Review: The Whispering Skull by Jonathan Stroud

Title: The Whispering Skull
Author: Jonathan Stroud
Series: Lockwood & Co. #2
Publisher: Disney Hyperion
Release Date: September 16, 2014
Source: ARC from ALA
Find it Here: Amazon, Goodreads

In the six months since Anthony, Lucy, and George survived a night in the most haunted house in England, Lockwood & Co. hasn't made much progress. Quill Kipps and his team of Fittes agents keep swooping in on Lockwood's investigations. Finally, in a fit of anger, Anthony challenges his rival to a contest: the next time the two agencies compete on a job, the losing side will have to admit defeat in the Times newspaper.
Things look up when a new client, Mr. Saunders, hires Lockwood & Co. to be present at the excavation of Edmund Bickerstaff, a Victorian doctor who reportedly tried to communicate with the dead. Saunders needs the coffin sealed with silver to prevent any supernatural trouble. All goes well-until George's curiosity attracts a horrible phantom.

Back home at Portland Row, Lockwood accuses George of making too many careless mistakes. Lucy is distracted by urgent whispers coming from the skull in the ghost jar. Then the team is summoned to DEPRAC headquarters. Kipps is there too, much to Lockwood's annoyance. Bickerstaff's coffin was raided and a strange glass object buried with the corpse has vanished. Inspector Barnes believes the relic to be highly dangerous, and he wants it found.

My Thoughts: 

100 page Evaluation: I love this series so far. Even though I really liked The Screaming Staircase, it took me a while to get involved in the world. So it has really grown on me. With the second book, it’s like stepping into a place I already know. I love the characters and the cases and the story the second time around is more interesting. I hope we get to know more and more about this world and Lockwood’s past. 

I don’t read middle grade very often and I’m so glad that Lockwood & Co. series is one of the few that I have read. I love anything that has to do with ghost stories and haunted houses so these books are right up my alley!

Lockwood, Lucy and George are all really fun characters to read and all so different. Since they’re all part of a very small ghost detective agency, they all have to have different strengths so they can balance each other out which makes this series great fun! I would have to say that I relate most to the George character not because I’m lazy and I like to eat (which I do) but because I am such a bookworm and I love history and doing research in old public records. I would love to have a job where I had to handle old records.

The thing that really appeals to me with Lockwood & Co. is all the artifacts that are used to create these ghost stories. In this series, usually the strongest ghosts are linked to an item that they had a very personal connection with. These artifacts are what tie the ghosts’ spirits to the world of the living, allowing them to wreak havoc on those that are near.

I had an ARC of The Whispering Skull from ALA and I read it fairly quickly after the event because it was so good! But now I’m kicking myself a little bit and wishing I had waited because it would be the perfect book to read this time of year! Nevertheless, it’s a great middle grade series and one that would be greatly enjoyed around Halloween time!