Just Couldn’t Put It Down Giveaway Hop!

Welcome to my stop on the Just Couldn’t Put It Down July Giveaway Hop hosted by Stuck in Books! The hop runs from July 7th to July 20th and features lots of bloggers giving away copies of books they consider to be gripping reads, so don’t forget to check out the linky at the end of this post so you can hop around and try your hand at winning more cool stuff!

The book I am offering today is a middle-grade fantasy book that is told in a series of letters, emails and newspaper cuttings and features pages full of awesome illustration. I speak, of course of the first book in the 43 Old Cemetery Road series by Kate Klise – Dying to Meet You.

Once-famous author of children’s ghost stories, Ignatius B. Grumply decides to rent a holiday house for the summer in order to finish writing (well, start writing, actually) his first book in 20 years. Unfortunately for Ignatius, 43 Old Cemetery Road is already occupied – by 11-year-old Seymour, his cat, Shadow, and the ghost of the previous owner, Olive Spence (who also just happens to be an avid writer. And 197 years old). So begins an unmissable correspondence betwixt old man and young lad, in which house rules are established and everyone tries to muddle along together. That is, until Seymour gets word that his parents (who ran off on a lecture tour abroad, leaving Seymour at home) have decided to demolish number 43 – will Seymour and Olive be able to convince I.B. Grumply to help them find a way to save their home?

If I had discovered this book when I was an eight or nine year old, it would have immediately become one of those books that I read and re-read and re-read until the pages were all dog-eared, vegemite stains covered the edges of the pages and the covers were all bloated from having been repeatedly dropped in the bath. It has all the hallmarks of a modern classic for the younger end of the middle-grade age group – humour, punny names, easy to follow text, eye-catching illustrations, formatting that spurs the imagination, as well as a story featuring ghosts, grumpy (and absent) grown-ups and a big old house with oodles of history.

I’ve immediately purchased the rest of the books in the series (not something I do often, I assure you!) and now I am giving one lucky reader the chance to experience this fun, fantastical series too.

So here’s my giveaway:

ONE winner can choose EITHER:

* paperback copies of the first two books in the series – Dying to Meet You and Over My Dead Body

* a hardback copy of book number one – Dying to Meet You

The giveaway is open internationally, provided the Book Depository ships to your country for free. Other Ts and Cs are available to view in the rafflecopter form.