Phil Hickes has a real knack for creating wonderfully pitched spooky stories for a young audience that will keep them on their edge of their seat. This is no exception. I’ve been a long-time fan of his Aveline Jones series and liked how this one linked cleverly but can also be enjoyed as a stand-alone story. I’m so pleased this is the beginning of a new series and can’t wait for the next instalment.

A little belated but I really enjoyed this start to a new series by one of my favourite authors. As expected there was a great atmosphere to the setting, well developed characters, both main and peripheral, as well as a decent plot. Throw in some genuinely creepy moments and you have another great ghost story for children. I liked the setting in the 1980s, Aveline's mother I believe, and I think it will work ok .I did think the pace wasn't quite as good as in the Aveline stories, but it was still a great tale.

I love spooky books, especially ones with ghosts in it and Shadowhall Academy was the perfect bone chilling story to read in a cold night surrounded by blankets

Lilian is the new student of Shadowhall Academy, a boarding school rumored to be haunted, and right on her first day she got prove of it when a weird knocking on the wall wakes her up in the middle of the night, with the help of her three roommates, Lilian starts to investigate the creepy story of the Academy and the supposed ghosts that haunted it.

I loved the dynamic between Lilian and her roommates, I always enjoy a story with strong friendship and the author was able to do it with perfection.

The plot was amazingly spooky, honestly there were times I had to stop reading it because I was getting a bit too scared but that just made me love this book even more.

I think it’s going to be a series and I’m excited about the next story.

Thanks Netgalley and Usborne Publishing for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review

I LOVE Phil Hickes middle-grade books. He always balances the right mix of spooky and scary, with an interesting story. This book was no different, and I genuinely found myself a bit scared in parts. I was guessing constantly. and I think that a certain spooky type of child would adore this. I'd love to read more adventures at this school!!!

Scary without being gory with enough adventure and intrigue to keep youngsters turning the pages and reading by torchlight under the covers.
Lilian starts school at the imposing and rather scary looking Shadowfell Academy which used to be the ancestral home of the Boulounge family. Sharing a dorm with two seasoned students and another new girl Angela, they start uncovering strange goings ons. Angela is freaked out by what seems like someone knocking on the walls. Why does Mr. Bullen have his office in the school cellars and how does Angela end up by the lake in the middle of the night? Add in past stories of disappearing girls and the alleged haunting of the school, something strange is indeed going on and Lilian and her friends are determined to get to the bottom of it.

Great book for primary and early middle school aged children who want something scary and ghostly but not too sinister or gory. Good choice too for those who like for the Fleur Hitchcock Murder series. If you’ve read and liked Phil Hicks’ previous series of Aveline Jones, then you’ll also love this

This is an excellent prequel to the Aveline Jones series.
We meet Lillian Jones as she attends Shadowhall academy for the first time and she soo realises there are some mysterious goings on linked to past events
This is the sort of book I wish existed when O was younger, supernatural but not too scary.
Book2 please

Off the bat… this is AWESOME!! Have you read the 'Aveline Jones' supernatural mystery series for ages 9+ from Phil Hickes already?? If not, and if you like a ghostie type adventure, then you'll love his writing. He reels you into finding clue after clue, dropping red herrings and sending you on wild goose chases, only for it to go horribly wrong when the ghosts turn up, then thankfully, everything turns out ok in the end!!!! It's an I-can't-put-this-book down, can someone please leave the landing light on page-turner of a book. Let me tell you a bit about this new offering from brilliant Children's storyteller, Mr Hickes…

We are in Suffolk, England, and it's the beginning of the Autumn Term in 1987, and Lilian Jones (HANG ON A MINUTE… is this Aveline's Aunt Lilian?!?!?!?! OMG… I've just looked through my Aveline Jones books and YES… Susan is Aveline's mum's name and she's Lilian's little sister in Shadowhall Academy!!!! Do I win a prize????) is starting at a new boarding school. Sorry about that rather huge moment of bookish EXCITEMENT… LOL, that's just sooooo mega cool a discovery - it wasn't written on any of the press release documentation or publicity stuff… WOW. Go me.

Right, this review just took on a whole new meaning. OK - so Lilian (the one day to become mother to Aveline, an amazing supernatural and paranormal investigator with her sidekick Harold), is off to boarding school for the very first time. It's Madonna on the car radio singing her 80s hits and Lilian is holding back the tears and is full of mixed emotions, her little sister next to her in the car so chirpy and unaware of this big new change in her beloved big sister's world. There's so much to feel anxious about… making friends, dormitory life, and the fact the school is so very CREEPY, GOTHIC and OLD. It doesn't help that the other kids take no time in telling her it's haunted either!

I have to say, brave, practical and super organised Lilian really lucks out though with her new dorm girls… Serena, the super rich, Queen Bee with her dry wit, confidence and fearlessness (mostly) + Marian aka Maz, super kind, friendly, goth and into dark and gloomy stuff like The Cure + Angela, another new girl, timid, sweet. Together, you'll find that they make an 1st Class team of paranormal detectives and best friends.

Like many old boarding schools in England, most were family estate homes once upon a time, and therefore many a drama (or crimes) will have taken place between their walls before any teachers or pupils arrived. Shadowhall Academy (just look at book cover artwork) is no exception. It has huge wrought iron gates, gargoyles, secret tunnels and rooms, and turrets, is surrounded by woodlands with an eerie lake. Even the lake features a mausoleum on an island filled with generations of bodies of the family that used to live there. Yikes! E.T. phone home…

Imagine, it's ONLY your first night in your new dormitory at your first ever boarding school and already there's a knocking on the wall in the dead of night. That's good (or not so good) going! It's a mystery that Lilian is determined to solve, there must ALWAYS be a rational explanation, mustn't there? After some incredibly brave and scare-jumpy sleuthing, Lilian and the rest of the dorm discover that a school girl once tragically DIED at the school in very PARANORMAL circumstances. Considering clue after clue... old belongings, a secret tunnel… enlisting the help of 'is he a Vampire or not - thankfully not' Mr Bullen the history master, the girls investigate. Danger continuously creeps up on them in the form of a very tricky 19th century child ghost who can shape shift to become an identical twin of anyone she's with!!!! YIKES (Scooby voice!!)

Sooooo….. THE LIBRARY SCENE!!!
I'm just going to leave that there. In the words of Miss Coates, the school librarian…”… ghost stories? Are you sure that's the best subject matter for late-night reading?” My bladder nearly burst because I didn't want to get out of bed to go to the loo… then I gave myself a good talking to and remembered everything I'd learned from listening to the Uncanny podcasts.

You know what's really creepy? I was also at a creepy old boarding school at the same age as Lilian, we even had woods and a lake in the grounds nicknamed 'The Bloody Lake' because it was meant to contain bodies from a war hundreds of years ago, and there were many a ghostly mission undertaken (shiver). I assure you 100%, Phil Hickes has totally captured that dreaded drive to school, the lack of privacy, the COLD inside, scary walks to the loo in the middle of the night, the sense of history, and the eccentric teaching staff. Right on!
I want to know his research source!!

Absolute homage to surviving a girls boarding school in the 1980s. BISCUITS. SONY WALKMANS. AMEN. I LOVE IT.
LOVE Keith Robinson's cover artwork… those 80's pink and blue/green shades exuding serious spookiness…
Shadowhall Academy is SO full of secrets, I wonder what will come to light in book 2.

Phil Hickes follows his excellent spooky Middle Grade Aveline Jones trilogy (2020-22) with Shadowhall Academy: The Whispering Walls, which is aimed at the same age group, or could even be read by slightly younger kids. In Aveline Jones a young girl (and her new best friend) gets wrapped up in supernatural mysteries whenever she is on holiday with her mum, Shadowhall Academy does not stray too far from that successful blueprint, instead this time moving the action to a creepy old girls’ boarding school, centring on a new girl nervous and desperate to make friends. As soon as I realised the main character was another ‘Jones’ I immediately realised this eighties set novel was a prequel to Aveline Jones, as main character Lilian is the aunt in the other series. Aunt Lilian always seemed to be a believer in the supernatural and now we know why! Coming in at around 200-pages Phil Hickes ensures the supernatural story dominates the plot from the very early stages which prevents the ‘dramas’ (bullying, struggling with homework etc) from having any hold on the plot. It was also quite old-fashioned, with eccentric doddery teachers and the young girls creeping around after lights out trying to solve an engaging mystery.

Lilian is a first-time boarder at Shadowhall Academy and after meeting her three roommates (Marian, Serena and Angela), becomes interested in finding out more about the school’s reputation for being haunted, especially after fellow new girl, the very nervous Angela, hears tapping through the wall near her bed. Lilian that opens up the panelling to find a little more than she bargained for and the mystery is off and running. It's a wonderful setting with atmosphere, terrible food and drafty corridors with the story’s strength being the developing friendship of the girls which compliments the mystery nicely. The story is paced very well and it was great to see the friendly school librarian pop up on a few occasions! It is not so scary to prevent sleep and is perfect for Year 5 and above. AGE RANGE 8-12

My class really enjoyed Phil's 'Aveline Jones' series and I think they will love this too. It draws you in quite quickly and there's enough action from early on to hook them. The main characters are likeable and their relationships with each other are well written and believable. In my opinion it's quite spooky and a bit scary but unlikely to lead to nightmares so I'd be happy to recommend it to children 9yrs+.
I'll be buying a copy for my class library.

My class and I love the Aveline Jones books, so I was really excited to get the ARC for Phil Hickes's new book. I was not disappointed. This is truly spooky and has a wonderful, likeable group of friends investigating the strange goings on in their school. I hope there will be lots more!

Surprisingly enjoyable boarding school-set chiller. I say surprising because so much of it seemed at first to be promising not much – new girl at boarding school she regrets being chosen for her, mysterious building on mysterious island in middle of mysterious lake in school grounds, usual antagonism amongst the girls in her dorm for want of better narrative drive… But the antagonism is soon seen to vanish, the whole school experience is evoked very well and snappily, and the spooky side of things is done a lot fresher and better than most.

OK, it's not perfect – we would have been better served with greater descriptions of the lake's island's building, and the size of the wall cavity would have helped us picture it, but we do have the imagination, and that's nicely played with by dodgy adults, mystery knocks, and a growing catalogue of cases of intrigue. This seeming on the short side does make you fear not getting to the conclusion by the time the pages run out, but we certainly have a self-contained drama here and the herald of a fine series to come. The last mystery to mention is the first – the fact this was set in the mid-1980s, and we have no clue as to why… I have seen bolder young horrors, but this was still a fine one – a strong four stars.

Having loved the Aveline Jones series by this author before, I was excited to see a new series

In this we join Lillian Jones as she joins a new boarding type school, which is the creepy Shadowhall Academy.

Upon arrival she meets her new roommates, two exciting students and another new student.

But when their sleep is disturbed by a strange tapping in the walls, a ghostly school rumour becomes something they need to investigate more

Fun wee read, very enjoyable and would definitely continue

Out on 1st Feb so you can read soon too. Thanks to NetGalley and Usborne Publishing for the early copy of this book for review

A great standalone adventure but also prequel to the Aveline Jones series. Ever wondered why Aunt Lilian was such a believer in all things spooky? Here we go back to the 80s and meet Lilian as a schoolgirl at Shadowhall Academy, a boarding school with all the spooky mysterious vibes you could ask for. It's a wonderful setting with so much atmosphere and goings-on that need investigation. Lillian and her friends Marian, Serena and Angela are the girls for the job and well written characters to get behind. The story has a great pace and tension, its not so scary to prevent sleep but enough to provide enjoyable chills for the target age group. Hopefully this is the first of a new series because the setting and characters deserve further exploration and Phil Hickes writes up a storm as always.

I must admit that I read this without the children. My excuse was that I like to check out spooky / scary books before I read them together just in case they are too scary. I do get into trouble if they have nightmares !
Actually though, it was more that I was so excited to get a new book by Phil Hickes , I really did not want to wait until we had finished the current book we were reading. It is a win, win situation for me as now I will have to read it again with them. I loved it and will be so happy to do that.

Im a massive fan of middlegrade horror and already had my eye on this author's work when I purchased The Haunting of Aveline Jones last year. Suitable for adults or children alike, this is definitely a spooky book but still quite tame in my opinion.

The old, isolated boarding school setting was very immersive and it had that cozy rainy vibe to it that I love. The school has a ghost story with a deadly twist that has the girls desperate to find answers before its too late.

The book itself is quite short, just short of 200 pages. it reads very fast and that was what I liked best about it, it got to the point and didn't have any needless things you might expect in a school setting such as bullying (which I hate in books). It stuck to telling you about the ghost story and the friendship of the four girls trying to solve the schools mystery.

I devoured the Aveline Jones series so jumped on this latest offering by the great Phil Hickes, which did not disappoint. Malory Towers goes Gothic, creepy going’s-on in the night, a tight-knit friendship group and a cool 1980s setting! Looking forward to more.

WOW!
What a gripping read which would be perfect for a Y5/6 class who love a good spine chiller. The characters are so relatable and well crafted that you automatically empathise with them and the situation they find themselves in. From the outset, there is a clear sense of tension which just compels you to keep reading until you reach the climax of the story and the outcome is revealed. I can't wait to purchase my own copy and look forward to seeing what Phil Hickes produces next.

Shadowhall Academy is the new spooky middle-grade series from Phil Hickes. I recently binge read the Aveline Jones series and this new series is such a lovely surprise for me. Lilian Jones starts a new boarding school and finds herself in a spooky situation. I loved the eerie setting of the boarding school and the strong bond of friendship between the girls. I highly recommend this book if you like the Aveline Jones series or spooky adventures. I can't wait to read more. Thanks to the Usborne Publishing and Netgalley for the arc.

I would have said this is Malory Towers with a darkly sinister edge but now realise Lesley Parr beat me to it on the blurb! Shadowhall Academy has the same old-fashioned boarding school feel but with ghostly apparitions and a constant sense of foreboding and the beautiful cover by Keith Robinson sums up the whole story. I survived my first term but hoping there are more to come. Loved it!

I was disappointed when there was no new Aveline Jones in 2023 but got excited when Phil Hickes announced a new series. Once again, the author has delivered a spine chilling story that many ghost story writers would be envious of.
Readers of the Aveline Jones books will know her Aunt Lilian was a believer and this prequel discloses why. A thoroughly spooky read.