As a grade-schooler in the late 1960’s or early seventies, my teacher read the class a mystery book/novel about a little girl who’d gone to stay with relatives. Possibly for the summer. She was mystified by a haunting voice that would sing a song again and again. I remember something about a swing and hollyhock flowers. I’m not sure but I think by the end of the story it turns out to be the ghost of her deceased Aunt who died as a child.
Stump the Bookseller
New format, same book stumper solving.
The Sound of Crying by Rodie Sudbery?
Sounds like GHOST IN THE SWING by Janet Patton Smith. There’s a summary here that mentions the hollyhocks.
https://openlibrary.org/works/OL7138843W/The_ghost_in_the_swing
This is Janet Patton Smith’s The Ghost in the Swing. There are three sisters. The protagonist is the child of one, who stays with another, who lives in the house where the youngest disappeared as a child, at about the same age the protagonist is now. The ghost of this youngest sister haunts the resident sister, and the protagonist learns what happened to her aunt.
I happen to be looking for the same book this week and had the title wrong in my head with “girl “instead of “ghost“. Thank you so much! I loved this book as a kid and have looked for it for decades. It’s suddenly popped in my head and I was obsessed searching the Internet for it completely out of the blue.
Isn’t this book the one where the aunt smells like peppermint and her bracelets make a jingling sound when she walks? I remember this book!
Yes, it is the book where the aunt (an author) smells of peppermints!
The hollyhock verse starts “Underneath the hollyhocks, where a head received some knocks….).
Joan is the protagonist, Margaret the eldest sister who Joan is staying with for the summer, Felicia is the youngest of the three sisters, the “Ghost in the Swing”.