The foundations of Cricklepit School are being dug up as builders move in, but for the moment the pupils are more worried about their imminent SAT tests and whether their classroom newspaper The Cricklepit Chronicle will get banned by bolshy head governor Mrs Somers. That is, until doors start mysteriously refusing to open, cars are vandalised, two shadowy figures are seen wandering around the corridors, and a strange illness begins to spread amongst staff and pupils. Are there ghosts at Cricklepit? And what's the link between these unusual happenings and the tragic death of two children during a cholera epidemic, almost 200 years before? As panic mounts, Strawberry, Shahid and Snaggletooth - founders of the Chronicle - set out to unroot the truth. And their investigations lead to a Summer Term scoop of scoops.