Ghost Train (book)

Ghost Train is a children's picture book by Chinese-Canadian historian and writer Paul Yee. It is illustrated with oil paintings by Chinese-Canadian artist Harvey Chan. The book was first published in 1996.

Plot
The story, first published in Canada, is told through the eyes of a young girl, Choon-yi, born to poor peasants in southern China. She has only one arm, and her mother rejects her, but her father loves her dearly and encourages her artistic gift. When she is 12, her father leaves for America to work on the railway being built through the mountains. After two years he sends her money to join him, but when she gets there, she learns that her father has died. He appears to her in a dream and asks her to paint him on the train he built. The full-page paintings show her traveling on the hurtling engines; they represent the power of the railroad and the sorrow of the men who died building it, their clothing stained with mud and blood.

Awards

 * 1996 Governor General's Literary Award for Children's Literature
 * 1997 Ruth Schwartz Children's Book Award
 * 1997 Amelia Frances Howard-Gibbon Illustrator's Award
 * 1998 Prix Enfantasie (Switzerland)(Winner; for French language version: Le train fantôme)

Adaptation
Ghost Train was adapted as a play by Betty Quan and performed by the Young People's Theatre in Toronto in 2001.