Michael Witwer’s Vivian Van Tassel and the Secret of Midnight Lake is a spooky fantasy mystery for 9 year olds about a girl who moves into her late mum’s creepy family home.<\/p>\n
Vivian is twelve and she’s angry. Mostly with herself. The last time she saw her mum, they had a huge row and Vivian stormed out, threatening to run away. Her mum got in the car to go and look for her. A tree fell on it.<\/p>\n
Vivian’s sure it was her fault. So she keeps people well away (it hurts less that way) and her temper keeps getting the better of her. The first chapter is a fencing match that ends with her jabbing the club bully with a blunt sabre, over and over, until the coach has to step in.<\/p>\n
Then she and her dad move from Chicago to Midnight Lake. Their new home is a peeling old house stuffed with portraits that all look a little bit like her mum. Her new school used to be a psychiatric hospital and still has bars on the windows. A pale, grey-faced man stares at her in the diner. And the local paper is full of farm animals being torn apart in the night.<\/p>\n
Oh, and she finds a silver pendant hidden under the floorboards of her mum’s old bedroom. What’s it doing there?<\/p>\n
It’s a proper creepy page-turner, but what’ll stay with your reader is Vivian. She’s prickly and very funny. She keeps a chart in her copy of Harry Potter comparing her life with Harry’s (so far, Harry’s winning). Her dad is lovely, hopeless at DIY and full of terrible jokes, and he’s a sweet bit of warmth in all the gloom.<\/p>\n
A heads-up on the dark bits. The prologue follows two hunters into a forest full of monsters, with mangled animal remains and plenty of blood. Vivian’s grief and guilt are raw, and the car accident is described plainly (it happened a few months before the story starts, so it isn’t a spoiler).<\/p>\n
For a child who has lost a parent, that could be a lot to take in. For a reader who loves a creepy house and a heroine with a temper, it’s a great find.<\/p>\n
If they’re after another girl who gets blamed whenever anything goes wrong, try The Trials of Morrigan Crow. Morrigan’s town blames her for everything from a spoiled fish to a heart attack, and the cook chalks each one up on a blackboard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Michael Witwer’s Vivian Van Tassel and the Secret of Midnight Lake is a spooky fantasy mystery for 9 year olds about a girl who moves into her late mum’s creepy family home. Vivian is twelve and she’s angry. Mostly with herself. The last time she saw her mum, they had a huge row and Vivian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":12869,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"lr_next_read_post_id":8279,"lr_next_read_anchor":"The Trials of Morrigan Crow","lr_seo_hook":"A grieving girl, a creepy family house and something killing the livestock."},"book_tag":[1045],"age_group":[24],"book_type":[1044],"book_author":[723],"class_list":["post-9662","our-books","type-our-books","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","book_tag-adventure-books","age_group-books-for-9-year-olds","book_type-paid","book_author-michael-witwer"],"yoast_title":"Vivian Van Tassel and the Secret of Midnight Lake by Michael Witwer | Little Reads","yoast_metadesc":"A grieving girl, a creepy family house and something killing the livestock. For ages 9+. 3,000+ books in the Little Reads app. 7-day free trial.","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n