The Skeleton Flute

A young boy makes a wish on a strange skeleton flute and watches his real family vanish, replaced by something that looks almost right and is not. The book follows his quest through a Pied Piper-coded nightmare world, where the music of the flute calls children away from their families, and he has to find his way back to his real parents before the song finishes. Allen braids the Pied Piper of Hamelin folklore with the Coraline shape of a child who has to undo a wish to recover the family that was stolen, written for readers ages 8 to 12.