arrow]

I get that this is for very young readers, but I feel like the brevity of Karen's haunting scene made the whole book feel fruitless. Either it's about Karen feeling haunted or it's not.

[Pastel Paperback]

Cute, seasonal, and just spooky enough.

[Emmy]

Okay, so when I was a little kid (I'm thinking second or third grade?) a classmate told me to read the Baby-Sitters Little Sisters books. And I grabbed this one as my first. How could I resist a bright pink cover and the promise of ghosts? Well, I read it, I loved it...and then, I never went on to read any more of the series. But, I read this one again. And again. And again. And eventually, that classmate who had recommended it started to get really irritated because I wasn't really reading the series--I was just reading one book. But, I really just wanted to read that one book and didn't really care.

It's been over 20 years since then, and I had been thinking about trying to track this one down, just for old time's sake. And then, shock of shocks, I stumbled upon it on the free cart at the library book sale room and snapped it up in a second. I waited until I had a quiet weekend, and treated it as something special. I had to see if it lived up to what I remembered.

As it turns out, I really didn't remember much at all. And while I found this book to be generally charming, Karen was quite a handful. I liked her, though, in spite of myself. And I did enjoy the book. Would I consider checking it out again and again and again? Maybe. But, I'm definitely going to keep this freebie copy. After all, what are the chances that it was sitting there waiting for me? It was meant to be mine!

If you're looking for a fairly tame ghost story with a spirited protagonist who keeps things fun, then I think you'll enjoy this book. I'm not planning on reading the rest of the series at this time (or even the rest of the Karen books), but I'm so happy I was able to pick this one up again. So, in fairness to the kid who loved this book, I'm going to keep my childhood rating of 5 stars.

[Chloe (Always Booked)]

3.5 stars. Cute enough story. It's Halloween time and Karen believes there is a ghost on the 3rd floor of her dad's house. I couldn't quite understand the layout of the house because the ghost (Ben Brewer) has a fully furnished living space, etc. that nobody goes into. They mention a lot how rich the dad is and how big the house is, but it seemed weird. Anyway, she plays up this big ghost story and expects a big deal on Halloween (Ben Brewer's birthday) but all the fear was for nothing.

[Alex]

Listened to this one.

I could have sworn the journal ended up being written by Sam/Charlie at the end. I must have that mixed up with some other book!

[Brian Stout]

At the end it was a little scary so you might want to read it in the morning or at nap time while it's light out.

[Luna]

Can there really be a ghost in Karen's house? AMM leaves it open for interpretation, as she is wont to do in these fantasy-type books. In Karen's Unicorn, Karen believes the unicorn winks at her at the end. Good going, Karen. You keep developing your schizophrenia.

[Brooke]

Spooky a Ghost

[Diana Keto-Lambert]

Alright a little background: I couldn’t find this book anywhere as a child. I couldn’t order it from scholastic for whatever reason, it wasn’t at any local bookstores. I even forced my parents to stop at Books-a-Million in North Carolina when we went on vacation to the OBX, in hopes I’d stumble across a copy. I was recounting this to Brett and realized, HEY! The internet’s a thing now, so I bet [35 years later] I can track down this book and fulfill my childhood dream of reading it. Imagine my surprise to see a bunch of Babysitter’s Little Sister books have been re-released and this was at EPL! So, I put a hold on it and picked it up.

I had always imagined it’d be about a run-in with Ben Brewer’s ghost, but really, it was just her reading an old diary of his son’s that scared her a bit. That was a let down, but I guess I built the story up for such a long time, anything would be a let down. Still a cute story and I’m always for her sticking it to Pamela.

I will say that while the new cartoonish pictures in the book are cute and I like them, I miss the feel of the old illustrations. The older version made it feel more real, whereas this definitely made it feel like it’s a cartoon (like Diary of a Wimpy kid). Also, some of the upgraded pictures don’t quite match the story. Andrew, the 5 year old, is riding in a booster seat in a modern car, and yet the script [from the early 90s] says he’s riding up front (we liked being dangerous and irresponsible then). You’re telling me Mommy is now responsible enough to get him in a car seat and yet still doesn’t care that the airbags could potentially kill him? If you’re gonna change the story to fit 2020s standards, change everything! Otherwise it does NOT. MAKE. SENSE.

Speaking of not making sense, I was sure some of that stuff that happened was Sam or Charlie playing a prank on her, but they said it wasn’t and gave no closure as to what happened. I also don’t like that, but I guess Ann M. Martin really wants me to actually believe in ghosts. 👻

3 ⭐️

[Malynda Arnold]

Great for kiddos around 7-9 years old! 20 short chapters to bridge the gap between picture books and YA reading levels.
This one can be pretty scary (and a little dark in one chapter) for the little ones towards the end, so I would recommend parents pre-read to gauge how your little one will react to death, scary stories and mysteries that are left unresolved.
Overall, I love this book! I love spunky Karen and her blended family and the story is interesting (even for adults!)

[Elise]

This book wasn’t even scary. Just a compilation of Karen being paranoid and delusional that her great grandfather is haunting the attic. And Kristy enabled her instead of talking sense into her. The ending is a little bit scary with additional notes in his journal that she found, but I think probably one of her older siblings did that to humour her. Nice work enabling her paranoia, if I were her siblings I would have told her dad and Elizabeth to intervene

[Jaclyn]

Fun to learn more about the true story behind Ben Brewer's life.

My one snag is that the noises that scare Karen at midnight on Halloween (coz she attributes them to Ben's ghostly once-a-decade birthday party) turn out to have logical explanations from Watson and Elizabeth. I think it would've been more fun if they hadn't, and it still could've been realistic coz the scene was written with a very surreal feel, so Karen could easily have been dreaming.

[Anna Coffee]

its a good book. it has lots of chapters and it ends the chapters at good parts.

[Anjelica26]

I used to love this book.

[Looney]

2.5/5

This is the first one that I’ve been able to enjoy in my re-read.

[Mary Alex]

Karen's Ghost is my all time Little Sister book. It has enough suspense and jump scares to keep me on the edge of my seat. Five stars.

[Cindy]

Karen's Ghost

[Eliana]

Karen is afraid because it seems like there is a ghost in her house. You will like this book, it is Halloween-themed!

[Ashley]

When I was a kid, this was the SPOOKIEST Little Sister book in the world - like, to the point where the cover would kind of freak me out, and I'd hide the book - but I think I kept getting parts of it confused with Karen's Witch . Which, surprisingly, didn't scare me. (I believe that I always thought the part with Morbidda Destiny flying away on her broom took place in this book, and that was what scared me the most. But it wasn't scary when I'd read the first book and it happened. So I have NO idea why this book was so freaky to me.) I also remember being scared because this book was ALMOST book number thirteen ahahaha. But I digress.

I pretty much just read this book because it happens at the same time as Kristy's Mystery Admirer and I wanted to cross-reference for my BSC re-read. Nothing really to note that wasn't mentioned in the other book, except that in Kristy's book when she's having a sleepover with her friends the night before Halloween, Karen screams from a nightmare and scares the girls, yet Karen doesn't mention a nightmare at all.

All in all, I like the little bit of spooky family history that we get from this book. Sidenote: is Dawn somehow related to Karen's witchy neighbour? (Dawn's mom's maiden name is Porter, Morbidda Destiny's real name is Mrs Porter, and Ben Brewer's childhood best friend was also a Porter. Hey Ann M Martin: I want a book about old Stoneybrooke!!!)

Edit 6/1/2024 - And then in Netflix BSC canon, Morbidda Destiny ended up being Dawn's mom's aunt. I don't consider it canon canon, but I do love that the Netflix adaptation had so much love for the series. It was cancelled way too soon.

[Sayo -bibliotequeish-]

When you were too old for childrens books, but too young for The Baby Sitters Club.
Ann M. Martin really is a genius to piggy back on the success of The Baby Sitters Club.

After reading the little sisters series I remember feeling like a real adult opening up that first BSC book.

[Shanjida begum]

no such thing as ghost

[Emily]

I thought it was cool how Karen and her friends dress up as The Wizard of Oz. I was wondering what would hapen on Ben Brewer's birthday! I really enjoyed reading this book.

[Bradley]

Amazing kiddie fiction that is just above Coale's comprehension level. Good for little kids I suppose. =)

[Kate]

In which Karen gets scared of fake ghosts.

[Melenia]

Loved these books as a child

[mya x]

Good for younger audiences, but I'm more of a Young Adult/Adult reader. Loved these books when I was younger though!

[Mellanie C]

Halloween is coming, and Karen wants to tell her class the scariest ghost story ever. Luckily for her, there's a ghost in the Big House!

[Jackie Brown]

What young girl did not love the Baby-Sitters Club and Karen, the Baby-Sitters Little Sister?

[Alex Grant]

This was a cool book.