1LeeAnn725
Ok, I'm not really trying to stump people, but I've had some of these books stuck in the back of my brain forever and I'm really hoping someone here can help with this.
Around 1990-1991, I read a book that had a girl who met a ghost (I think) and the ghost needed something from the house she/he used to live in. The house had museum type people in it and they were examining a painting in the house and x-rayed it to find a portrait underneath. Finding the portrait was very important. That's all I remember.
If anybody knows anything, I'd greatly appreciate it!
Around 1990-1991, I read a book that had a girl who met a ghost (I think) and the ghost needed something from the house she/he used to live in. The house had museum type people in it and they were examining a painting in the house and x-rayed it to find a portrait underneath. Finding the portrait was very important. That's all I remember.
If anybody knows anything, I'd greatly appreciate it!
2gemini_angel
A keyword search turned up The Haunted Portrait by Ann Ashton, but I can't seem to find a good description. I'll keep looking, but I thought I'd post this, in case the title sounds familiar.
edit: no description, but I did find this snippet on Google:
The ghost lunged for her. Marty stepped aside and dashed toward the door to ...
Eugenia, a wily ghost if indeed that is what she was, managed to force her ...
edit: no description, but I did find this snippet on Google:
The ghost lunged for her. Marty stepped aside and dashed toward the door to ...
Eugenia, a wily ghost if indeed that is what she was, managed to force her ...
3LeeAnn725
Because my memory is so vague, I'm definitely going to check this out. I also seem to remember the book starting with the girl and her father in a park(?) and possibly something about the park about to be under construction (?).
Like I said...really vague memory.
Like I said...really vague memory.
4LeeAnn725
Ok, did some research. The Haunted Portrait by Ann Ashton is NOT the correct book. It's described as a gothic romance, and that seems a little older than the book I'm looking for. But, for anyone who is interested, here is another description of The Haunted Portrait:
"Martha Parnham is a young heiress restoring Kessler Mansion in the beautiful Berkshires. But she is enigmatically involved with the manor's malevolent history: a bizarre double murder committed more than a century before. Some believe Martha to be the reincarnation of one of the victims as she finds herself in danger."
"Martha Parnham is a young heiress restoring Kessler Mansion in the beautiful Berkshires. But she is enigmatically involved with the manor's malevolent history: a bizarre double murder committed more than a century before. Some believe Martha to be the reincarnation of one of the victims as she finds herself in danger."
5gemini_angel
LeeAnn, sorry that is not the book, if I had been able to find that description I would have known it's not what you were looking for. I'll keep searching and maybe someone else will recognize your book:)
6gemini_angel
The Bassumtyte treasure by Jane Louise Curry sounds promising:
When he goes to live with his cousin at the family's ancestral home, a ten-year-old boy finds a secret room and clues that could help unravel the riddle of the family treasure.
I searched inside the book and found this passage:
"Gemma's friend at the Courtauld Institute had immediately taken x-ray and infra-red photographs of the painting...
When he goes to live with his cousin at the family's ancestral home, a ten-year-old boy finds a secret room and clues that could help unravel the riddle of the family treasure.
I searched inside the book and found this passage:
"Gemma's friend at the Courtauld Institute had immediately taken x-ray and infra-red photographs of the painting...
8DisassemblyOfReason
a girl who met a ghost (I think) and the ghost needed something from the house she/he used to live in. The house had museum type people in it and they were examining a painting in the house and x-rayed it to find a portrait underneath. Finding the portrait was very important.
This sounds to me like Eleanor Cameron's The Court of the Stone Children, but the details are a little off.
The ghost, Dominique, spent her whole life attempting to prove that her father had been innocent of the charge for which he had been executed (under Napoleon, I think; he'd been executed for murdering a devoted family servant). She swore never to rest until she had proved him innocent, and she never managed to do so in life.
One of her descendants sold the family chateau, and the furniture wound up in a museum. The protagonist - Nina - is a girl who wants to be a curator someday, and met Dominique at the museum without realizing at first that she was a ghost.
The business about the portrait - it proved that Dominique's father, Kot, had been a very long way away from the scene of the crime for which he had been executed. It had been painted by his fiancee's father just after Kot had proposed to her, and the date and names were painted into the picture. After the execution, the girl's father painted over the names and Kot's face, but didn't destroy the picture because it was the best painting of his daughter - Odile was her name - that he'd ever done.
Nina and Dominique together had read one of Odile's published journals describing her life leading up to her unnamed fiancée's death - Nina guessed that Odile's fiancee and Dominique's father might be the same person after reading an English translation of one volume of the journal, and got Dominique to translate the 2nd volume for her. (In life, Dominique had never known her father had considered remarrying after her mother's death, and Odile's journals hadn't been published until long after Dominique herself had died.)
Dominique's knowledge of her father and what had happened before his death convinced them that they now knew where Kot had been before his death, and why he never gave his alibi when accused - he'd been afraid of bringing danger upon Odile's family.
Dominique then said she'd wager the painting had been destroyed.
When Nina found out that the portrait might still exist, she persuaded the museum people and the portrait's owner to get it X-rayed because she thought it was the portrait named in Odile's journal. (She didn't tell them about the ghost or that she already knew what the painting would show if it were the same one).
- edited to plug in some names -
Is that the book you might have been looking for?
This sounds to me like Eleanor Cameron's The Court of the Stone Children, but the details are a little off.
The ghost, Dominique, spent her whole life attempting to prove that her father had been innocent of the charge for which he had been executed (under Napoleon, I think; he'd been executed for murdering a devoted family servant). She swore never to rest until she had proved him innocent, and she never managed to do so in life.
One of her descendants sold the family chateau, and the furniture wound up in a museum. The protagonist - Nina - is a girl who wants to be a curator someday, and met Dominique at the museum without realizing at first that she was a ghost.
The business about the portrait - it proved that Dominique's father, Kot, had been a very long way away from the scene of the crime for which he had been executed. It had been painted by his fiancee's father just after Kot had proposed to her, and the date and names were painted into the picture. After the execution, the girl's father painted over the names and Kot's face, but didn't destroy the picture because it was the best painting of his daughter - Odile was her name - that he'd ever done.
Nina and Dominique together had read one of Odile's published journals describing her life leading up to her unnamed fiancée's death - Nina guessed that Odile's fiancee and Dominique's father might be the same person after reading an English translation of one volume of the journal, and got Dominique to translate the 2nd volume for her. (In life, Dominique had never known her father had considered remarrying after her mother's death, and Odile's journals hadn't been published until long after Dominique herself had died.)
Dominique's knowledge of her father and what had happened before his death convinced them that they now knew where Kot had been before his death, and why he never gave his alibi when accused - he'd been afraid of bringing danger upon Odile's family.
Dominique then said she'd wager the painting had been destroyed.
When Nina found out that the portrait might still exist, she persuaded the museum people and the portrait's owner to get it X-rayed because she thought it was the portrait named in Odile's journal. (She didn't tell them about the ghost or that she already knew what the painting would show if it were the same one).
- edited to plug in some names -
Is that the book you might have been looking for?
9LeeAnn725
I think that this might be it. The description has the right feel to it, and the name Dominique seems familiar to me. I'm definitely going to the library tomorrow to see if it's there! I'll give feedback if this is definitely it, but I've got a good feeling.
Thanks so much!!
Thanks so much!!
10bookel
Most libraries have online catalogues; does yours? You could check online. If they have access to other branches you could see if there's an interlibrary loan available too.
11LeeAnn725
Yeah, I just checked, I'm gonna have to buy the book off amazon.com. Or go to the local used bookstores.
12bookel
Check these worldwide sites: http://www.usedbooksearch.co.uk/ or www.bookfinder.com and also postage rates etc. to find the cheapest in the condition you want.
13DisassemblyOfReason
#9
You're welcome. Even if this turns out not to be what you're looking for, I think it's very good.
#3 I also seem to remember the book starting with the girl and her father in a park
Missed this bit of your description.
The opening scene of The court of the stone children is in a park near the museum - a fairly spiteful group of girls are laughing at Nina, the protagonist, when she says she wants to be something-in-a-museum when she grows up (she'd blocked on the word 'curator'). Her father isn't there, but a boy she later becomes friends with, who then mentions the museum to her for the first time during that scene, is present.
Nina's father figures in the book, though not to do with the park specifically that I recall. He's been very sick, which is why the family had to give up their old house and move to San Francisco (the setting of the story) in the first place. (I have the impression that this was probably because it was easier for her mother to get a job there, but the book may not say so outright.) They have conversations on and off throughout the book about various things. At the beginning of the story, Nina hates living in San Francisco, largely because the family has a really terrible apartment and her parents haven't got the energy to go apartment-hunting for a better place. That might have to do with the construction stuff you're thinking of - later, when Nina finds a nicer place by accident, she spends some time helping to repaint it.
The paperback edition I have says it was reprinted in 1990 (that's the green cover, if you look at LT's covers). The only other edition I see on LT, judging by the covers, is the original 1973 hardcover edition (with the white background behind the stone statues). I suspect the 1990 edition might be easier to find, but I've had it for a very long time so I'm not a fair sample.
You're welcome. Even if this turns out not to be what you're looking for, I think it's very good.
#3 I also seem to remember the book starting with the girl and her father in a park
Missed this bit of your description.
The opening scene of The court of the stone children is in a park near the museum - a fairly spiteful group of girls are laughing at Nina, the protagonist, when she says she wants to be something-in-a-museum when she grows up (she'd blocked on the word 'curator'). Her father isn't there, but a boy she later becomes friends with, who then mentions the museum to her for the first time during that scene, is present.
Nina's father figures in the book, though not to do with the park specifically that I recall. He's been very sick, which is why the family had to give up their old house and move to San Francisco (the setting of the story) in the first place. (I have the impression that this was probably because it was easier for her mother to get a job there, but the book may not say so outright.) They have conversations on and off throughout the book about various things. At the beginning of the story, Nina hates living in San Francisco, largely because the family has a really terrible apartment and her parents haven't got the energy to go apartment-hunting for a better place. That might have to do with the construction stuff you're thinking of - later, when Nina finds a nicer place by accident, she spends some time helping to repaint it.
The paperback edition I have says it was reprinted in 1990 (that's the green cover, if you look at LT's covers). The only other edition I see on LT, judging by the covers, is the original 1973 hardcover edition (with the white background behind the stone statues). I suspect the 1990 edition might be easier to find, but I've had it for a very long time so I'm not a fair sample.
14LeeAnn725
Ok, I have purchased the book, once I get it and read it I will let you know if this is the right story. I'm pretty excited about this! That's 2 out of 3 books so far :)
15LeeAnn725
Just to let all the people who helped out know, The Court of the Stone Children was the correct book. Thank you to everyone who lent a helping hand!!
