Water Ghosts

by Linda Collison

Overview

A troubled teen on a unique summer adventure sail for at-risk youths, believes the Chinese junk to be haunted and sailing to its doom. Fifteen-year-old James McCafferty is forced to take part in a summer adventure sail for at-risk youths. He finds himself on board a rickety old junk with three adults and six other resentful teens from various parts of the country - all of whom are struggling with behavior problems of various sorts. To some kids this "sentence" might sound like the best summer ever - six weeks of sailing around the equatorial Pacific Ocean. But for James it's a nightmare before it even begins. James is troubled by the voices inside his head and the visions he sees - especially the vision of the fire that killed his father - a fire James believes he started. He soon becomes aware of the ghosts in the hold, ghosts the Chinese call shui gui. James is certain the ship, ironically named Good Fortune, is sailing to its doom. The only good thing that could possibly come from this hell ship is getting to know Ming, a Chinese girl adopted by Americans. Ming and Truman, a boy who picks his nose and has a penchant for explosives. Three of the boys aboard taunt James and bully him because of the crazy things he blurts out. But when the adults begin to go missing off the ship, the others start to listen to him. First, Miss Marty, the ever-cheerful camp counselor, disappears. Next Mr. Miles, hard-ass first mate. Then the captain is found dead in his bunk. The seven teens are now alone on Good Fortune, adrift in the doldrums without an engine and no wind to fill the sails, the The ship's radio is broken, the cell phones are all dead, and they are far from shipping lanes and air traffic. The teens must work together to survive. Instead, they start falling apart. When their supply of fresh water dwindles, they're in danger of dying of thirst. As they weaken the water ghosts become more powerful. Below deck, James meets Yu who is a shui gui; a water ghost of a young Chinese eunuch who drowned at sea six hundred years ago. Yu is intent on trading places with James. He's waiting for Good Fortune to pass over the exact place where he drowned, on Hungry Ghost Night when the gates of hell are opened. When that happens his power to take over James' body will be complete; Yu will become James will replace Yu deep in his watery grave. He holds James captive in the belly of the ship and tells him the story of Yu's tragic life. Just when it seems Good Fortune might be rescued, a fleet of Ming Dynasty warships rises up from the bottom of the ocean and attacks them. The battle for their lives is on as the teens fight the shui gui. James knows the ghosts are cowed by fire - but fire is what killed his father. It's teen against teen, teen against nature, teen against himself - and teen against ghost in this fast-paced psychological adventure with strong paranormal and historical elements.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781943404018
Publisher:	Fiction House, Ltd.
Publication date:	06/01/2015
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	184
File size:	513 KB

About the Author

Born in Baltimore, Linda Collison moved west as a young woman cobbling together a composite career that has included critical care and emergency nursing, freelance writing, volunteer firefighting, teaching skydiving, and other occupations. Linda and Bob Russell (they met skydiving) wrote two guidebooks in the 1990s based on their travel adventures. The husband-and-wife team has sailed many blue water miles together, aboard their sloop Topaz, based in Hawaii. Their three-week sailing experience aboard the HM Bark Endeavour, a replica of Captain Cook's 18th-century ship, inspired Linda to write Star-Crossed, a nautical historical novel published by Knopf. The New York Public Library chose Star-Crossed as one of the Books for the Teen Age -- 2007. Collison also writes the Nurse Kit Carson Knife & Gun Club serialized adventures, and other fictions.Collison has won recognition for her fiction, including awards from Maui Writers, Southwest Writers, Honolulu Magazine and others. Her novels Looking for Redfeather and Water Ghosts were Foreword Reviews finalists for Indie Book of the Year.

Editorial Reviews

"A witty YA voyage with plenty of narrative power" -- Kirkus Reviews
Foreword Reviews finalist Book of the Year 2015
"An ancient Chinese junk packed with delinquent teens and ghosts alike sets off on a dangerous voyage in this fantastic book." -- Foreword Reviews

From the Publisher

2015-05-12
In Collison's (Star-Crossed, 2006, etc.) YA adventure, a teen on a character-building excursion at sea faces challenges larger than getting along with his crewmates when the spirit of a destructive ancient Chinese ghost appears.James McCafferty has the bad luck to be shanghaied by his mother and her boyfriend and sent aboard the Chinese junk Good Fortune. He is not a happy sailor. While the other teens possess what might pass as conventional behavior problems—the bookish boy obsessed with weapons, the tattooed punk girl, the adopted Asian kleptomaniac, the bully and his minions—James is different. He isn't a bad kid; he just sees and hears dead people, who now pursue the Good Fortune as it wanders to the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Yu Chin, the spirit of a 700-year-old Chinese eunuch in the imperial court, talks to James, berates him as a weakling, then tells him his plan to take over his body and send him to hell. Until then, readers' are treated to plenty of irreverent Holden Caulfield-like wit along with James' spot-on observations, which seem to keep him afloat as the situation takes on water. When the chipper youth counselor Marty—"a continuous public service announcement"—and first mate Miles disappear and Capt. Dan, who "looks more like somebody's fat, stoned uncle," dies, the ship is inexorably drawn toward a fate that involves a parallel spirit world and an ancient Chinese power struggle. The abandoned teens don't become as feral as those in The Lord of the Flies; instead, their camaraderie comes in handy just as a ghost armada raises itself from the deep. Much interesting information on Chinese sailing ships and mythology is introduced, and while not all of it is essential to the plot, Collison deftly prevents the info from talking down to young readers or encumbering the story.A witty YA voyage with plenty of narrative power.

Kirkus Reviews