Goth Girl and the Ghost of a Mouse (1)

What a great book with pleasing illustrations. I love Chris Riddell's style and storytelling.

My eight-year-old daughter, who was already a fan of Ridell's beautiful illustrations from Neil Gaiman's "The Sleeper and the Spindle", loved this book. So did I. The story is charming, funny, sharp, never condescending. Grownups will appreciate the densely laid literary puns -- a mouse named Ishmael and a visit from the author Mary Shellfish are but two. Ada Goth is a smart, empowered girl protagonist. Great, silly, smart fun.

Chris Riddell is one of our favorite authors... we love the Ottoline series and now we are getting into the Goth Girl series. The story line is always great, the characters are so fun and unique. The illustrations are amazing. You won't be disappointed!

Excellent quality hardcover book, durability will last a lifetime. Storyline and illustration are spectacular for young and old readers alike.

Cute, imaginative and different like all of Chris Riddell's shorter books.

The story is fun and silly and can be enjoyed by adults and kids. Physically the book is a beauty--the inside covers, the paper edges, the cover and the illustrations are rich and a joy to hold. I purchase a lot of kindle books but this is a paper book that I will keep and enjoy for years.

Very cleaver story with artistic illustrations, it was pleasure to read to my daughter.

Gorgeous book. Got it for a Christmas gift for a niece. She will love it.

This is a fun, well written book with lots of lovely illustrations but I’m not sure exactly what age it’s aimed at - I wish this was made clearer on all kids books. I ordered it intending to read it aloud with my 7 and a half year old, but she was bamboozled and a little bored by it very quickly. It’s very witty and has tons of references to classic novels and tropes (eg Jane Austen, Mary Shelley) which are written to raise a smile, but a smile for who? Which child under the age of 12 is going to have read any classic pre/Victorian novels? I feel like a grump writing this as it is a lovely, well written book but I get frustrated as I seem to buy more books than I’d like that end up sitting on the shelf waiting for my daughter to get to an age where she’ll enjoy them.

What an utterly delightful book. I read this to my 3 children over the space of a week. It was bought for it's beautiful illustrations and engaging title for my 7 year old daughter (who does not want to be a princess or a mermaid) and is still ever so slightly too much for her to read. However my 9 and 12 year olds were also completely sucked into the story and there was much jostling as to who could see the pictures at any one time. Gripping story, with many literary references for the grown up reader to amuse, and side ramblings that had everyone laughing. We all loved it so much that I went straight out and bought another. These are beautiful on the shelf and I can see them becoming much loved family favourites.

Early on, when I hit that line describing Lord Goth, I knew I had a book that I was going to enjoy. The bigger question, though, was whether a younger reader who wouldn't get that joke would enjoy the book.Well, this is one of the most carefully and sharply written and most elegantly illustrated books I've looked at for younger readers. It's a mystery, an adventure, a ghost story, and a little-girl-lost-story, but it's loaded with puckish good humor and cheerfully dark wit. This is a quirky delight and a testament to what you can produce when you write for younger readers but respect their sensibilities and their abilities. The charm and the sophistication of the book is tailored to younger readers' emerging sensibilities and it rewards them and entertains them without at all patronizing them.And, the book works for a variety of readers at different reading levels, because the jokes, asides and subtle bits all complement each other and a reader can get a few them, or some, or all, and still enjoy the story immensely. For younger readers the story is at least silly fun; for the oldest readers it is loaded with sly inside jokes about Gothic literature. For everyone it's fantastic and quirky and rollicking, often all at the same time.So, there really isn't much of a downside to taking a flyer here. At a minimum the book is entertaining and engaging. At best, it could become a favorite. At the absolute very worst it will amuse Mom and Dad and be judged "O.K." by the kid reader. All of those are attractive options to me, and I'm happy to add such a rewarding change of pace to the family shelf.

This is one of the most BEAUTIFUL books I've ever come across, with dazzling metallic and rich purple edged pages, with a lovely designed hardback cover!The full title for this book is `Goth Girl And The Ghost Of A Mouse', but to be honest, I don't really know why the mouse part has been included as it's very misleading; it would in my opinion have been much better to have been simply called `Goth Girl' as this is really who the story is about - the mouse hardly features at all, and for a good portion of the book is not even mentioned... It's a shame, as the mouse (apart from the girl) is the very first character to appear in the story which leads one to believe that he's quite important to the story - but the plot has little if anything at all to do with this poor little creature, which is a real shame... There is a `mini' book tucked inside the back cover about this pretty pointless character which is rather a sweet and novel idea - but this is a bit of an odd thing to do, and if anything really should be read before the main book to give the reader some background on the mouse character, but as said earlier, to no real purpose since he has such a little place in the main story.This is a crazy - zany kind of a book that is really fun to read, and as it progresses, it becomes crazier and zanier still, until the last few chapters and the end of the story when it almost becomes nonsensical as it reaches its crescendo!As some have already said; much of the writing, jokes and play on words would be lost on most children as they would be simply too young to `get it' or understand them, and so this is rather an odd book all round... Not quite sure what age group it is really aimed at - still a great and fun read though, but am undecided myself yet as to whether I shall be purchasing the follow up.NOTE: Drawings and illustrations are quite fabulous!

I bought this book purely on the title, couldn't resist the Goth! My daughter is dyslexic and unfortunately "hates" reading. At 13 her reading age is a couple of years behind so trying to find books that she can manage but are still interesting is difficult. This book fits the bill. The print is larger than normal with not too many words crammed on the pages. My daughter has even told me the plot so I know she must be reading it and enjoying it. Will be buying more from the series.