The Spook's Curse

The Spook's Curse
Author(s)	Joseph Delaney
Country	Great Britain
Language	English
Series	The Wardstone Chronicles - UK The Last Apprentice - America
Genre(s)	Children's Fiction
Publisher	The Bodley Head, an imprint of Random House Children's Books
Publication date	30th June 2005
Pages	432
ISBN	0-370-32827-2
OCLC Number	60768093
Preceded by	The Spook's Apprentice
Followed by	The Spook's Secret

The Spook's Curse is the second book in the Wardstone Chronicles series. In America, it was released as the second book in The Last Apprentice series, with the title Curse of the Bane.

Plot summary

The book begins with Tom binding a Ripper in Horshaw. Although he is successful, the Ripper's victim, Father Gregory, the Spook's brother, dies from shock. He's sent to be buried in Priestown and the Spook goes there with Tom, to pay his respects and to finally deal with an ancient demon locked in the catacombs under the city. The demon, also known as the Bane, has already bested the Spook once and has since grown in power. The Spook makes preparations to enter the catacombs but is betrayed by his cousin, Father Cairns and is arrested by the Quisitor.

Tom enters the catacombs to slip inside the prisons undetected, but only manages to free Alice. Andrew hides them into a haunted house in town and they fall asleep. The Bane comes to tempt them both in their dreams, yet although Tom refuses him, he wakes up to find Alice at the Silver Gate, where she confesses she made a deal with the Bane so that she could help him. She helps save the Spook and the other prisoners from the execution.

Tom takes the Spook to his mother who heals him and they set out to find the cemetery of the segantii, the first people to have bound the Bane. Their leader, Naze, tells them that he too had made a pact with the Bane, so that if the Bane was to be freed and then enter his prison once again, he was to be bound there for the rest of the Bane's existence. Following this information, the Spook takes Alice back to the catacombs. Tom follows without his knowledge after opening a letter from his mother where she wrote that if he does not go too, both the Spook and Alice will die pointlessly.

After Alice summons the Bane, he whisks her away and turns into his material form to feed for the last time from her blood. The Spook being knocked out, Tom follows the Bane on his own and binds him with the silver chain that his mother gave him on his last visit. The Bane tries once again to sway him but fails and Tom kills him. He dies, as predicted by Naze, but Alice doesn't let him go and uses the power of the mark she'd made on his arm during the events in The Spook's Apprentice to bring him back to life.

The Spook, Alice and Tom return to Chippenden where the Spook tries to put Alice into the pit he had Tom dig for her. Tom uses what he knows about Meg Skelton and the Spook to demand Alice's freedom and the Spook is swayed. He allows Alice to stay at Chippenden in exchange for her knowledge about witches and her skills with latin.

List of chapters

Chapter One: The Horshaw Ripper
Chapter Two: The Spook's Tale
Chapter Three: The Bane
Chapter Four: Priestown
Chapter Five: The Funeral
Chapter Six: A Pact with Hell
Chapter Seven: Escape and Capture
Chapter Eight: Brother Peter's Tale
Chapter Nine: The Catacombs
Chapter Ten: Girl Spit
Chapter Eleven: The Spook's Trial
Chapter Twelve: The Silver Gate
Chapter Thirteen: The Burning
Chapter Fourteen: Dad's Tale
Chapter Fifteen: The Silver Chain
Chapter Sixteen: A Pit for Alice
Chapter Seventeen: The Quisitor Arrives
Chapter Eighteen: Nightmare on the Hill
Chapter Nineteen: The Stone Graves
Chapter Twenty: Mam's Letter
Chapter Twenty-One: A Sacrifice
Chapter Twenty-Two: A Bargain's a Bargain

Characters

• Thomas Ward Thomas Ward (the Spook's apprentice)
• John Gregory (The Spook)
• Alice (Tom's friend and a suspected familiar witch)
• Jack (Tom's brother, Ellie's husband, Mary's father)

More Characters

• Ellie (Jack's wife, Mary's mother)
• Mary (Jack and Ellie's baby girl)
• Mam (mother of Jack and Tom. suspected Lamia witch)
• The Bane (The single enemy that the spook has never been able to defeat, lives in the dark catacombs of a cathedral)
• Andrew Gregory (John's brother, a locksmith)
• Father Gregory (John and Andrew's brother)
• Father Cairns (John, Andrew and Father Gregory's cousin)
• The Quisitor (Evil dictator who captures what he thinks to be "witches and warlocks")
• Brother Peter (Gardener of Priestown Cathedral and helpful friend to Tom)

Reception

Generally well received by fans of the series.^[1] Where the through plot of the series is not yet clear, Delaney exposes the first signs of overall arc. This second book only fueled the already growing interest.

Additional information

• Paperback = 6 July 2006 Published: Red Fox ISBN: 009945646X
• Hardback = 30 June 2005 Published: Bodley Head ISBN: 0370328272

External links

• Random House Page
• The Spook's Curse on Wikia
• The Spook's Curse general information on Goodreads

References

1. ^ http://www.rjspindle.com/content/curse-bane-last-apprentice-book-2-joseph-delaney Full Length Commentary of Curse of the Bane

This article about a children's novel of the 2000s is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.v · Categories: 2005 novels Children's fantasy novels British children's novels 2000s children's novel stubs Wikimedia Foundation. 2010. Игры ⚽ Поможем сделать НИР William Redmond P-series fuels Look at other dictionaries: The Spook's Curse — La Malédiction de l épouvanteur La Malédiction de l Épouvanteur (The Spook s Curse) est le deuxième tome de la série The Wardstone Chronicles signée Joseph Delaney. Paru en 2005, il est précédé de l Apprenti Épouvanteur et suivi du Le Secret de l …   Wikipédia en Français The Spook's Secret —   …   Wikipedia The Spook's Sacrifice —   …   Wikipedia The Spook's Apprentice — Infobox Book | name = The Spook s Apprentice image caption = Book cover for The Spook s Apprentice author = Joseph Delaney country = Great Britain language = English series = The Wardstone Chronicles genre = Children s Historical novel publisher …   Wikipedia The Wardstone Chronicles — 200px The Spook s Apprentice The Spook s Curse The Spook s Secret The Spook s Battle The Spook s Mistake The Spook s Sacrifice The Spook s Nightmare The Spook s Destiny The Spook s Blood Author …   Wikipedia The Wardstone Chronicles — (littéralement Les Chroniques de la pierre des Ward), est une série littéraire écrite par Joseph Delaney et publiée initialement chez Random House. En France, on parle parfois de la série de l Épouvanteur car le titre principal n apparait pas sur …   Wikipédia en Français Spook-Pentalogie — Der Spook ist eine fünfteilige Buchreihe des englischen Fantasyautors Joseph Delaney. Sie handelt von dem Jungen Thomas J. Ward, der mit 13 Jahren den Beruf eines Geisterjägers erlernen soll. Sie hat folgende Bände: Spook der Schüler des… …   Deutsch Wikipedia Spook-Tetralogie — Der Spook ist eine fünfteilige Buchreihe des englischen Fantasyautors Joseph Delaney. Sie handelt von dem Jungen Thomas J. Ward, der mit 13 Jahren den Beruf eines Geisterjägers erlernen soll. Sie hat folgende Bände: Spook der Schüler des… …   Deutsch Wikipedia Spook-Reihe — Der Spook ist eine Buchreihe des englischen Fantasyautors Joseph Delaney. Sie handelt von dem Jungen Thomas J. Ward, der mit 13 Jahren den Beruf eines Geisterjägers, eines Spooks, erlernen soll. Von den bislang sieben Teilen sind die ersten vier… …   Deutsch Wikipedia Der Spook — ist eine fünfteilige Buchreihe des englischen Fantasyautors Joseph Delaney. Sie handelt von dem Jungen Thomas J. Ward, der mit 13 Jahren den Beruf eines Geisterjägers erlernen soll. Sie hat folgende Bände: Spook der Schüler des Geisterjägers,… …   Deutsch Wikipedia 18+ © Academic, 2000-2024 Contact us: Technical Support, Advertising Dictionaries export, created on PHP, Joomla, Drupal, WordPress, MODx. Mark and share Search through all dictionaries Translate… Search Internet Share the article and excerpts Direct link … Do a right-click on the link above and select “Copy Link”