The Phantom Hour (Babysitting Nightmares #2) by Kat Shepherd

Imprint, 2019

ISBN-13: 978-1250156990

Available: Hardcover, Kindle edition, audiobook, audio CD

This summer has been a great one for discovering books with all kinds of girls, from reckless risktakers to insecure new girls, facing their fears– literally.  What a victory for representation, am I right? I wanted to make a list, but I would have spent hours on it.

Babysitting Nightmares by Kat Shepherd is a series I want to see succeed like crazy. I encountered the second book, The Phantom Hour, at the library, and it is so much fun! Apparently there’s a third out now, The Ghost Light, so I’ll be back at the library soon.  The book centers on four friends, all seventh graders, with very different interests and backgrounds. Clio is the leader,  and the book is worth reading, if for no other reason, than to encounter her aunt, Kawanna, who runs a costume shop called Creature Feature located in a storefront on Coffin Street, wears a Godzilla print skirt, hosts horror movie nights for the girls, and drives them where they need to go on their secret missions without actually interfering. Doesn’t she sound like someone you’d want to be friends with?

If you were thinking “this sounds like The Babysitters Club dressed up with ghosts”, you’d be wrong. While there is a standalone storyline in this book, there’s also a thread that connects it to the first book and on into the third. In the first book, the four girls had to enter the Nightmare Realm to retrieve one of their charges who had been replaced with a changeling,  but apparently the Nightmare Realm is not done with them. So as they go about their daily lives and babysitting jobs, they also have to contend with containing the Nightmare Realm. In The Phantom Hour,  Clio takes a job babysitting for the Lee family, who have just moved into the abandoned Plunkett Mansion. Of course the mansion has a supernatural resident, and it’s up to Clio, with help from her friends, to figure out what’s going on and resolve it.  Shepherd does a nice job not just of portraying a diverse group of girlfriends (including three girls of color) who really support each other. The little girl Clio is babysitting is hearing impaired and she’s also represented respectfully.

While most hardcore horror lovers might not get much of a scare out of this book, it has some genuinely creepy and frightening moments– the ghost in the story is not a friendly one.  This series is a nice change from books about girlfriends who are crushing on boys and tearing each other down. It’s not every day you see a positive depiction of four smart, geeky girlfriends taking on and defeating the supernatural, and this one is tops.  Highly recommended.