Black Maria

By: Diana Wynne Jones

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Hardcover | 1 August 2000

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On the surface, Aunt Maria seems like a cuddly old lady, all chit-chat and lace doilies and unadulterated NICEness! When Mig and her family go for a short visit, they soon learn that Aunt Maria rules the place with a rod of sweetness that's tougher than iron and deadlier than poison. Life revolves around tea parties, while the men are all grey-suited zombies who fade into the background, and the other children seem like clones. The short visit becomes a long stay, and when all talk of going home ceases, Mig despairs! Things go from bad to worse when Mig's brother Chris tries to rebel, but is changed into a wolf . Mig is convinced that Aunt Maria must be a witch - but who will believe her? It's up to Mig to figure out what's going on. Maybe the ghost who haunts the downstairs bedroom holds the key?

Industry Reviews

In the wake of the Harry Potter phenomenon, Black Maria, an old favourite from well-loved children's writer Wynne Jones, has been dressed up in Hess's appealing illustrations and marched back out onto our bookshelves. When Mig, a young writer, goes to Cranberry-on-Sea with her mother and brother Chris to look after aged Aunt Maria, she soon has a few questions. Why do the townswomen gather around Aunt Maria under her sugar-coated command while the zombie-like men skulk around in silence? Why are the only children in town shut up in a forbidding orphanage? If the family car really crashed into the sea, killing Mig's errant father, how could she have seen it parked in Cranberry? Mig and Chris set out to solve the mystery with the help of the ghost in Chris's bedroom, and they are soon up to their necks in magic and mayhem. The book is lots of fun, but is also unafraid to explore the darker side of human nature. In Aunt Maria's stifling politeness we see how people control others through passive aggression. Through the women's domination of their men, we learn that power must be balanced. With Mig we find out that repressed feelings suffocate personal freedom. And with ghosts, curses, people transformed into animals, time travel and dark secrets from the past, Black Maria will delight Pottermaniacs everywhere. (Kirkus UK)

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