Tag Archives: ghosts

Tallulah's got a shopping trolley

Book Review of C.L. McRitchie’s Tallulah’s Got A Shopping Trolley

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Tallulah's Got a Shopping TrolleyI grabbed my copy of Tallulah’s Got a Shopping Trolley, by C.L McRitchie from the Amazon KDP list.

Description from Goodreads:
I met Harvey on the car-park of Morrisons a few weeks ago. I’d forgotten to pick up a pack of pink and whites for Gran and had to do a late night dash.
Harvey was alive when I met him.
Not so alive when I left.
He’s now living in my flat and floats through walls.
Harvey is a ghost.
He blames me for killing him. I didn’t. It was an accident.
As punishment he floats into the bathroom when I’m showering and into the bedroom when I’m dressing.
He doesn’t look at me when he floats in – he doesn’t want to see me naked, he just does it to make me feel uncomfortable.
The truth is, I’m a bit put out that he doesn’t want to see me naked and that can’t healthy.
When he was alive Harvey was very attractive.
He still is.
He has sandy hair that occasionally flops into his eyes and he has developed a habit of giving me a sideways look whenever I say something stupid; So he does it a lot.
He has a calm confidence that I suspect belies an infrequent but fiery temper and he makes me feel safe – which is ridiculous given that he’s dead. His voice is like warm cinnamon and the twinkle in his eye gives me goosebumps.
When he was living he had a confident arrogance that made him successful – both in business and with women.
Harvey wouldn’t have looked twice at me when he was alive. He doesn’t now. And that irritates me and makes me want to re think my diet.
Sometimes I feel something electric pass between us, but that could be the poor wiring in the flat.
Nevertheless, Harvey is here and he is here until we find the elusive Tulip Martin, who vanished several years ago.
There’s a part of me that doesn’t want to find her, I suspect she’s dead and finding her means Harvey would be gone and I don’t want that.
Very soon I will learn that Harvey isn’t all he seems to be.
One day, Harvey will bring about my end.
But for the now he’s the sexy ghost living in my flat and I’m ok with that.

Review
Tallulah’s Got a Shopping Trolley needs three things badly–an editor,  a formatter and a new cover. There are a lot of editorial mistakes, especially in the beginning. It’s still perfectly readable, but it’s hard to miss them. I don’t think the word ‘brought’ had an r in it once in the whole darned book, for example.

The formatting is similarly hit and miss, both because there are a number of odd line breaks and such and because there are no paragraph indications. Neither indents nor hard returns are used at the beginning of a new paragraph, making it awkward to know where one ends and another begins. Seriously, if the book wasn’t double spaced, so that the lines are at least well spaced it would be all but unreadable. (What a shame that would be.)  

Lastly, IMO the cover is both unappealing (generic) and doesn’t accurately represent the subject matter of the story or portay the feel of the book, which despite being presented in a upbeat and light hearted narrative style,  is actually a little dark with a bitter sweet ending.

I imagine these three rather major issues put a lot of people off reading the book. Don’t let them. The book is a gem. It’s hilarious. It reminds me a lot of Leigh Parker’s 10 Ways series. A lot of the humour in both is based on the main protagonists frustration and the completely ridiculous circumstances she finds herself in by virtue of her own social ineptitude. Really funny.

There were a couple times in the course of reading this book where I had actual laughing fits. You know the type where you start laughing, eventually try to pull yourself together with a few deep breaths and stop, only to start up again–The unfortunate monkey incident. That disastrous first date. Hilarious.

About two thirds of the way in it veers off into the truly absurd and for a little while I was really disappointed, thinking the author had simply given up on writing a serious book. It’s all explained in the end, however, and despite the strong humorous vein running throughout the book I teared up at the end. 
I’ll also admit that the book has both a slow, confusing start and I was left with some unanswered questions. What exactly happened at the beach for example. The final result is pretty obvious, but not what the cause was.

This book lacks polish. Claiming anything else would be dishonest. But it’s good enough to be worth slogging through the mistakes and horrendous formatting. I would love to see the author have it professionally tended to and rereleased. The story deserves the attention.  (I downloaded it back in February, so it’s possible this has already been done and a new edition is available. I hope so, but have no way of knowing.)

Haunted on Bourbon Street

Book Review of Deanna Chase’s Haunted on Bourbon Street

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haunted on bourbon street14031401I grabbed Deanna Chase‘s Haunted on Bourbon Street from the Amazon KDP list…twice it would seem. (Thus the two covers) I didn’t even know it was possible to download the same book twice on Amazon. I guess the ASIN changed at some point or something. Anyhow, as the time of posting it appeared to be free again.

Description from Goodreads:
Jade loves her new apartment–until a ghost joins her in the shower.

When empath Jade Calhoun moves into an apartment above a strip bar on Bourbon Street, she expects life to get interesting. What she doesn’t count on is making friends with an exotic dancer, attracting a powerful spirit, and developing feelings for Kane, her sexy landlord.

Being an empath has never been easy on Jade’s relationships. It’s no wonder she keeps her gift a secret. But when the ghost moves from spooking Jade to terrorizing Pyper, the dancer, it’s up to Jade to use her unique ability to save her. Except she’ll need Kane’s help–and he’s betrayed her with a secret of his own–to do it. Can she find a way to trust him and herself before Pyper is lost?

Review:
I was pleasantly surprised by Deanna Chase’s Haunted on Bourbon Street. I think I expected something a little more H.P. Mallory-ish…more sexual tension and humour. I don’t mean to suggest that there wasn’t plenty of both, but rather it isn’t the focus of this book. In a sense this is as much a mystery as a paranormal romance. They have to investigate and identify the ghost, find out what he wants, find out how to defeat him, and find out how to get on with life.

I liked Jade. While she came in with some preconceived notions about strip clubs and those that work in them, she eventually proved herself to be open minded and mentally flexible. She also had a good strong backbone… though one of these days I swear I am going to do some sort of research project on how often otherwise healthy, well-balanced women in romantic fiction manage to twist ankles while in the presence of sexy men who can carry them away…and maybe even go on to explore how often they then end up in said sexy man’s bed. Here we find a woman who apparently can’t even turn 90° to the right without injuring herself. Sheesh!

Dodgy balance aside, I really did like Jade. It was also nice that her empathic ability was integral to her personality, but not to saving the day. Well it was, but you know how sometimes in books the main character will have one strong skill and somehow it is the only thing that is needed to single-handedly save the world? Not so much here and that was refreshing.

I thought Kane was not only super sexy, but a sweet heart to boot. Pyper was a firecracker. I did have a little trouble deciding what an LSU graduate (one presumes she graduated in the absence of information to the contrary) was doing working in a strip club, but I was willing to accept it. Kat, Dan, and Ian filled their roles, but I felt little for them.

The twist wasn’t all that difficult to guess, but it also wasn’t so obvious that one felt there wasn’t a need to finish the story. I did think things got a little convoluted there at the end. Yes, I suppose I could call it action packed, but the whole feel of the novel changed with the increased pace. Plus, it all felt a little convenient. I know a week was supposed to have passed, so obviously the group worked hard to pull it together. But since the reader isn’t party to any of this it felt wrong. Does that make sense?

I’m glad to have given it a read at long last and would be more than willing to read the continuation of the series.

 

The Ghost and the Graveyard

Book Review of Genevieve Jack’s The Ghost and the Graveyard

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The Ghost and the GraveyardI grabbed Genevieve Jack’s The Ghost and the Graveyard from the Amazon KDP list.

Description from Goodreads:
Left destitute by an unscrupulous ex-boyfriend, Grateful Knight takes her father up on his offer to live rent-free in a house he hasn’t been able to sell. Desperate to make a new start, Grateful tries to overlook the property’s less desirable features, like the graveyard that stretches to her back door. On the bright side, the unbelievably gorgeous cemetery caretaker, Rick, is dead set on helping her feel at home. She vows to take things slow, considering her recent disastrous relationship, but is baffled when she literally can’t keep her hands off of him.

When things in Grateful’s house start moving on their own another man enters her life, a sexy ghost with a dark secret. Magical forces are at work in the tiny town of Red Grove and they’re converging on Grateful. Solving this ghostly mystery won’t be easy and with the caretaker becoming increasingly jealous of her spectral relationship, Grateful may be forced to choose between the ghost and the graveyard.

Review:
I really quite enjoyed this book. That’s despite it being told in the first person present tense, which I generally hate and involving both a love triangle and insta-lust, which usually drive me crazy. The book somehow managed to overcome all of its handicaps and provide an enjoyable read. And it did it with surprising ease. The magic irritation-nullifying ingredient? Humour. The Ghost and the Graveyard is funny. Yes, yes it’s hot and steamy too, but that wouldn’t have been enough to overcome my dislike for the parts that make up its whole. I needed Grateful’s quick wit and sarcastic internal monologue for that. She’s a great heroine. She manages to stay strong and sure of her own sense of self in the face of some fairly severe identity shake-ups. She might have gone weak at the knees in the face of Rick and his awesome sex appeal, but she was never weak-willed. I respected that.

Rick was a surprisingly complex hero. He was simultaneously strong and fragile, loyal and of a little untrustworthy. I’m sure (in my own imaginings) that there will be a lot more to him and his backstory in the future books. I liked Lucas too. He was like a lost puppy, but I was a little tired of his whinging by the end of the book.

I was a disappointed that the book didn’t quite wrap up by the end. Don’t get me wrong it ended OK, but only one small part of the larger whole was solved. There were a lot of loose threads about. I’m always left wanting when that is the case. It’s a shame the next book isn’t out yet.