I loved Mary Downing Hahn's books when I was a young girl so I was thrilled to be approved for this book through NetGalley and Houghton Mifflin. Hahn did not disappoint!

This novel was more than a ghost story. Hahn introduces us to a time of uncertainty for our young characters. WWI is raging in Europe and then the Spanish Flu affects our characters in a personal way. In the midst of this, Hahn tells a story about prejudice, friendship, and peer pressure.

Part of what makes the book so compelling is all of the different feelings I had as I read. Hahn made the characters and situations come alive for me. No character was truly evil or saintly.

It's been a long time since I've read a book all in one day. One for Sorrow kept drawing me back into Annie and Elsie's world. Thank you, Ms. Hahn, for writing another fantastic novel. I hope more will follow.

Apologies, so disappointed this one isn't available as a mobi file. Will keep it on my list for when it releases.

Thank you for this book. Unfortunately, since it is not in kindle format, I am unable to read it.

Mary Downing Hahn has been a favorite of mine for many years and One for Sorrow did not disappoint. When school girl Annie moves with her parents, she has to start over making new friends in a new school. Before she can meet the other girls, outcast Elsie takes over Annie's life. The influenza outbreak of 1818 is the perfect setting for this haunting story of a sad motherless little girl, and the measures she takes to have just one friend. A truly frightening story, I stayed up late to find out how Annie and Elsie's story would end. Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this eGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

I am a huge fan of scary stories, and this one didn't disappoint! I was particularly impressed with the way that issues such as bullying and cliques were handled alongside the ghostly goings on-- a really great balance, and the story kept me reading all night!

I'm not sure why I haven't come across the work of Mary Downing Hahn before (probably because I'm a school librarian in the UK where she's not as well known?) but I'm very glad that I'm now aware of her writing thanks to this deliciously creepy book popping up in my NetGalley suggestions.

The story is told from the point of view of new girl at school Annie, a not altogether likeable girl with doting, wealthy parents. When Annie starts her new school she accidentally falls in with disturbed outsider Elsie which alienates her from the 'cool girls' that she would otherwise have made friends with. She manages to successfully push Elsie away and restarts her school identity as one of the cool gang who are actually quite naughty and unpleasant themselves.

So far so slightly twisted Enid Blyton BUT Elsie is not your usual kooky, misunderstood outsider type of sympathetic character. She is mean, spiteful and seriously unhinged. Then she dies during a flu epidemic and becomes a mean, spiteful and even more unhinged vengeful ghost girl who tortures Elsie for her former bullying and abandonment.

What I really enjoyed about this book was the way that Hahn writes those everyday little tortures of school life and the way that girls can be so mean to each other very clearly so that at the beginning of the book Elsie is quite terrifying in the way that she grabs on to Annie so quickly and manipulates the adults around them. The book then takes a quite horrifying lurch once Elsie returns from the grave to haunt Annie and we realise that this formally cruel girl now has total access to Annie's life and has the power to completely destroy it. I also enjoyed the fact that none of the main characters are totally blameless, they are all quite realistic children in the way that they are mean to each other and don't really think through the way in which their actions will affect others. Hahn could have made us feel a lot more sorry for Elsie who has by all accounts had a difficult background and experience of home life compared to the other girls in her school. Hahn leaves this past quite sketchy however and although we do start to feel some sympathy towards the end of the book it's not a story of Elsie's redemption and I don't think that we're supposed to soften our feelings towards her too much.

This is a creepy, toe-curling story that I think readers of around 10+ would really enjoy. For UK readers I would recommend this book to fans of Frances Hardinge and to readers of Emma Carroll who wanted to try a bit more horror in their ghost stories.

Classic Mary Downing Hahn that will have children scared out of their minds! For my patrons, scary is requested and I always recommend Mary Downing Hahn. She is a great writer, talented storyteller and her books ring true. As a librarian, I appreciate the quality of her books and the obvious research she puts into them. Yes they are scary but they are so well written!

This story centers around a group of girls during World War 1 and the outbreak of Spanish Influenza. The historical details are what make Hahn's stories so real and well done. But the scares and creepiness are what have readers coming back for more. Will most definitely buy and recommend.

Couldn't down load to my tablet sounds like a good book and would love to read it

I jumped this ahead in my queue after reading the first four pages. Spooky time infused with history as this is set during the influenza epidemic of 1918. I haven't read a genuinely scary book for awhile. It's going to be hard to review this without giving away spoilers. I'll set the stage, and you can deduce the rest. Annie is the new girl at her school. She has just moved to town with her mother and father. She has an uncle away fighting World War 1, and they are hopeful that the war will end soon and that he will be home by Christmas.

On her first day of school, Annie sets off confident that she will make new friends. Her first day academically goes great, and she is befriended by Elsie who isn't all that nice. None of the other girls like Elsie either and therefore turn against Annie. As a reader, you can see why. Elsie is bossy, mean, and just plain unlikeable. She lies, steals, breaks Annie's doll and is just awful. Then she dies. Annie soon becomes good friends with the girls who had rejected her by association with Elsie.

Influenza is killing people all over their town, and the girls get the bright idea to go to viewings pretending they know the deceased to get cake and other sweets.

I don't want to spoil the plot any further- but know that the premise of this plot is that ghosts are real- so if that doesn't jive with your beliefs, you think it will scare the heck out of your kid, then skip this one.

If you are up for some conversations of what may or may not be real, bullying and girl cliques or just want a good scary book, then you should pick this one up. I binge read it in a few hours, I could not put it down. Small spoiler- there is a happy ending.

One for Sorrow does not disappoint. Setting it during an influenza made for an added bit of interesting history to become the perfect backdrop to a ghost story. The author entertained through the scary side and educated through the rest particularly since Hahn included a bit of a historical note at the end of the story.

Hahn did a great job in her character development and creating believability in how people would interact during the 1800s. Particularly when they are faced with a loved one exhibiting behavior elements consistent with their belief of mental illness.

Her backdrop using the Influenza spread was descriptive and well thought out. Considering in our time we have a flu shot available, Theraflu, a better idea on how it transmits and how to treat it reading about what could occur when there is a lack of these things made me very glad to be living in the 21st century.

I liked how the author brought her story to a satisfying conclusion because it wasn’t just a great ghost story but it was an interesting portrayal on human behavior and in some ways the stages of grief as her ‘ghost’ had to come to terms with her death.

As perfectly sinister as her other novels, readers will eat up this story. Elsie is positively mean and evil while Annie suffers at Elsie's hand. I especially enjoyed the historical setting of the Spanish Influenza epidemic. It is the perfect setting for a ghost story. I am eager to share this with my students next September.

This is CLASSIC Mary Downing Hahn!

I still remember as a kid reading my first Hahn book, Wait ‘Til Helen Comes, and becoming a lifelong fan. Now that I have daughters it’s been very exciting introducing them to the fun and scariness of her books.

One for Sorrow does not disappoint. Setting it during an influenza made for an added bit of interesting history to become the perfect backdrop for a ghost story. The author entertained through the scary side and educated through the rest particularly since Hahn included a bit of a historical note at the end of the story.

Hahn did a great job in her character development and creating realism in how people would interact during the 1800s. Particularly when they are faced with a loved one exhibiting behavioral elements consistent with their belief of mental illness.

Her backdrop using the Influenza spread was descriptive and well thought out. Considering in our time we have a flu shot available, Theraflu, a better idea on how it transmits and how to treat it reading about what could occur when there is a lack of these things made me very glad to be living in the 21st century.

I liked how the author brought her story to a satisfying conclusion because it wasn’t just a great ghost story but it was an interesting portrayal on human behavior and in some ways the stages of grief as her ‘ghost’ had to come to terms with her death.