Isabella: Hi. I'm Isabella Ripa and I'm the main character in The Night The Penningtons Vanished. I have two friends, Vicki Ciconne and Lauren Simmons. We're just average girls.

Vicki: I'm Vicki and I resent the average part. We're bright, we're fun—

Isabella: We're fat.

Lauren: I'm not fat. I'm as skinny as a rail.

Isabella: Anyway, something very weird happened to me, weird and scary. It started when I did something that I shouldn't have done, which is very unusual for me because I try very hard to do the right thing all the time—

Lauren: Not really.

Vicki: And, besides, it's not all about you. What happened happened to all three of us.

Isabella: Anyway—it threw us head first into a murder mystery.

Vicki: And no one believed one word we said.

Isabella: Including my older sister, Anna, who did nothing but complicate matters in the worst way. She tends to be a little on the wild side—if you know what I mean.

Vicki: So the bottom line is if you want to read a really scary, spooky, funny book—

Isabella: Well, to be perfectly honest, only parts of it were funny.

Lauren: None of it was funny.

Vicki: If it was such a horrible experience, then why are you so intrigued with Eva? When she asked us to help her, after that fortune-teller predicted her death, you didn't walk away.

Isabella: Wait a minute that's the second book in the Isabella Ripa series The Death Of Me.

Lauren: That is so unfair. Having a series named after you, when clearly Vicki and I did all the work.

Vicki: For once Lauren is right. First you have to read The Night The Penningtons Vanished. And now if you'll excuse us, we're going to make some fudge.