The Haunting of Pip Parker by Anne Fine
Sometimes you think you can just throw away a book and not think twice about it. Sometimes on a dumb hunch you open that book up and are immediately hooked and engaged, and you read the whole thing in ten minutes and consider yourself lucky you found it. That’s this book. A quick, voicey read about a young girl who just wants the skull-shaped glowy thing on her wall to go away for Christmas. Not toys or sweaters or a bike chain, just that. It's scary, a mystery, a growing-up book, and more, all in about twenty pages. Masterpiece? Maybe not, but close. Then you look up the author and see it’s by Anne Fine , the same woman who wrote Mrs Doubtfire, yes that Mrs Doubtfire, though she called her book Madame Doubtfire (much better title if you ask me) so you decide to keep this book on the shelf and cram it in between the other Anne Fines you didn't know you had ( Bill's New Frock , for one) and do the best you can with the rest of your day. Verdict: Keep, on literary merits.