How To Disappear And Never Be Found is a captivating book that keeps me wanting to know more. The way the writter writes this book makes me really feel that I am in the story. The choice of words and drawings gave the book life.
Now, for the story.Margaret always knew that something was different about her family. She herself was a normal six grader. But Margaret felt that something was strange about her mother. Her mother did not seem to talk about anything anymore after the mysterious drowning death of her father three years ago. Then one day, Margaret's mother took her and her sister to an old abandoned house and placed a 'For Sale By Owner' sign in the front yard. Mother forbade them to enter the house and spoke nothing about it. But who have lived there? And why was mother keeping it a secret? Why did they take ferry ride to this place just to place the sign? These were questions that appeared in Magaret's mind. Just then, Mother asked Margaret to take somthing from the house. This was the chance that Magaret can look and see what was in the house and how it looked like.
It was filled with all sorts of things, from floor to ceiling. There were so many things that Magaret could have stayed there for days and explore what was in the house. Then she remembered her task. Upon leaving the house, Magaret spotted a package that had her mother's name on it. It was sent 4 years ago to her mother but her mother had sent it back. Curious, she took the package and stuffed it in her jeans and pulled her sweatshirt low to cover that part of her jeans. Then she ran out of the house to her mother.
At home, Magaret opened the package secretly and found a swimming medal ( first place ), a comic book, and a key. Opening the package was not easy. It was made hard as her sister had hidden the package a few times. Not knowing what all those things meant and convinced that her father's death, her mother's silence and the spooky mansion were all related, Magaret went back to the mansion secretly. She opened the door of the mansion with the key and entered it. Everything was fine after entering the mansion until she heard some strange noises and she ran out of the house. She dropped her backpack in the house accidently while escaping.
After that, she met a boy by the name of Boyd. Boyd was a boy who was a lonely comic-obsessed person. He was obsessed with the comic by the name of Ratt.He had read all the volumes of the comic book except for the first one, which was in Magaret's backpack. It was a story about two good friends who turned into monsters. One a half man half mouse and the other a Drowning Ghost. It was said in the comic that the Drowning Ghost would come out every month when the moon is full to haunt someone and drag him into the water and then dig out his eyes( this was because the crabs under the sea had eaten both the Drowning Ghost' eyes ). Boyd believed that all these were true. There was something about the comic that was strange. All the actions and thoughts that Boyd and Magaret did were all drawn in the book. Every detail was there. Was Ratt following both of them?
(Let me tell you more about the book. The book was actually found in the library near Boyd's school. This library was no ordinary one. All the books inside were all hand written by the people of the neighbourhood. There were no published books in there. Boyd was a usual patron of the library, in fact, the only one most of the time. He spotted the comic book on one of his visits to the library. A new edition of the comic book would strangely appear everyday at night.)
Boyd and Magaret tried to get near the house and find clues but before they even enter the house, they were always frightened by the sounds that came out from the house and ran away. One day, the duo came out with a plan to sneak into the house. When the full moon was shinning through the window of the top floor( this is when Ratt will go out of the house as said in the comic book) both of them sprang into action. Magaret went into the house firstly, to get her backpack back , secondly, to find out more about her father in the first volume of the Ratt comic . She found out from there that the swimming medal belonged to her father. When she was about to leave, Magaret was horrified to find a comic strip that had her sister with Ratt, on his boat.
Knowing that her sister was in danger, Magaret rushed to the dock with Boyd trying to keep up. Boyd operated his father's motorboat to find her sister. Magaret found it hard to call out her sister's name with all the noise around her. Then Magaret found her sister on a boat with Ratt! There was a hubbub. Boyd's parents had called for a search party and there were lights coming out from the house. It was the police. They were searching the mansion. Seeing all these happening, Ratt carried Sophie(Magaret's sister) and jumped into the water. This made Magaret panic. Without thinking, she jumped into the water trying to find them. She was finding it hard to swim as the weight of her jeans and clothes pulled her down. Suddenly, Magaret was lifted up. It was Ratt.
Magaret asked : " Why did you do that? Why did you take my sister?"
Ratt: "I only wanted to tell her everything."'
Magaret: " Why her and not me?"
Ratt: " I know that you came here for your father. I only wanted to tell her the truth. I am your actually your uncle and the Drowning Ghost is your father. Your father comes out of the water every month because he wanted to take a last look at his children"
After hearing this, Magaret looked at Ratt with in a different attitude. There was softness in her eyes. There was a family reunion. Magaret was enjoying the prescence of her uncle when Boyd had thrown a life preserver near Magaret. She held on and asked Ratt to hold on to it too. The search party's boat was getting nearer and nearer at the same time. As Ratt was still not ready to be seen by other human beings, he crept away.
Boyd pulled Magaret nearer to the boat he was in and wrapped her in a woollen cloth found on the boat. The the search party's boat then stopped next to Boyd's father's boat and a man on it brought Magaret and her sister on to their boat. Magaret immediately asked about her sister and was relieved to hear that Sophie had been already saved.
Back on land, Magaret's mother ran and gave her daughters a hug. She also apologised for hiding the truth from them for such a long time. Boyd's parents offered to let Magaret and her family stay at their house for a day.
This story ended happily. Magaret's mother had removed the "FOR SALE BY OWNER" from the mansion and Ratt had sent a letter of thanks to her. Boyd told a boy about Ratt's story from the comic books and the number of 'listeners' increased significantly as the boy brought friends and the friends brought even more friends. Boyd told them that the comic books could be found at the library (the one that Boyd always visited) and that very day, the library became very crowded. Soon there were not enough books to go around and the children left a note at the front porch of the mansion to ask for more copies, together with some small gifts. The note and the gifts disappeared and the next day, a stack of Ratt books appeared at the front porch. The children were elated.
Apart from the mystery of Magaret's father, this book is also about frienship. One day during Physical Education class, one of Magaret's classmates Tina Louise got hitby the ball and fainted on the ground. Then there was a spot on her pants and it grew bigger and bigger. Tina Louise was peeing on her pants!
The next day, everyone teased Tina but Magaret met her at the bus stop. Magaret asked Tina if she was alright. This was the first time that Magaret had ever talked to her. They took the same bus home and became friends. Tina was the first person that knew what was in the package other than Magaret herself. Tina was also the one whom Magaret thought of for advice when she was scared or in trouble. And very often, these advices would really work. This is the work by THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP
This book is both frightening and funny so do yourself a favour and go read it. Lastly, be careful who is behind you as it might be Ratt.
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