Joseph Delaney

Young Tom, the seventh son of a seventh son, starts work as an apprentice for the village spook, whose job is to protect ordinary folk from "ghouls, boggarts, and all manner of wicked beasties." Can Thomas succeed? Will he learn the difference between a benign witch and a malevolent one? And what will happen if Thomas accidentally frees Mother Malkin, the most evil witch in the county?

Reading level: age 10 and up The continuing adventures of Tom, the seventh son of a seventh son and apprentice to the local Spook, who faces danger and death daily in his job protecting the region from evil.

Apprentice Tom and the Spook for whom he works flee to Ireland, where a powerful witch has joined forces with the dark mages trying to call forth ancient powers to destroy Tom.

Tom is dismayed when his master the Spook decrees that they will be spending the winter on gloomy and forbidding Anglezarke Moor but soon discovers the reason for his master's decision, as they tangle with two dangerous witches and struggle to keep a dark mage from resurrecting an ancient evil.

As creatures of the dark hunt for the witch assassin Grimalkin, who carries the captured Fiend's head, Spook's apprentice Tom tries to find a way to finish this terrifying evil once and for all.

Recounts the frightening adventures of Thomas Ward, who is Spook's apprentice, covering details about Alice's dark past, how Grimalkin the witch assassin became so fearsome, and other details of the county's various villains.