Violet and the Velvets:
The Case of the Angry Ghost 
Rachael King    Phoebe Morris

 

 

Violet and the Velvets: The Case of the Angry Ghost
Rachael King Ill. Phoebe Morris
Allen and Unwin (2025)
Novel, paperback, 208 pages
ISBN 978 1 99100 699 8

 

‘You only need to know three chords to play a song.’

Violet Grumble, the self-confident, guitar-playing 12-year-old from Oakleaf Primary School has plenty of ambition for her euphoniously-named band, Violet and the Velvets. In the first book of the series, Violet and the Velvets: The Case of the Missing Stuff (2025), Violet and her friends solved the mystery of who was sabotaging their band’s efforts to get to the BandChamps, an inter-school contest.

Now, the Velvets are one of fifteen bands competing at the BandChamps national finals in the Royal Theatre (a craftily-disguised version of Christchurch’s historic Theatre Royal), which is packed with excited young musicians and their teachers.  When the excitement is interrupted by sinister whispers of ‘get out get get out’, rumours of the ghost of a ballerina spread among the bands.  Lexie (bass) is reading a Nancy Drew story about a haunting, The Ghost of Blackwood Hall, so she urges the band to emulate Nancy Drew by ‘searching for clues and interviewing witnesses.’ The band members are happy to copy Nancy’s detection work but Lexie does have reservations about Nancy’s misadventures.

‘She almost drowned in quicksand though.’

Violet once again proves a confident clue-seeker and suspect-interviewer, as well as a cheerful narrator. With the tension of the sound-check and impending performance, everyone is on edge.

‘Excitement wobbled around us like jelly.’

When further ghostly happenings trigger panic, Violet keeps her head and even manages to safely extinguish a backstage fire. Who is to blame for the worrying events? Is there perhaps a real ghost? Or is it another attempt to sabotage the Velvets? Meanwhile, the band contest must go on and Violet has stage nerves as she prepares to sing the band’s Hallowe’en song, Angry Ghost. The conclusion is satisfyingly theatrical and enjoyable.

This witty, fast-moving adventure is a pleasure to read with neatly-sketched characters and lively dialogue. The music teacher, Mr Saunders, returns and even has a hint of romance with another teacher. Less welcome is the return of irritating braggart Brayden Jones, who is thoroughly unpleasant to everyone but who unintentionally makes everyone else seem kinder and more caring by contrast.

Brayden: ‘Hey, why are you in a wheelchair?’

Dee: ‘I find that it really helps me … to mind my own business!’

Co-operation and recognising other people’s merits are the keys to success in Violet’s world, and if seeing girls succeed puts Brayden’s noise out of joint, all the better. The atmosphere of a band contest is well created, clues are examined, witnesses are interviewed and red herrings are rejected in a thoroughly enjoyable story. There are also some great band names, from Go Dog Go to Shimmy Shimmy.

The illustrations and decorations throughout the book are by the talented Phoebe Morris. Her black-and-white illustrations give visual identities to all the characters. Particularly cute is the picture of the two teachers at the precise moment when their eavesdropping students discover that their first names are Duncan and Jojo.  

I was fortunate enough to hear the author’s world premiere vocal-and-guitar rendition of Angry Ghost. Readers who wish to listen to Violet and the Velvets’ version of Too Shy and Angry Ghost will find them on the author’s website:

rachael-king.com/fun-stuff

 

Trevor Agnew 
14 Sep 2025    [Review 3793]