Mischief Night is the third book in the Saranormal series about 12-year-old Sara Collins. Sara longs to be just a normal girl, but she can see, hear, and talk to ghosts. Last night was Stellamar, New Jersey's annual October Boardwalk Bash, a farewell to the summer tourist season. It's been two weeks since Sara was crowned the Harvest Queen in book two, Haunted Memories.

Mischief Night is what the folks in Stellamar call the night before Halloween. It's the night for the kind of pranks often done on Halloween itself. (Sara doesn't mention one of the tricks my dad and his friends pulled on Halloween when he was a boy. Good!)

A subplot is Sara's attempt to become a photographer for Stellamar Middle School's web newspaper, the Stellamar Wire. She wants to be the sports photographer because that will give her an excuse to watch that cute Jayden Mendes while he plays for the soccer team. Sara has been photographing objects, not persons, and she needs good samples of people photos to have a chance of getting the position.

Another subplot is about Sara and her Dad's landlady, Lady Azura. Lady Azura's psychic business is slower than it usually is after the tourists leave. Sara's best friend, enthusiastic and outgoing Lily Randazzo, comes up with an idea to help. The girls go up to Sara's craft room on the third floor to carry out Lily's plan. Then the closet opens by itself. A ghost starts pulling poltergeist-like activity, so the girls flee.

Sara has known that Lady Azura's house is haunted since the day her dad drove them there, but she doesn't want Lily to know. She's afraid that Lily will tell her friend Miranda (who doesn't like Sara), Miranda will then tell their whole school, and Sara will be labeled abnormal. Lady Azura plays along for Sara's sake.

NOTES:

Chapter 1: Mr. Chopra, who runs the Boardwalk arcade, is not one of the many relatives of Lily Randazzo who run things in Stellamar.

Chapter 2:

a. The silver braided ring Sara wears belonged to her mother. She now wears the red crystal Lady Azura gave her in book one, Ghost Town, and the aquamarine she was given in book two. (Could it be because Sara accidentally left the aquamarine in her room back then?)

b. Lily and Sara's friend, Avery, has an admirer in Jack L.

c. Lady Azura's Victorian house has peeling yellow paint (on the siding?) That explains the burnt orange trim mentioned in book one.

d. Lily's dad runs strip malls. Her Aunt Dolores has a store called the Salty Crab on Beach Drive. (I smiled at Lily's opinion of the dresses sold there.)

Chapter 3: Weird things happen after a closet door opens by itself in Sara's craft room.

Chapter 4:

a. Sara seems to be forgetting her first interaction with ghosts in the prologue of book one. They didn't just let her alone. (To be left alone means there is no one else where you are. To be let alone means no one is pestering, annoying, vexing, irritating, aggravating, etc. you.)

b. I don't know why Lady Azura wants fennel seeds, but two uses I know for them are covering them with sugar to make comfits and eating several of them plain to get rid of intestinal gas pains.

Chapter 5:

a. The soccer uniforms at Sara's school are blue and gold.

b. Sara has a vision.

Chapter 6: Mike Collins, Sara's dad, has a date.

Chapter 7: Sara learns about Henry, the ghost in her craft room.

Chapter 8: This year Lady Azura is going to allow children to attend her Blue Moon party on October 30th, Mischief Night.

Chapter 9: Sara has another vision.

Chapter 11: Mike Collins' new lady friend is a co-worker named Janelle. (Mike & Sara called themselves the two Musketeers when she was little.)

Chapter 12: Sara sees the rest of the interrupted vision from chapter 9.

Sara is still having problems with Marco, the ghost of her crush Jayden's big brother. Another of the ghosts in Lady Azura's house has become active again. Sara seems to be developing another power. Lady Azura can advise her, but Sara has to do her bit to keep her new power from harming her.
At least Sara is becoming friends with most of Lily's friends. For the first time, she's not the outsider at school. Sara is so afraid that Lady Azura's Blue Moon party will ruin that. It's bad enough that one of the consequences of her win in book two has made her an enemy. Who needs to have a school mean girl against her?

I really enjoyed this book and could hardly wait to read the next one. ( )

Sara continues to try to balance her home and school lives with her "gift" for seeing and communicating with the dead. Keeping that kind of secret is hard when a ghost really has it out for you, like her not-boyfriends deceased brother, Marco and the little boy who haunts her craft room. But Sara is growing up and accepting her gift and trying to learn the rules for working with spirits. With Halloween approaching, wish her luck.

This series is fun. Sara and her friends are pretty cool and even the mean girls are not that mean. At least not yet. Still very appropriate for teens there are lessons to be learned about friendship and other relationships. Looking forward to the next in the series. ( )