The Madonna Ghost

(6 customer reviews)

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Description

The Madonna Ghost
The Annie Tillery Mysteries
Linda Maria Frank
Juvenile Fiction
iUniverse
12/2009
Digital, Audible, Paperback and Hardcover
132

Seventeen-year-old Annie Tillery and her Aunt Jill set off for Long Island's Fire Island for a vacation of surf, sun, and sailing. Annie is happy to leave behind the stress of her relationship with her parents. Aunt Jill, who is an NYPD detective, is mixing her vacation with a case she must keep secret from Annie, who is suspicious nevertheless. Annie finds romance and intrigue when she meets Ty Egan, the nephew of their host on the island. They find themselves in the middle of an eerie adventure when she and Ty investigate the tragic and perplexing story of a local ghost. Annie becomes increasingly uneasy and the investigation turns sinister when Aunt Jill goes missing, the ghost appears, and the troublesome neighbors in the cottage next door become hostile. When they find one of Aunt Jill's special earrings on the neighbor's porch, they begin to wonder what she was doing there. Will they find Aunt Jill before it's too late? In the breathless conclusion to their investigation, Annie and Ty narrowly escape death solving the mystery of The Madonna Ghost.

6 reviews for The Madonna Ghost

  1. Sandra L. Sells –

    This is a great story for teenagers and I would recommend it for them. There were lulls in the storyline. Once it picked up it was much better! So let it start slow and enjoy the ending.

  2. Cold Coffee Cafe –

    Come on vacation with Annie Tillery and her Aunt Jill to Long Island’s Fire Island. Stand with Annie on the Ferry and recall what she sees; “Looking out across the Great South Bay, I could see Fire Island in the distance, a long stretch of dunes and scrub pines across the horizon. At the western end of the island, was the black and white striped tower of Fire Island lighthouse, blinking away. Sailboats maneuvered across the dark blue waters of the bay in ballerina fashion, their sails puffed out by the wind like dancers’ gauzy skirts.”

    Walk along the boardwalk which “opens onto a broad cement lane where homey little cottages, each with a tiny garden” stretch as far as the eyes can see. Relax with Annie and Aunt Jill in the charm of “Windalee” one of the oldest houses on the island where secret a secret passage was used to smuggle liquor onto Long Island in the twenties. The Long Island coastland has always been the perfect environment for shipwrecks, lost treasure, pirates, bootleggers, drug runners, kidnapping and terrorists.

    Learn the history of settlers coming to Long Island as far back as the early 1800s and how Fire Island got its name. Become aware that men, women and children enduring treacherous seas in wooden ships came to Fire Island and some were forced to wade cold ocean water to make it to Bay Shore. Join Annie and TY on their quest to see ‘The Madonna Ghost’ as past accounts and island legend recalls seeing her walking on the Bay Shores in the mist of the salt water air to protect the grave of her infant child who perished while she was trying to make it to shore

    Mystery and suspense develops when Annie discovers that her Aunt Jill, who is a NYPD detective is not really on vacation, but working an active case. Watch Annie’s sleuth abilities interrupt her own vacation when her beloved Aunt Jill is missing and some unscrupulous neighbors beside “Windalle” are on the top of her short list.

    Enjoy a youthful budding romance and see for yourself that “Fire Island must indeed be a paradise where dreams come true.”

    Annie Tillery Mysterys book two ‘The Madonna Ghost’ is an enjoyable read for students and young adults of all ages. Each book in the Annie Tiller Mystery Series is unique and stands alone with no need to read in a particular sequence. Author Linda Maria Frank uses her own background in forensic science, great research, delightful writing skills, intensive character development and interesting dialog to keep her readers engaged in each one of her mysteries. The Annie Tillery Mystery series should be placed on our schools’ summer reading list.

    Cold Coffee Press endorses ‘The Madonna Ghost’ and the Annie Tillery Mysteries by Linda Maria Frank. We received a PDF version of this book for review. Review completion date March 27, 2015. For more information please visit Cold Coffee Press

  3. Martha A. Cheves –

    “The story goes that the women lashed their small child to themselves with their shawls before they jumped overboard to swim ashore. This action proved to be fatal for some of the children. They couldn’t struggle to the surface to breathe, and most of the mothers were not swimmers anyway. They were at the mercy of the waves.”… “Some could be revived, and this drove one woman in particular to wander up and down the beach, trying to find someone who could revive her baby. When they saw that her child was dead, the good people from Bay Shore tried to comfort her…. She wandered the beach, her baby clutched to her, until she collapsed and died herself. Her grave is in the old cemetery in Bay Shore… Even today, the Madonna Ghost, as she is called, is sighted by people on occasion.”

    Annie and her Aunt Jill are vacationing on a small island out from New York called Fire Island. The island is small and Annie is really hoping that there will be at least a couple of people her own age. She was in luck. They were staying at the summer home of a friend of Jill’s who just happened to have his nephew Ty staying with him. Now the vacation was looking up and even more so when she learned there was a ghost on the island. Maybe she would be able to see the Madonna Ghost for herself, making it a first for her. And of course with Ty by her side, it would be fun.

    What Annie and Ty soon learn is that there is more than a ghost on the island. The men staying in the cottage next door seem a little strange. And when Jill comes up missing, they are both sure the neighbors have something to do with it.

    The suspense and mystery in this book had me rapidly turning the pages. I read a lot of books and usually have them pegged at least halfway through. Not this one. It kept me guessing all the way to the end. So much so that I’ve ordered the next two books by this author… Secrets in the Fairy Chimneys and Girl with Pencil , Drawings

  4. Melissa Kuch –

    When I was a young adult I used to love the Nancy Drew books, which is why I was drawn to The Madonna Ghost. The novel revolves around a modern day young detective, Annie Tillery. She is a great role model for young girls. Not only is she smart, but she is down to earth and someone people can relate with. She is not only facing the mystery of the Madonna Ghost on Fire Island, but she is also facing family issues, with her mother’s drinking problem and her father always being away on business. The mystery itself is engaging and the reader is uncovering the clues and helping to solve the mystery along with Annie and her crush, the cute college boy Ty. I really enjoyed how Ty and Annie’s relationship grows throughout the novel, and though there is romance, the two bond on another level as well. Ty understands what Annie is dealing with and shows her there is a path toward forgiveness. Linda Frank is a very talented author who not only sucks you into this mystery, but her beautiful descriptive passages about Fire Island will make you feel like you are on the beach along with the characters. The ending is a page-turning, nail-biting experience, and I recommend this story for mystery lovers, both young and old. I can’t wait to read the next Annie Tillery mystery!

  5. Karen Bonnet –

    This riveting story, set on beautiful, historic Fire Island, takes readers on a page-turning adventure that begins with protagonist/teenager Annie Tillery and her NYPD detective, Aunt Jill. While vacationing on Fire Island during the summer, Annie, a likeable teenager with an unstable family life, finds romance and uncovers a sinister plot with newfound boyfriend, Ty Egan. Together, they discover why a local ghost has been “appearing” for years and causing concern among the townspeople who have seen her walking along the shores of the beach, searching for her long-lost child. Annie and Ty soon learn that Aunt Jill’s difficult and hostile neighbors may be the reason for her aunt’s sudden disappearance. While the plot thickens and readers become more entrenched in the lives of the characters, Linda Maria Frank continues to weave her intriguing and captivating adventure/mystery that keeps readers on the edge of their seats!

  6. D. Mele –

    Linda Frank has written a great book for young readers. This short, appealing novel will hold young readers interest at any time, but especially as a summer reading. The reader will see the sparkling blue waters at Fire Island and feel the soft sand under her feet while she ponders the mystery unfolding before her eyes.
    I will strongly recommend this gem of a novel to my young students.

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