FernFolio

Boney, Itchy and Squeak are neighbours and best friends.  All three boys are odd; Boney, whose parents disappeared when he was a baby, lives with his neurotic aunt and her long-suffering husband, Squeak, whose mother ran off to work in a travelling cabaret, views the world from behind World War I goggles fitted with lens made to someone else’s prescription, and Itchy contends with a father who’s an Elvis impersonator and a mother intent upon redecorating their house.  Together, they built the club house in the tree behind their houses, have entered the yearly Invention Convention at their school, and weathered the attentions of the class bully, Larry Harry, and his henchmen, Jones and Jones.
Larry, aka the Fart King and Prisoner 95, seems determined to make the Odds’ lives unbearable.  He and the Jones twins regularly throw eggs at the boys’ clubhouse, and ambush them on the street.  Boney, Itchy and Squeaky are regularly assaulted by the bullies, especially during phys. ed. classes, which frequently end in one or other of the boys making a visit to the school nurse.
Since Larry has sabotaged their entries into the Invention Convention, the Odds have never won, even though Squeak is a scientific and engineering genius, but this year the friends are determined to win the grand prize of $500, and solve the bullying problem once and for all.  Squeak thinks he’s figured out how to build an Apparator, a device that can detect the presence of ghosts, and, since the ruins of the Old Mill are rumoured to be haunted, the Odds decide that it would be the perfect place to test Squeak’s invention, and plan Larry Harry’s comeuppance.
Little to the friends know that their plans will put them afoul of the Old Mill’s current occupant, or that a chance encounter with a dog will land them in hot water and about four thousand sequins!
Written by Natale Ghent, author of No Small Thing, The Odds Get Even is an action-packed adventure about three boys, their bullies and….. a ghost?
FernFolio Editor