4 out of 5 stars
Maggi is delighted when her father takes a job restoring an old abbey in the country. The family, including her two little twin brothers, move into the habitable parts of the mansion, along with Miss MacFarlane, the secretary overseeing the restoration of the abbey. Maggi cleans out the bedrooms and sets up the kitchen, since she has been used to doing all the housekeeping since her mother’s death. But there are many mysterious things happening around the abbey, and Maggi starts to wonder if the house itself is sentient. An ethereal voice sings in the garden, bells ring to call servants that are long dead, and Maggi sees a vision of a man from history. Could the house be trying to protect itself from intruders, or is the house welcoming them and asking for help?
I first read this book as a pre-teen, and I remember being fascinated by it! It has stayed in my memory all these years, and I finally found it again about 30 years later. And reading it as an adult, I was just as enchanted with the characters and fascinated with the mystery. What a delight to rediscover this book after so many years!
One of the things that I loved when I was a kid was seeing how Maggi takes over the housekeeping and takes such good care of her family. At that time when I was 11 years old, my mom was pregnant with my baby brother and on bedrest for several months, and I loved “playing house” and caring for my younger siblings and helping my Dad with the chores. So I really related to Maggi and all her housekeeping! I was so pleased that that was a major focus of the book, because it shows how close their family is and how they enjoy meals together and talk together.
Maggi is an amazing main character! She’s frightened by all the spooky things in the house, but she has the courage to investigate when it really matters. At one point, she gets so fed up with the house and all the creakings and groanings of the old timber. It’s really funny how she gets irritated with the house, as if it is an annoying younger sibling. I love her spunk!
The best thing about Maggi is her insight into the other characters. We see everyone else through her eyes, and she notices their facial expressions and body language and tone of voice, and she can accurately guess what they are feeling and thinking. She makes intuitive leaps about the relationships that are changing around her, especially as her family begins to move through their grief after her mother’s death. It’s brilliant how perceptive she is!
I love that this story is not scary, just spooky and mysterious. I also think that it has stuck in my memory all these years because it is a “ghost” story without any ghosts. The concept of the house itself being sentient is so intriguing and different! However, that’s also why it took me 30 years to find this book again, because the title and blurb make it seem like a ghost story. It’s marketed as a ghost story, so I probably passed by it in my search to find this book again.
There is one scene where Maggi sees a vision of the past, but it’s described like an old movie that is playing a scene from history. It’s not a ghost interacting with the present. And there is the mysterious singing voice, but that is also presented as an echo from the past, not as a ghost that is aware of them. So I feel like the title is a major misnomer.
The writing is brilliant, and I love how the mystery gradually deepens as the house gets more aggressive and dangerous. Every chapter really drew me into the story, and I loved the character arcs for each of the supporting characters and especially for Maggi as they adjust all to their new environment in the abbey and their new relationships with everyone involved in restoring the abbey.
There are so many great emotional moments and little details that I loved, but there are two major scenes that stuck in my memory all these years. One is when a construction worker starts vandalizing the abbey and he falls off some stonework that crumbles under his feet and he is badly injured. Maggi instantly recognizes that the house caused him to fall as a way to protect itself. And then one of her twin brothers catches the carp in the garden pond, and he falls in and almost drowns. The only reason they could find him among the pond weeds and rescue him, is because the carp flopped back into the water. Maggi intuits that if the carp had died, the house would have also drowned her brother. Chilling! I loved those scenes because it showed the supernatural power of the abbey to influence events within its grounds.
There are so many great layers to this story – the abbey and all the mystery and creepy things, and Maggi’s family moving through their grief, and Miss MacFarlane who is lonely and putting all her hopes into restoring the abbey. People, and relationships, and grief, and family loyalty, and all these wonderful themes of belonging and faith – and over it all, the abbey is looming with danger and hope.
There is a little bit of sensitive content and some mild profanity. This book has been screened on the Screen It First website. https://screenitfirst.com/book/ghost-abbey-105566
Luminous Libro 