The Curse on Spectacle Key

From the author of the Muse Squad series comes a sweetly spooky middle grade standalone ghost story about a Cuban American boy who befriends a pair of spirits and tries to break the curse on his island home . . . only to discover a seemingly lost piece of his family’s history in the process. Perfect for fans of Doll Bones and The Girl and the Ghost!

Frank Fernandez’s family never stays in one place for long. His parents renovate unusual buildings and turn them into homes, which means the family moves—a lot. This makes it hard for bookish Frank to make friends. So when his parents announce they’re moving to Spectacle Key, Florida, to live in a lighthouse—this time for good!—Frank is thrilled.

But Spectacle Key isn’t the perfect forever home they'd imagined. The lighthouse is falling apart. There are knocks on the door—but no one is there—and mysterious sighs and sniffles from nowhere. There’s even a creepy doll that seems to move on its own. Could Spectacle Key be haunted?

Then one day while exploring, Frank meets a girl in old-fashioned clothes, with no memory of who she is. What she does know, though, is that the island is under a curse—and she needs Frank’s help to figure out how to lift it. But what if learning the truth about Spectacle Key means losing the first real friend he’s ever had?

Chantel Acevedo was born in Miami to Cuban parents. She is the acclaimed author of the Muse Squad middle grade series as well as several adult novels, including The Distant Marvels, which was a finalist for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction. She is also a professor of English at the University of Miami, where she directs the MFA program