Ghost by Jason Reynolds (208) pages a story about Castle Crenshaw who is a troubled kid at school but a fast runner. Castle has a traumatic past due to his alcoholic and abusive father shooting at him and his mother, causing him to run possibly the fastest he's ever ran to safety. Safety, in this case, was a convenience store run by Mr. Charles who also gave the Castle a Guinness world record book. After the shooting incident with his father both Castle and his mother never slept in their respective rooms again, Both of them slept in the living room because being in the room brings back awful memories for Castle and his mother. Castle takes a daily route that includes getting sunflowers at Mr. Charle's store then going to a bus stop and watching people through the glass gym. But one particular time while Castle is taking his daily route he notices a group of people running on a track. Castle observes them from the bleachers while enjoying his sunflower seeds but decides to run against the fastest kid on their team to prove a point. Lu, the fastest runner, is standing on the track getting ready to run and the Castle stays on the grass, lined up with Lu. Once the race began they came so close the winner was never determined. That race led to the coach recruiting him. Castles recruitment had conditions, He could only stay on the team if there were no more altercations at school. This was a way for Castle's mother to try to keep him out of trouble. The reasoning behind this is that at school he had what he called his rap sheet, this rap sheet includes all of the trouble that he's been in while in school, which included him getting into a physical fight with another kid named Brandon who managed to push him too far after constantly bullying him. After the fight Castles called the coach to pick him up because he wanted to avoid his mother discovering that he had been in a fight. The coach picks Castle up and makes him run, which Castle did not realize was a punishment at that moment. Castle starts to practice with the entire team and essentially becomes a part of the team. The only issue was that Castle didn't feel like he was running to his full capability because of the clothes that he wears. Basically thinking the clothes were weighing him down. So he decided to cut his shoes and wear them to school, but at school, a girl named Shamika pointed them out and had a burst of loud contagious laughter. And at that moment the Castle felt immense embarrassment. He runs out of school and decided to steal a pair of shoes. After the stolen shoe incident it was announced that the newbies must attend a “newby dinner.” That newby dinner was enforced to help create a bond between the new team members. Once at the newby dinner the coach makes them share a secret to be able to earn their utensils to eat. Each newby shares a secret that had an impact on them. At that moment Castle shares that his father is in jail for trying to shoot him and his mother. Although the team is shocked they essentially get closer because they can each relate to each other in some strange way. After the newby dinner, multiple practices take place and the team gets a lot stronger, but as their race day gets closer the team finally gets their uniforms. These uniforms were blue and silver. Castle was excited to get his uniform because it wouldn't have matched perfectly with his stolen shoes that he called silver bullets. But when it came to Castles' turn he did not receive a uniform. Instead, he received a paper. This paper had his picture with the word shoplifter in big red letters. The coach was disappointed and didn't give Castle his uniform immediately because he didn't earn it. 

In addition, one of the crucial characters in this novel is Coach Brody. The coach was incorporated in this story because it would help Castle with his character development. The way that the coach was portrayed in this story was to try to help Castle become a better person overall. Coach pushed Castle to be the best version of himself by giving him proper punishment when he steps out of line but he also helped Castle realize that he had another passion aside from basketball. Coach Brody introducing track to Castle allowed him to release his pent-up anger in a sense because track allows Castle to truly feel like himself, and without Coach Brody, Castle would not have potentially never been on a track team.

Another interesting character is Sunny. Sunny is a newby on the track team along with Castle. At the newby dinner sunny shares a secret about his mother and how she connects to his running. Sunny reveals that he runs for his mother, his mother died during labor and she had a dream to win a marathon so he runs because he feels as if he owes it to his mother he never met. This connects to Castle because he also has an absent parent, his father an abusive alcoholic who remains in jail is also the reason Castle runs. Castle ran because of the shooting incident and is now running as a way of expressing himself. So Castle can relate to Sunny because they have something in common regardless of the slight differences. 

Furthermore, one very important passage from the story happens when Coach Brody and Castle are in a serious conversation about facing your challenges instead of ignoring them. “Show you that you can’t run away from who you are, but what you can do is run toward who you want to be.” Coach Brody says this to Castle as a way to motivate him and explain to him that not everything is and should be avoided. Through the course of the novel Castle constantly tries to avoid every bad situation, for instance, he avoids getting in trouble with his mother by calling coach Brody after his fight and he avoids getting overly embarrassed at school because of his cut-up shoes by running away. So what can we take away from this quote? That regardless of what you have been through and how hard it has been for you, you can't put your future on hold because time continues. This is an important theme in the story because it teaches the Castle to not be afraid. In nearly every instance Castle came up with a way to avoid a situation when instead he should have faced them and moved past them. This lesson allowed him to have a major character development at the end when he went and apologized for stealing the shoes. 

In conclusion, I rate this book a 10/10. I highly recommend this book, although this story is based around a 7th-grade boy and his life. Many people could connect with it because the fear of facing your problems could happen to anyone and some could even relate to other characters’ stories as well. For instance, anyone could relate to being adopted, having single parents, getting bullied, etc. Another reason why people love this book is that it is a short but captivating read, with only 10 chapters the story is very well written and not slow-paced. In other words, this book is a must-read. Read this book!!