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The Curse of the Blue Figurine
The Curse of the Blue Figurine
The Curse of the Blue Figurine
Ebook207 pages3 hours

The Curse of the Blue Figurine

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

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A boy sneaks into an old church to confront a mad ghost in this adventure by the author of The House with a Clock in Its Walls
 
It’s the 1950s when Johnny Dixon’s mother dies, his father goes to fight in the Korean War, and he goes to live with his grandparents. Although life in a new house is strange, Johnny’s “Grampa” listens to his favorite ballgames, takes him on long walks, and tells him stories of the strange mysteries that lurk in the shadows. Best of all, he’s friends with Professor Childermass, an eccentric academic who’s about to take Johnny on the adventure of a lifetime.
 
When the professor learns Johnny loves ghost stories, he tells the  boy the spookiest legend in Duston Heights, Massachusetts—the tale of the haunted church on the edge of town, with demonic carvings on its altar, and the troubled spirit of mad Father Baart, who is said to have killed two people before vanishing long ago. With the professor as his guide, Johnny sets out on a quest that will put him face-to-face with the crazy, long-dead priest.
 
The first book in the delightful Johnny Dixon series by the author who provides “suspense and action aplenty” (Booklist), The Curse of the Blue Figurine is a good old-fashioned Gothic adventure.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateApr 1, 2014
ISBN9781497614598
The Curse of the Blue Figurine
Author

John Bellairs

John Bellairs is beloved as a master of Gothic young adult novels and fantasies. His series about the adventures of Lewis Barnavelt and his uncle Jonathan, which includes The House with a Clock in Its Walls, is a classic. He also wrote a series of novels featuring the character Johnny Dixon. Among the titles in that series are The Curse of the Blue Figurine; The Mummy, the Will, and the Crypt; and The Spell of the Sorcerer’s Skull. His stand-alone novel The Face in the Frost is also regarded as a fantasy classic, and among his earlier works are St. Fidgeta and Other Parodies and The Pedant and the Shuffly. Bellairs was a prolific writer, publishing more than a dozen novels before his untimely death in 1991.

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Reviews for The Curse of the Blue Figurine

Rating: 4.142857142857143 out of 5 stars
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  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The first of the Johnny Dixon books is now available on Amazon as an ebook! The only reason to own a paper version is if you can find one with the original Gorey artwork, and I'm sure one day I'll get one. In the mean time, it was nice to reread it. This is actually one of the creepier Bellairs books, and I remember that I don't own an original Gorey copy because when I read my friend Jacob's in elementary school, it badly frightened me. I own originals of all of the other Bellairs books, though.

    It was interesting reading this on the iPad because the fictional Duston Heights in the book is actually Haverhill Massachusetts, so I could go back and forth between the book and the map, finding the exact street Johnny is walking down. Because I've walked through Haverhill several times, I even have pictures of some of the places in the book, like the Merrimack river off of Water street.

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    After his neighbor the eccentric professor tells Johnny a ghost story about a priest who once practiced black magic and now haunts the local church, Johnny kinda-sorta accidentally steals a blue Egyptian figurine from the church's basement. Is it just the harmless trinket it appears to be, or is there a reason why ever since Johnny picked it up, bad things keep happening to the kid who bullies him?Unlike The House with a Clock in Its Walls, which I read a few weeks ago, this one didn't have quite enough spooky atmosphere and excitement to make me more or less forget that I was reading something clearly aimed at kids. And the ending isn't as good, either; it wraps up the main story a little too abruptly and then tacks on a little too much "here's what just happened" exposition afterward. Still, it's a fun little tale, with a nice mixture of menace and mystery. I probably would have really loved it when I was eight or nine, and it's still fairly enjoyable even now.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The Curse of the Blue Figurine is the first in the series of Johnny Dixion books by John Bellairs.Set in 1950s Massachusetts, Johnny Dixon is living with his grandparents while his father is off fighting in the war. He befriends his neighbor, Professor Childermass, and life seems to be going smoothly between school, chess games with the professor and listening to his favorite radio programs. The professor has told Johnny a story about a wicked priest that haunts his church, but Johnny thinks little of it...at first.One day, while trying to avoid a school bully, Johnny sets off into the basement of his church and discovers a statue and a note that seem connected to the priest the professor told him about. He takes it home with him to further investigate it. One day at church, Johnny meets an unusual man who listens to Johnny's story of the blue figurine, and encourages him to use to to fight off his fears of the school bully....and only too late does Johnny realize what he has done...This was a good book. It was the first in the Johnny Dixon series, so it isn't my favorite (no Fergie yet!), but still has a good scare factor. If you are a fan of John Bellairs previous work, you will enjoy this one!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    John Bellairs' _The Curse of the Blue Figurine_ is the first book in the series of adventures of Johnny Dixon, a young man of Duston Heights, Massachusetts, and his eccentric friend, the knowledgeable Professor Childermass. Johnny finds in the musty basement of his local church a mysterious blue figurine, apparently Egyptian, along with a curse that anyone who removes the figurine from the church will be visited by the vengeance of Remigus Baart, an evil former priest. Of course, Johnny does remove the cursed figurine, and finds that the ghost stories he's been told are true.As a young man, I always found Bellairs' tales gripping and thrilling--it would be fair to say they helped turn me into a reader of all books--and as I've become older I still find much there to appreciate. Bellairs had a seemingly vast collection of weird facts and illustrative details that brought his stories to life, even though they generally take place thirty or forty years or so before they were published. Bellairs, as easily as any adult horror writer, creates an atmosphere that is not merely exciting but also chilling, and it's easy to imagine them happening to the reader. Dixon, like Bellairs' other main protagonists Lewis Barnavelt and Anthony Monday, is believable and sympathetic, his real life problems effortlessly mixed with his supernatural exploits.That being said, I've always found the Johnny Dixon stories less satisfying than the others. I've always felt that the outline of the tales is more easily identifiable, easier to see through certain cracks in the story. Certainly all of Bellairs' books--any those of any other writer--follow an outline, but the Johnny Dixon books appear a bit more generic. In fact, the entire novel _The Curse of the Blue Figurine_ is very easily seen to be a re-hash of _The House with a Clock in Its Walls_, from the themes to the character motivation to the ultimate climax, which is _extremely_ similar to _The House...._. Although on the one hand, you can find these themes throughout all of Bellairs' books--when the formula works, it works--but the Johnny Dixon stories, including _The Curse...._, are rather more threadbare.Johnny Dixon is a likeable, courageous and intrepid hero, likewise Professor Childermass, but Lewis Barnavelt and Anthony Monday, and their respective companions-in-arms, have better written adventures. Three-and-a-half stars.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    this is the first in a series of marvelous books by John Bellairs starring Johnny Dixon. middle reader mysteries that had a profound impact on me when i started reading them in the 5th grade. the stories are always interesting and spooky, with a not-too-prominent-but-nevertheless-evident educational component. historical facts, random anthropological details and the like. i know i always came away feeling like i had been edified. the main character is Johnny Dixion an adolescent who has been effectively orphaned by his mother's death and his father's military service. he goes to stay with his grandparents in the interim and strikes up a friendship with the eccentric college professor that lives across the street from them. Johnny is a quiet bookish kid, but weird crap just keeps happening to him.Professor Childremass is the typical crotchety but soft-hearted sourpuss professorial type whom Johnny turns to when all the aforementioned weird crap starts up, since he just can't lay it on Gramma and Gramps. Professor Childermass takes all the wicked mystery in stride and often supplies the ways and means usually unavilable to a pre-teen to get to the bottom of the spooky goings on.these books tend to follow a format which serves as a comforting constant for younger readers in what are otherwise remarkably eerie tales. the pacing is even such that there is usually something of a respite amidst the action to make the final climactic scene all the more exciting. geared toward children, i still find these books engaging even as an adult. my 9 year old still thinks they are too scary for her, but i would definitely reccommend them to any middle reader who likes a good ghost story. or mummy story. or killer robot story.additional props for cover art by Edward Gorey.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The story is set in 1951, and Johnny’s mother has just died. His father, who was an air force pilot during World War II, has jumped at the chance to fly in the Korean War, and has sent Johnny to live with Grandpa and Gramma Dixon, in Duston Heights, Massachusetts. He and his grandparents go to St. Michael’s Church, and he attends the attached Catholic school.One winter night, after Johnny and his Grandpa have helped to shovel out Professor Childermass’s car, the Professor tells Johhny the story of Father Baart, a 19th-century priest, formerly the rector of St. Michael’s, who may have been an evil sorcerer, and who is said to haunt the church. When Johnny finds a blue figurine and an ominous warning hidden in a hollowed-out book in the church basement, he becomes convinced it has something to do with Father Baart.I found John Bellairs’s books incredibly frightening when I was a child. Even though they don’t hold the same level of suspense for me these days, they’re still lovely and charming to read. Bellairs creates some wonderfully quirky personalities, and every character vibrates with life, from Johnny’s Gramma to the school bully. I love Johnny, who is a shy and timid, a bookworm and a worrier—not the kind of kid who regularly stars in horror novels.The most entertaining character is Professor Childermass, a small, middle-aged man with a bad temper and a kind heart.It’s such a shame that this book, and all of Bellairs’s kids’ books, were re-issued without the Edward Gorey covers, because they were, and are, such an integral part of my enjoyment of the books. Unlike many illustrators, who seem never to have opened the book, or even glanced at a synopsis or description of the characters, Edward Gorey always drew actual scenes from the book, and the characters always looked exactly right. I couldn’t find a good picture of the cover, but the drawing of Father Baart is perfect; I don’t think I’ve ever seen a cover that was so right.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    God, I love John Bellairs. I believe this was the first book of his I ever read, and recently brought an old copy from my house to my apartment and re-read it with much enjoyment. The cranky old professor and the unsure young Johnny took me through many an exciting night when I should have been asleep. Not much has changed.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Perhaps my favorite of Bellairs books -- wonderfully creepy!

Book preview

The Curse of the Blue Figurine - John Bellairs

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