Twain's Treasure

Gr 5–7—Alex April's new best friend Clarence "Bones" McFadden is obsessed with ghosts, which is why the pair finds themselves in a cemetery in the middle of the night searching for ghost activity. Bones wants desperately to find evidence of life after death. Alex claims to be a nonbeliever, but he's harboring a secret: it's easier to hide his ability to see and communicate with ghosts than to risk everyone thinking he's crazy. Ghost trouble is why Alex recently moved with his mom to Hannibal, MO, home of Mark Twain—and, unfortunately for Alex, Mark Twain's ghost. Alex is in the library working on an assignment about Mark Twain when Twain's ghost finds Alex and demands that Alex help him find his lost treasure. Alex wants nothing to do with any ghost, even the ghost of Mark Twain, but Twain is persistent, even though he doesn't quite remember what his treasure contains. Alex reticently accepts, but the search for Twain's treasure causes Alex a lot of trouble, and threatens what is possibly his only friendship in Hannibal.