Your Questions Answered

Polo’s Mother

Polo has always longed to find his mother. All he remembers is that she was soft and warm and smelled of milk. So when sassy, street-smart Geraldine returns, she isn’t exactly the mother he expected. But Polo is still thrilled to have found her and is eager to show her off to his pack of friends in the Club of Mysteries.

As usual, there are many mysteries to be solved. Does the light inside a refrigerator turn off when the door is shut? What is at the top of a church steeple, anyway?

But perhaps the most puzzling mystery of all is one Polo cannot figure out: Does his mother truly love him? If so, can he convince her to change her roaming ways and stay?

Irresistible to cat lovers everywhere, this is a heartening conclusion to Phyllis Reynolds Naylor’s Cat Pack series.

Bernie Magruder & The Case of the Big Stink

What smells like rotten potatoes, ammonia, sick cats, and sour cream? All of Middleburg these days, that’s what! There’s a crazy gasser on the loose.

Bernie Magruder and his family live in the Bessledorf Hotel. Mr. Magruder is the manager and the family wants to be sure that the hotel is safe and well run so that their dad will not be fired.

Bernie is afraid that the Mad Gasser just might be living there in the Bessledorf Hotel, and he sets out to solve the mystery.

Bernie Magruder & The Disappearing Bodies

Mr. and Mrs. Magruder have been hired to run a residential hotel. Bernie is one of their children. A dead body is found in a room; then it disappears. A second dead body is found; then it disappears. A third body is found; it’s real and was stolen from the next door funeral parlor. Bodies are coming and going from the Bessledorf Hotel – dead and alive!

Who wants to stay in a hotel full of zombies? Not too many – and that’s a big problem for Mr. Magruder, who’s trying hard to manage his hotel!

Because of all the nutty publicity Mr. Magruder is fired.

Bernie’s determined to get to the bottom of the case. Will he and his friends Georgene and Weasel find out how these bodies are mysteriously moving from place to place?

Bernie Magruder & The Haunted Hotel

What’s bigger than a chair, but smaller than a house? Larger than a loaf of bread, but isn’t an animal or a vegetable?

What could this ghost want?

Bernie and his friends Georgene and Weasel are going crazy trying to figure out how to please the ghost who’s haunting Bernie’s father’s hotel. If Bernie’s father loses his job, then his family will need to move again — but Bernie likes Middleburg, and wants to stay. And so, before his father can be ousted from the suffering hotel, Bernie must face the ghost — and figure out how to make it leave them all alone!

Bernie Magruder & The Drive-Thru Funeral Parlor

Everyone in Middleburg is talking about the new drive-in viewing window at the Bessledorf Funeral Home — at least until the vice president of the Higgins Roofing Company disappears along with the company’s pension fund, leaving behind only a mysterious chuck roast.

For Bernie, it’s his chance to get into the Guinness Book of World Records as the youngest person ever to capture a criminal — he just wishes the case weren’t leading him to the creepy goings-on at the funeral home.

Bernie Magruder & The Bus Station Blow-up

Someone set off a bomb in the Bessledorf Bus Depot — and all fingers are pointing at Bernie’s sister Delores. And the next suspect in line is Joseph, their brother! It’s up to Bernie and his friends Georgene and Weasel to help solve the case — and save the Magruder name..

Naylor’s fifth story about the escapades of 11-year-old Bernie and the offbeat Bessledorf family is as clever as the previous titles. This time, Bernie is certain that either his revenge-seeking sister, Delores, or his secretive brother, Joseph (or the two of them in cahoots), is responsible for a series of bombings in Middleburg. Unfortunately, Bernie has shared his suspicions with Officer Feeney, who is dangerously close to arresting Delores.

It’s up to Bernie, with his trusty friends Weasel and Georgene, to ferret out the truth and clear Delores’ name. Snappy dialogue, cliff-hanging chapters, funny situations, and nutty characters will make this a perfect choice for reading aloud or for readers’ theater.

Bernie Magruder & The Pirate’s Treasure

Did the long-dead pirate Peg Leg bury his treasure in Middleburg, Indiana?

Officer Feeney seems to think so. And Bernie Magruder, whose father runs the Bessledorf Hotel in Middleburg, believes him. After all, the Middleburg River runs into the Wabash, the Wabash flows into the Ohio, the Ohio runs into the Mississippi, the Mississippi empties into the Gulf of Mexico, and the Gulf, as everyone should know, opens into the Atlantic, which is where the pirates were.

Is this why a pale light bobs about in the dark of night on Bessledorf Hill? Is this why holes appear on the hill? Has the spirit of Peg Leg returned for his treasure? Or does the great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson of Peg Leg, who turns up at the Bessledorf Hotel with a treasure map, know more about these mysterious events than he is willing to tell?

Rumors of the old pirate bring treasure hunters from everywhere, and once more Bernie and the colorful characters who form his family have a mystery on their hands.

Bernie Magruder & The Parachute Peril

Life in Middleburg is mighty strange these days — a mysterious building is going up in the next town over and Bernie’s absentminded sister, Delores, shocks everyone by devoting her life to a career in parachute-making. But when Delores is summoned to jump from a plane wearing one of her own parachutes, Bernie and his friends smell trouble.

Who would volunteer Delores for such a stunt and just who is that suspicious guy hanging around the new building?

Bernie Magruder & The Bats in the Belfry

There are strange goings-on once again in Middleburg. Someone has put up posters warning townspeople that the dreaded Indiana Aztec bat has been sighted in the area. What’s more, the town is in an uproar over the bells recently placed in the church belfry that chime every hour — twenty-four hours a day! It seems the whole town is going batty with the constant pealing!

Bernie Magruder is determined to get to the bottom of things. Who put up all those posters about a species of bat no one has ever heard of? What can the townspeople do to return some peace to their lives? And are the bats that Bernie and his family see swooping about the belfry the dreaded Indiana Aztecs?

Looks like Bernie, and his two friends Georgene and Weasel, have their work cut out for them again!

Winner of the 2004 Edgar Award for Best Juvenile Book

Witch’s Sister

When the darkness,

tolls the hour,

I shall have you

in my power…

Lynn and her best friend, Mouse, are positive their neighbor, Mrs. Tuggle, is a witch. And they suspect the old woman is forcing Lynn’s sister, Judith, to join her coven of witches. But Lynn and Mouse can’t prove anything and their parents don’t believe them. The girls are desperate to expose Mrs. Tuggle’s evil nature, especially since her actions are becoming more threatening everyday.

Now Lynn’s parents have announced that they’re going away for the weekend, leaving Judith and Mrs. Tuggle in charge. Can the girls outsmart Mrs. Tuggle and save Lynn’s family — or is the dark magic too strong to conquer?