Tolly and the Pirate Ghost

Tolly and the Pirate Ghost is a new magical adventure story for children from Lucinda Williams. It's a tried and tested story, as Lucinda first started to relate the story to her children and their friends whilst they were on the school run.

Emily is 11 years old and circumstance force Emily and her mother to leave their nice, comfortable house and move into a tiny and cramped flat on the third floor of a block of flats.

This means that Emily can no longer keep her new puppy, a puppy she had always wanted.

But then, as if things were not bad enough, her mother becomes ill and Emily, who is a shy girl, must go and stay with a lollipop lady Gertie Pink and her twins who are a bit too boisterous for Emily's way of thinking.

However, Emily soon finds that she has been dragged in to a series of extraordinary events in the Pink household. Especially the arrival of their Uncle Wilf, an extraordinary gentleman who was a bit eccentric who had lost his house after a storm had swept it into the sea.

The experience had caused him to develop pneumonia and whilst he is recovering, Emily is thrilled to be asked to take charge of his talking African Grey parrot.

But disaster strikes! The parrot disappears and Emily is heartbroken. How can she tell Uncle Wilf that his parrot has vanished?

But Wilf needs to make a confession of his own. With him has travelled the ghost of Tobias, a 17th century pirate who shared his house on the Devonshire coast.

The parrot returns and lays an egg. But one night the egg is stolen and Autolocus, the parrot, is riven with grief.

The twins, along with Emily, must quickly find the egg and return it to Autolocus. But who is responsible for the egg theft? Can they get it back in time?

And what baby will he, sorry, she, give birth to?

This is am amazingly good read for children aged 7 and older and also their parents, too.

It costs £7.99 from Matador and please do keep an eye out for sequels.