When ex-gang member and ""new kid"" at Sussex Academy, Bo Sawchuk, is a suspect in a number of suspicious local fires, Shirley Holmes is on the case.
When Sussex Academy Presidential candidate Alicia Gianelli is electrocuted at the podium, all fingers point to the obvious suspect--her opponent Sterling 'Stink' Patterson.
Watson, Shirley's not very faithful and often disobedient basset hound, leads her to Redington's latest crime--a break-in at ""Pete's Rare Pets"".
Shirley notices that Rita, the cafeteria assistant, is stealing food. By following her, Shirley discovers why: Rita is hiding her young niece in the school's laundry room.
In one month, three citizens of Redington have been attacked and knocked unconscious with no explanation other than--one victim claims it was an alien abduction!
Bo has quit the football team, flunking half of his classes and falling asleep at school - and he won't tell Shirley what is going on.
It is the fiftieth anniversary of the disappearance of Sussex student Maggie Hancock and Maestro Vespemi, the school's music teacher. Every year on the anniversary the Maestro's ghost comes looking for Maggie.
After receiving an ancient Egyptian toy from an old colleague on his deathbed, Peggy Holmes starts acting very strangely. Does the toy carry an ancient curse?
The students at Sussex Academy cannot figure out what is wrong with the usually stern and strict Ms. Stratmann--she is smiling and laughing all the time and she is even complimenting Stink on his practical jokes.
When Stink, the class clown, goes missing from his thirteenth birthday party everyone, including his dad, thinks his disappearance is an elaborate practical joke. Everyone, that is, except Shirley.
Ancient native ceremonies and a mysterious tribal trickster follow Shirley Holmes as she tries to find out what happened to a box of two-hundred-year-old bones that has gone missing from a reservation.
Bo is stunned and Shirley is devastated when they find Robert Holmes, Shirley's dad, kissing the pop music superstar Leah Farrell.
While performing in a local theatre production of ""A Midsummer Night's Dream"", Shirley discovers that the lead actress, Rebecca Radcliff, is a jinx--or so the entire cast and crew believe.
