Caramel has recently inherited Marshmallow’s complete collection of Magic Tree House books, and returned to reading them regularly. In the past he had reviewed several books from this amazing series by Mary Pope Osborne already: Night of the Ninjas (Magic Tree House #5), Afternoon on the Amazon (Magic Tree House #6), Knights and Castles (Magic Tree House Fact Tracker #2), Sunset of the Sabertooth (Magic Tree House #7), Midnight on the Moon (Magic Tree House #8), and Dolphins at Daybreak (Magic Tree House #9) as well as Sea Monsters (Magic Tree House Fact Tracker #17). Today he reviews book #10: Ghost Town at Sundown. As usual, Sprinkles is taking notes and asking questions.
Sprinkles: So Caramel, you chose a Magic Tree House book for your last review before we take a month off for summer.
Caramel: For summer fun and other stuff.
S: Yes, so tell us a bit about this book.
C: The book is about the same kids that showed up in the other Magic Tree House books. So if you read any of those before, then you will know Jack and Annie. Jack is the older brother and Annie is the younger sister, she is more rebellious and Jack is more logical and cautious. Way more cautious.
S: Yes, I remember them well. So what happens in this book to Jack and Annie? What is the ghost town in the title?
C: It’s called Rattlesnake Flats. It is a town in the Wild West. And guess what? They meet the person who wrote the book that took them there.
S: Oh I remember. In this series Jack and Annie travel in a magic tree house. When they open a book they find in it, the tree house takes them to the time and place of the book. So do you know what the Wild West is?
C: I am not sure.
S: Let us see. Wikipedia calls it the American Frontier, and says the popular understanding of the phrase involves “Native American lands west of the Mississippi River, in what is now the Midwest, Texas, the Great Plains, the Rocky Mountains, the Southwest, and the West Coast.” Time-wise, it could be anytime as early as the seventeenth century, but more likely is the eighteenth or nineteenth century.
C: I see. That makes sense. At the end, we learn that the book they use to go there is published in 1895 in Dallas. That is in Texas.
S: So is this story tied in to the previous ones? You last read and reviewed Dolphins at Daybreak (Magic Tree House #9).
C: Well, they are related. This story begins with Morgan giving Jack and Annie a riddle. We saw Morgan before. She is Morgan Le Fay from the King Arthur / Merlin stories, but she is not evil.
S: In fact the kids really like her in these books, right?
C: Yes. The tree house is hers I think. She tells them that they will soon become Magic Librarians, so they can travel with the magic tree house.
S: That sounds exciting!
C: Yeah, so they go and meet a ghost.
S: Is that scary?
C: Not particularly, he is a friendly ghost. He waves at them.
S: Hmm, that sounds intriguing. So tell me your three words for the book then Caramel.
C: Happy, cowboy-ish, and amusing. It’s funny.
S: This makes sense to me though I am not quite sure “cowboy-ish” is a real word.
C: It must be!
S: Okay! So let us wrap up your last review before our summer break. What do you want to tell our readers?
C: Stay tuned for more book bunny reviews! We will be back in August!
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