Helen Grant has written a story that spans genres. She professes to like the old tales of witches, ghosts, and horror, but this story includes a good mystery as well. Grant and her family lived in Bad Münstereifel, Germany, for seven years and she fell in love with the quaint old town and its old-world folk stories.

The book follows Pia Kolvenbach, age 10, as she tries to come to grips with suddenly becoming the school outcast and having to accept StinkStefan as a friend. When Katharina Linden disappears, never to be seen again, we readers are drawn into the mystery as we watch Pia and Stefan try to discover what happened. Grant was able to work in a number of the folk tales that are still told in Bad Münstereifel.

I like the book and give it a solid 4 rating.

Mike Lawrence