Martine Allen turned eleven years old on New Year’s Eve. She was dream ing about a strange, beautiful land, but when she awoke she was screaming. Her house and her parents were enveloped in flames. Martine leaves England for South Africa to live with a grandmother she never knew existed. The few people and things Martine finds interesting about her grandmother’s game preserve are off limits for her. It is not until Martine encounters a “ghost giraffe” in the middle of the night and realizes there are dangerous hunters trying to capture it that South Africa becomes her home. Sequels include Dolphin Song (2008), and The Last Leopard (2009). lmp

Originally published by Orion Children’s Books Great Britain, in 2006.