Halloween in July? Mattie, Alex, and Sophie think it’s a great idea. The youngest child, Sophie, gets dressed up in her spectacular witch costume while Mattie and Alex carve a Jack-o’-lantern face out of a watermelon. The three children are excited. A new Travel Guide, Mrs. Sullivan, has arrived and that can mean only one thing: the kids will be off on a new adventure the next morning. Mattie, Alex, Sophie, and their parents sit around the living room as Mrs. Sullivan, a folklorist, begins to tell them a spooky story about a headless horseman in a little town called Sleepy Hollow. Everyone is enthralled.
The Next Morning - Sleepy Hollow
The children wake up early and head downstairs for breakfast. Little Sophie is still in her witch costume from the night before, and Mrs. Sullivan’s waiting for them with a special postcard. Excited, the children look at the picture on the postcard: a cemetery. There’s also a message on the card from someone with the initials of I. C. Mattie is spooked and repeats to herself over and over that she doesn’t believe in ghosts.
The children rush upstairs to the third floor and go inside a secret compartment door behind a bookcase. They each put a hand on the wooden spyglass and the room begins to disappear. Moments later, the children are standing in an old school house. A man starts to scream in terror at the sudden appearance of the children. The children look at the terrified man. He was incredibly tall, terribly skinny, and he had a rather large nose. It was none other than Ichabod Crane, Sleepy Hollow’s schoolteacher.
Ichabod Crane
Ichabod stared at little Sophie and her strange costume. Was Sophie a witch child? Ichabod was uncertain, but decides to help the newcomers out. Since it is nighttime in Sleepy Hollow, Ichabod leads the children to a barn to sleep in. The moment Ichabod leaves the barn, however, the children begin to talk. Why are they in Sleepy Hollow? What are Mattie, Alex, and Sophie supposed to do? Together, the children realize that they are supposed to help Ichabod Crane and find out what happens to him on the night he disappears.
Helping Ichabod Crane, the biggest scaredy cat who ever lived in New York State, is not as easy as it seems. There’s Brom Bones, the village bully who enjoys scaring Ichabod, and then there’s Katrina Van Tassel. Ichabod is in love with Katrina, but so is Brom Bones. If this isn’t bad enough, there’s also the headless Hessian who threatens to jump out and scare them at every turn.
Fun to Read
Rider in the Night: A Tale of Sleepy Hollow, book 6 in the Time Spies series, by Candice Ransom (Mirrorstone, ISBN 978-0-7869-4354-8) is a thrilling read for children ages 8-12. It is also a great story to read out loud to younger children. Each chapter bustles with activity and mystery as Mattie, Alex, and Sophie dig themselves deeper and deeper into a seemingly bottomless hole, which they manage to escape at the last possible moment.
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