The Spook's Secret - Joseph Delaney

The Spook's Secret is the third book in Joseph Delaney's series. As the story opens the nights are drawing in and the Spook decides it's soon going to be time for him and his apprentice Tom to move to his winter house in Anglezarke. Before they do so, however, a stranger arrives at the summer house with a letter for the Spook, and a bad attitude. He is dressed like a Spook, but Tom has never met him before.

Tom has heard that the house at Anglezarke is a sinister and menacing place, but nothing he's heard can fully prepare him for what he finds there because this house, and the whole of Anglezarke Moor, is full of surprises. Tom discovers that there is a huge cellar beneath the house and in it are kept bound boggarts and witches, both live and dead. One of those live witches is Meg Skelton, about whom Tom has heard a few things, and read more in one of the Spook's journals.

Before Tom and his master have been at Anglezarke for long they are called out to deal with a more dangerous than usual type of Boggart, a stone-chucker, which has crushed a shepherd to death by chucking a huge boulder on top of the man. They succeed in dealing with it temporarily, but then it turns up at the farm where the young witch Alice, whom Tom likes, is boarding. When Tom and the Spook go to deal with it a second time, it injures the Spook quite badly. Whilst Tom is trying to nurse the Spook back to health the mysterious man who left the letter for Tom's master at the start of the story, turns up again. His name is Morgan and he's a former apprentice of the Spook's, but a failed one; he claims that the Spook has something that belongs to him. Morgan tries to bully the Spook into giving back what he holds, and then he starts to threaten Tom. Things go from bad to worse, and Tom finds himself in very grave danger, and not only Tom, but the whole County as well, when Morgan tries to call forth one of the old gods.

As with the two preceding books (The Spook's Apprentice and The Spook's Curse) The Spook's Secret is a gripping tale that will keep the reader on the edge of their seat. And it should NOT be read by sensitive readers !