Are you looking for a great summer ghost story for middle grades? I highly recommend The Girl in the Lake. Celeste, her younger brother Owen, and their cousins Daisy and Capri are invited to spend several weeks at their grandparents' lake home where the water is murky, the weather is stormy and tensions are high. Without giving too much away, there's a haunted house, a family mystery, a spooky lake and enough summer thunderstorms to send anyone hiding under the covers.
Incorporated into the fictional narrative are horrifying true stories of segregation. In the novel, Celeste recently failed her swimming lessons and doesn't want anything to do with the water. Learning to swim and enjoy the water safely are important to Celeste's family. A relative drowned after being barred from whites-only swimming lessons at the local pool decades before. That tragedy combined with the real life stories and statistics on race and swimming add another layer to the feeling of danger in the water. Pairing an intense story with powerful facts makes for a compelling read.
Also by the author:
The Forgotten Girl - Iris sneaks out at night to make snow angels in the forbidden woods across the street and meets a mysterious friend who helps her uncover the truth about a segregated and abandoned black cemetery.