Books: The Haunted Castle

FIRST FAMILY (253 pp.)—Christopher Davis—Coward-McCann ($3.95).

For years, a weather-beaten FOR SALE sign has drooped dispiritedly in front of the big Victorian house. With its crazy turrets, towers and gables, the place half-frightens Katie Charles, a pony-tailed 13-year-old who lives across the street and pretends that the house is a haunted castle. One day the sign is gone, and a contagious whisper races along the sycamore-lined street that the house might as well be haunted. The first Negro family is moving into Sheridan Avenue in the placid Midwest suburb of Courtland Park.

Unexamined Values. Remarkably close in plot to Peaceable Lane (TIME, Dec....