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Showing posts with label Paranormal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Paranormal. Show all posts

Saturday, 28 June 2025

Death and Other Occupational Hazards by Veronika Dapunt

 

This* was a fun diversion from my usual diet of crime thrillers.  It's a very entertaining tale about the two major elements of existence, death and life, personified. 

Death and Life are sisters, would you believe. Like most sisters, they bicker, sometimes hate each other, but mostly can't do without each other. 

Death has been in charge of every single death over quite a few millennia and is singularly unimpressed when she learns of three 'unplanned' demises: ones she didn’t know about.  Investigation is therefore essential.  This entails a bright, mismatched, eccentric wardrobe, some unexpected friendships and some rather dicey situations, even for Death. See About the Book below.

Quirky, darkly comic but wonderfully entertaining. 

Just a little note to Ms Dapunt.  In your very comprehensive list of acknowledgements (pet dog included), where was that nod to your readers?  Whilst all your helpers are important, where would you be without readers?  Food for thought.

*Provided by NetGalley




Monday, 17 February 2020

Mystery Walk by Melissa Bowersock

Never mind that I've been congratulating myself on reading the sixteenth book in a series, Bowersock has written sixteen books in a series (well, twenty-five or twenty-six actually…I'm a smidge behind!), which is really what blows my mind. How she keeps them fresh and original is truly awesome. If someone had asked me which was my favourite, I'd have been very hard pressed to pick one…until now. I think this one has to be it. We see the fun side of our spirit-sleuthing investigators, Sam and Lacey, when they are invited to a murder-mystery weekend. Lacey rather smugly thinks it's going to be a piece of cake. She is, after all, an ex-LAPD detective, so she surely has a head start. But it doesn't quite turn out like that at all…especially when pleasure unexpectedly gets mixed with business. 

Karma Walk by Melissa Bowersock

My regular fix of sleuths-with-a-difference, Lacey and Sam, in book number 15, in which they're met with two surprises: one, Sam's son wants to put his L-plates on and follow in his father's footsteps, and two, their investigation into the mystery why a dead policeman's ghost is appearing at a beach he used to patrol leads them to encounter not just his ghost, but that of a young girl who died there many years previously.

All I need to do is pull out my usual compliments for Bowersock's writing: neat, tidy, concise, easy to read, engaging, original, complete. The Lacey-and-Sam novellas are like a literal Tardis. Small on the outside but huge on the inside.


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Saturday, 26 October 2019

Gangster Walk by Melissa Bowersock

In this, their fourteenth case, Sam and Lacey get the opportunity to experience how the other half live when a multi-millionaire whisks them off to his luxury home, where his gardener is terrified of an unfriendly ghost in one of the extensive property's outbuildings. Lacey's research unearths the mysterious disappearance of a gangster many years previously and discovers that 'honour amongst thieves' doesn't always hold true. 

Bowersock is always true to her style…and to her readers. You never have to wonder if the next Sam and Lacey mystery is going to live up to the one before, before: it always does. Their business is always about releasing a ghost from its painful ties, of course, but each case is different, new and fresh.

Keep 'em coming, Ms B!


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Revenge Walk by Melissa Bowersock

Back with my friends, Sam and Lacey for their thirteenth case. We have a two-pronged story line in this one. They take on the case of a haunting, in which two young children are being bothered by a ghost. At the same time, they're preparing to open Sam's new ceramic art studio. The former seems to be straightforward, but Lacey is a little niggled by its straightforwardness. And the preparations for what they hope will be a successful grand opening of the studio are worryingly hampered by cruel vandalisation, which, they realise, points to one of their former cases, whose outcome seriously disgruntled some people linked to it.

The story is told with Bowersock's usual efficiency, conciseness and flow. It takes no time to settle into her comfortable and familiar style, and always manages to leave you wanting more.



Monday, 7 October 2019

Valley of Secrets by Morgan Knight

Well now, this was a pleasant surprise. A tapestry of genres: paranormal, fantasy, romance, erotica, thriller, crime, suspense. The first four are my least favourite…not on my never-read list, just not my go-tos. But I'm weak and succumbed to the temptation of the latter three. My submission was well rewarded. 

When very young, Emilia was adopted by her parents' good friends when they were tragically killed in a car accident. Years later, as a college student, an attorney traces her to tell her that there is a family estate in a small village in Europe and that she needs to travel there promptly. A holiday in Europe with her much loved adopted sister, Amanda, is too good an opportunity to miss. And it might help distract her from some rather sensual dreams she's having, which feature an irresistibly attractive man, Massimino. Emilia and Amanda's jaunt turns out to be quite something. Little did they expect that Emilia would uncover some unsettling truths about her family, the village and that Massimino is a ruthless sorcerer. 

Good quality writing and a well-formulated plot made this very compelling, along with a striking contrast of well-portrayed good and bad (some evil, in fact) characters and an unguessable ending. Despite having to suspend my disbelief, I was transfixed till the end, which, although complete with no loose ends, left a door ajar for a sequel. I'll certainly be all over that.

Wednesday, 8 May 2019

Fire Walk by Melissa Bowersock

This is the twelfth in the Sam and Lacey series. I seem to have peppered my reading list with their spirit/ghost mysteries for a while, to the point where I am beginning to wonder what will I do when they're no longer around every third book or so! Comfortingly, I think I have a few more to go before that stage is reached. 

The couple is required to get to the bottom of a fire which seems to plague a certain property in a small town in Massachusetts. No sooner is something built on the site…a former site for a church…than it gets razed to the ground. They uncover lies, secrets and a fair old bit of resistance by small-town mentality. 

Pocket-sized though these books are, you never feel short-changed: just pleasantly satisfied and eagerly awaiting the pair's next case.

Right!  Watch this space...I'll be back with Sam and Lacey in two or three books' time!



Monday, 25 February 2019

Spirit Walk by Melissa Bowersock

When you get to book number eleven in a series, you don't just have respect for an author who can keep your attention eleven times, you have certainty and reassurance that you're in a safe and welcoming place. I so needed this after a book which I really did not like. Looking at my review list, Bowersock's eleventh Sam and Lacey case was the inevitable next book because I knew there was a hundred-percent guarantee of enjoyment.

And in this case, Sam and Lacey investigate the death of Sam's brother's (Gabe) friend. Written off as a tragic accident, Gabe doesn't believe his fall to his death to the bottom of canyan is an accident. After the ritual 'walk', Sam can confidently agree with his brother.  He and Lacey are tasked with finding who killed him.  But canyons can be dangerous…life-threateningly so.

I'm not going to apologise for saying the same as I do with all of the 'Walk' books, or indeed all of Bowersock's books: well-written, well-characterised, enjoyable and addictive.

And number 12 is waiting patiently for me in my TBR queue!





Tuesday, 22 January 2019

Murder Walk by Melissa Bowersock

After ten Sam and Lacey tales, I don't even think of them as characters in a book…they're more like my next-door neighbours. I'm in awe of Bowersock's ability to find compelling stories for the pair's ghost sleuthing. (And there are another two after this!)

In this instalment, events are pretty close to home: Daniel's (Sam's son) best school chum has been murdered. Police investigation is slow and Lacey is chomping at the bit somewhat, keen to find the killer, especially as Daniel is showing signs of having inherited his dad's ability to 'communicate' with ghosts. And if the murdered boy can identify his killer to Daniel, will Sam be able to protect him until the police find the culprit?

The quality of the writing and story-telling is consistently at optimum level, and you ease into the story quickly and comfortably. Sam and Lacey's personal life is an enjoyable back story…it never intrudes the main plot but gives you enough to feel and know the characters. 

I'll be honest: the paranormal genre really isn't my thing;  I very rarely give it the time of day, so it's quite something that Bowersock always has me looking forward to the next case.



Being Travis