Thirteen-year-old Simon's life has been knocked askew ever since his family moved into his deceased grandfather's house. First there's his eccentric neighbor Mr. Hawkins, who is laid up with a broken leg.

Simon's mother begins sending him over there with dinner for the elderly man, and soon Mr. Hawkins is depending on Simon to fetch old books and manuscript pages from all over his eerie, mirror-filled house.

There's one mirror in particular, an ancient Egyptian piece, that keeps showing Simon visions of a disturbing figure emerging from its depths.

No one else sees the figure, though — just like they don't see the huge, gaunt dog lurking in Mr. Hawkins' bushes. As Simon himself becomes increasingly plagued by a mysterious illness, he is powerless to help as his neighbour descends into paranoia about dark forces encircling his house.

The terrible part is, Mr. Hawkins is right. Everything is about to get much, much worse. (From Pajama Press)

Michael Bedard is a Canadian children's writer.