Jasmine Lin and the Dollhouse

By M. Kate Allen

Third grade is over and Jasmine Lin has just finished building a dollhouse all by herself. She's excited for summer to begin. The day after she finishes her dollhouse, however, she discovers her dollhouse at the end of Arcadia Lane. It's not just her dollhouse-it's human-sized. How did it get there? Who built it? And what will she find inside?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Thea Press
• Release date: May 13, 2022
• ISBN: 9781956604047

M. Kate Allen

After a childhood spent with her nose in a book, M. Kate Allen now spends her grownup life weaving magical tales of her own. M. Kate Allen lives in Tempe, Arizona, with her daughters, both of whom are voracious readers, and her husband, who is a hoot.

Book preview

Chapter 1

It wouldn’t be long now—a few more carefully placed miniature shingles and the finishing touches on Jasmine Lin’s dollhouse would be complete.

Jasmine took care to place each stained cedar shingle, adjusting each with the nudge of a pair of tweezers, adding a drop of wood glue where more was needed.

She stepped back and folded her arms, assessing her handiwork. She had built the dollhouse from a kit, putting it together piece by piece like a 3-D puzzle. Once that was done, she began modifying the outside and inside with added details. Every window frame had a perfectly placed plastic film to resemble glass, and the windows at the front of the house also had a special design of narrow columns with points at the top to resemble the windows of an old-fashioned bungalow. Before installing the shingles, she’d stained them herself with a little help from her mom, who opened the stain can and helped her set up a place on the back porch to work so she wouldn’t get woozy from the fumes. The outer walls of the dollhouse were a deep maroon color with stained wood trim. Inside, the walls of the dollhouse were off-white, and the floors had thin layers of vinyl glued to them that looked like hand-laid wood flooring. On the main wall of the living room, a wooden panel with carved lettering in the style of the famous architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, said, Jazzy is the coolest kid on the block. That had been her own idea, and a great one, she thought. She could hardly believe she was finished.

Just in time for summer, she thought. Though she did well in school, Jasmine was usually bored with her daily classwork. She preferred creating wild adventures on the playground, spinning perfect pirouettes in P.E., and—above all—creating something from nothing with her hands at every opportunity. Most of the time, school meant a bunch of bookwork about stuff she already knew. At home, though, she could do