Ann Brophy

To Catch a Ghost
Lucy Walsh, an aspiring young writer, never goes anywhere without her pocket notebook. When the family takes a weekend retreat to a gloomy island, Lucy is swimming in an ocean of inspired thoughts which she immediately jots down. A strange old man named Wilson, a haunted lighthouse and a long-ago accident provide an eerie landscape for the young girl and her family.
When Lucy graciously volunteers to take care of her lively twin brothers, Adam and George, for the weekend, she finds she has more on her hands than she expected. George's obsession with ghosts and vampires runs at a fever pitch, and Adam becomes possessed by an island ghost who has been held hostage in the lighthouse. With her parents taking some time alone and her older sister, Hannah, pursuing young romance, Lucy might have to handle these spooky happenings on her own. Chilling events unfold and the Walsh family and Wilson's past loved ones become entwined as an accident that has haunted the island for 60 years draws Lucy and her siblings into the mystery.

Best Friends are Better than Diamonds,
A Story of Diamond Heels and Stepped-on Toes
The diamonds belong to Agnes' celebrated grandmother, Harriet Bell Anthony, and the story is a mix of characters, in place and out of place, in a peaceful Indiana town in the late 1940s. The problems center on a sensitive, imaginative 12-year-old girl who is caught in the inevitable struggle to understand and accept feelings, frustrations and loyalties. The conflicts intensify with the visit of a legendary grandmother in her diamond-heeled shoes.
"Later, before they fell asleep, they swore everlasting friendship until the day they died and afterward in heaven." Diamonds are definitely secondary.

Summer Storm in Gettysburg
In 1853, a band of children set off on a midnight adventure in the woods around Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. This group included Jennie Wade, her older sister, Georgia, her younger brother, Samuel, and two friends, Jack Skelly and Wesley Culp. Ten years later, we meet Jack and Wesley on a Virginia battlefield, where fate has cast them as enemies. Wesley is a Confederate soldier, and Jack is a mortally-wounded Yankee. Jack asks his one-time playmate to deliver a letter to Jennie back home in Gettysburg. Although Wesley does make it back to the familiar Pennsylvania farmlands of his boyhood, he is not able to deliver the message from Jack to his betrothed. The war has come directly to Jennie's door, with the summer storm engulfing Gettysburg.

John Ericsson and the Inventions of War
Born in Sweden, John Ericsson showed early signs of extraordinary engineering genius. Taking his talent to industrially booming England, young Ericsson designed one of the world's first steam locomotives. He then moved to the United States and created a new way of moving ships - the propeller. When the Civil War broke out, he built the crowning achievement of his career, the ironclad warship Monitor. This famous vessel would later engage the Confederate ship, Merrimack, in one of history's greatest naval duels. After the war, Ericsson returned to Europe and continued to invent.

Flash and the Swan
Returning to her family's summer home a year after the death of her father, Madeline resigns herself to a summer of seclusion and loneliness, not wanting to share her hurt with anyone. Her only consolation is the companionship of the family's pet, an aging golden retriever named Flash. It is only through the mysterious appearance of a majestic swan on Madeline's private little inlet retreat that she is able to face the loss of a loved one and experience the love and friendship of those around her.