Deep and Dark and Dangerous by Mary Downing Hahn

Ali is just your average 13-year-old girl looking for some adventure in her summer. When her Aunt Dulcie invites her Gull Cottage by Sycamore Lake, where Dulcie and her mother used to spend summers, to baby sit Emma while Dulcie paints, Ali can’t say yes fast enough. Ali’s mother is not as open to the idea, could it have something to do with the picture Ali found a few weeks of Dulcie, her mom, and the arm of a girl who’s name completely gone except for the letter “T”? Ali tells her mom that there is nothing dangerous about Sycamore Lake. Although her mom seems to be holding something back, she eventually lets Ali go with her aunt and cousin. When they get to lake Ali has no idea how her mother could hate such a gorgeous place.

Emma, who’s 4 years old, is simply ecstatic that she gets to spend the summer here and is almost happy except for one thing, besides her mom Ali is her best and only friend. Then Sissy comes. Sissy is cruel, bratty and Emma’s new best friend. Ali is furious when Emma starts acting exactly like Sissy. Ali is sure that Sissy is just using Emma ,but whenever she brings the topic up Emma becomes furious and Ali gets in trouble with Dulcie. When Sissy starts telling them the rumors about a girl being drowned right in Sycamore Lake, Ali begins to wonder who she can trust and what is and isn’t real.
Deep and Dark and Dangerous by Mary Downing Hahn is a thrilling, quick read that will keep you reading until the very end. I’d give it a 4 out of 5 because at times the plot was quite predictable, other than that Hahn does a wonderful job of making the characters jump off the page and has really created a wonderfully chilling ghost story.

Review by SilentLikeALamb17

Works Cited
"Deep and Dark and Dangerous Cover." Online image. LibraryThing. 7 May 2009 http://www.librarything.com/work/2338116.