Author Description

When Charlotte learns that her favorite teacher is leaving the school, she vows to hate the replacement forever. But she finds comfort one afternoon. After a baseball game in which she hits the ball so hard that it explodes, a strange dog follows her home in a rainstorm. The dog responds only to commands spoken backwards -- emoC ereh! -- so she names him ttuM. ttuM becomes Charlotte's constant companion, even following the girl to her parents' summer cottage on a lake. Everything seems to be fine until Charlotte becomes aware of a mysterious person who always dresses in black and likes to go canoeing -- a witch! The witch's house turns out to be just down the road, and it smells enticingly of gingerbread cookies. When ttuM disappears one night, grief-stricken Charlotte decides that she must summon up her courage and go looking for him, even if it means breaking into the witch's house.