The Last Phantom Train

by Sue A. DelBianco

The Last Phantom Train is a mystery novel. The setting is New England, where a struggling writer, Nan Dale, discovers something through a series of mysterious events at this hotel. There is a phantom steam locomotive that appears on a train bridge over a parkway that has the ability to take people back to the 1800’s when railroad was king. Nan decides to board the phantom train and finds herself back in the past where she finds a chest of money on her ancestor’s property which is buried underneath a well. When she tries to bring the money back on the phantom train, she discovers it turns to ashes. With the help of an old friend “Professor” who lives in the hotel in the city of Waterville, Nan finds the clues to why the phantom train exists, and it is then that she will have to make a moral decision whether to stay here in the present as a struggling writer or go back to the past and live among the wealthy. She must make this choice soon because according the laws of physics, the phantom train is losing energy in the present and it will make only one more trip back to the past in the 1800s where it will arrive at its final destination, never to return.

50 pages, Paperback

First published August 31, 2004

Reviews

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book by author, Sue A. DelBianco, brings the audience back in time to a railroad era gone by as the protagonist in the book, Nan, takes a journey back in time on a steam locomotive, where she finds money and tries to bring it back to the present, only to find out the money disappears when the train comes back to the present. This book has a great theme to it: "You can't bring the past into the future", and this is what the money that Nan found in the past signifies. This is a must read! Also, Sue A. DelBianco, has written the sequel to this book "Phantom Train II: Crossing Over". Krista Lucas