The Ghost of Normandy Road - Soundtrack to the Story + Special Excerpt from the Book

Short post today: When I wrote the first book in the Haunted Minds series, The Ghost of Normandy Road, and indeed, many of my books are enhanced by musical compositions that I reference throughout the stories.

For 'Ghost', the song that stayed in my head was released some twenty years ago. As I write this blog post, I cannot quite believe so much time has passed. But life has a way of doing that. Anyway why not play the music whilst you read short excerpt from the story. Maybe you will want to give the full book a try.

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Prologue

Every time I go to the house on Normandy Road, I think it will be the last. No matter how many times I do this, I find myself shaking uncontrollably. Perhaps it is understandable. I do this to myself, time and again. Because, I want to feel the excitement, the exhilaration, the fear. Okay, I admit it.

I want to see her.

I know she’s there. I’ve been told about her before. Only in ghost stories, they are just stories, they don’t mean anything, nor should they, to you or I. When I am not anywhere near that house on Normandy Road, that’s all it is. A house. Nothing more, nothing less.

I want to believe in her. I want to believe in the existence of ghosts.

Oh, I know you will think I’m being silly. Your questions? I’m sure you have many. I bet you have the answers to them all as well.

Do the floorboards creak? Of course they do. Does the door open slowly, making a sound only those on the other side of the grave could possibly make? You bet.

Do the windows rattle? Yeah, for real.

All houses do this, don’t they?

Sigh.

Yes they do. Pretty much all of them.

Come on. Rationalise this. Everyone knows why I shake uncontrollably when I go there. It’s because she is real. She exists, and she will not rest in her grave. Why? Because she belongs there, belongs in the house on Normandy Road. She’s never going to leave, because she can’t. But I can. I tease her every time I go, daring her to scare the living daylights out of me.

Sometimes, I can swear she responds to my dare. But no-one will believe me. No-one believes in ghosts, where I live.

Perhaps they don’t believe because I have not followed through on the dare, and lived to tell the tale. I hear them say ‘you should spend a night in the house then’, or they put it in the rules of threes, you know, like saying ‘you should go there, three nights in a row. Whatever is in that place, sure won’t like that.’

Of course, it’s my own fault. I say I will go and stay the three nights, but I never do. I can’t, really. I have to be home soon after school, otherwise Mum will be mad.

To understand, you’d really have to see the world through my eyes. That’s the problem with convincing people of the truth. They are only ever willing to accept their version of it.

Everything else, is a lie.

---

“Came in from a rainy Thursday

On the avenue

Thought I heard you talking softly

I turned on the lights, the TV

And the radio

Still I can't escape the ghost of you.”

Ordinary World – Duran Duran

---

Act One: The Witch of Hill-Top Green

The route from my school to home takes about fifteen minutes to walk, maybe ten if I run. On the days that I dare to pass the house on Normandy Road that stands so tall, foreboding, and yes, terrifying to me, I go quicker. Much quicker. On those days, I don’t think Jesus himself could catch me.

It’s something my mum would term as ‘he’s got the fear of God put into him.’ That would be a pretty accurate way to describe it. My heart would beat fast as I would approach it, and even faster as I passed it. As to what happened to my heart as I ran alongside it, maybe, just maybe it stopped beating for a few moments.

I know you won’t believe me, and think that it is the overactive imagination of a child. I’m only ten years old, and I will soon be eleven. I think I might just be growing up, but I know for a fact that the adults think differently when they look at me.

They think I am scared of my own shadow, and well – they’re probably right.

I do have a genuine reason for being scared, I really do. I’ve been nervous for as long as I can remember. Maybe it is a case of genetics, and my parents have passed their fears on to me.
Every time I pass that house on Normandy Road, I refuse to believe my fears are anything to do with genetics. The fear – the one psychiatrists would say is not real or rational, nor one that could hurt me, takes on a life and persona all of its own.

I believe an entity that is the embodiment of all I fear resides in that house.

Now I know I’m being irrational.

At school, we are always trying to scare each other. Sometimes, it’s a dare like going into the girls toilets, even though it’s five minutes after hometime and only the teachers remain in the school.

Oh, and the caretaker. He’s always there.

And the ghost.

Well. We don’t know for sure. There’s an old story that the girls failed to confirm or deny, but it is said that a girl died after being locked in the toilets one night.

The official record of her death (say the girls) is that she died from a severe anxiety attack. The news had reported she was found with her eyes sewn up, and her tongue had been ripped out to stop her screaming.

The boys that heard this added something to it.

“She was killed by the Ghost of Normandy Road.”

Prior to them saying anything, I never believed there was a ghost on Normandy Road. Our school was in the next street, called Bayswater Road.

There was a church beyond it, and a football stadium on the other side of the road that stands to this day.

Normandy Road had tall houses back then, and it’s fair to say that adults were sure to be dwarfed by that big old house.

It stood alone, you see. Every other house was semidetached or part of a terraced block – all except that one. Why, I did not know, but I was intrigued to find out.

That’s what we kids do. We like to look around – if there’s a side entry, a dark alleyway, a broken window or an abandoned house, you can bet we want to check it out.

Not for its historical significance, if it had any, and not because we are without any sense of right and wrong. Don’t let anyone just say ‘oh, they’re kids.’

We know what we are doing – we just happen to rely on the foolishness of society to let us off the hook. I know for a fact that there are some children at the school who play the ‘I’m only a child, I didn’t know it was wrong’ card on purpose.

As for me, I probably had one of those faces that looked innocent in one way, only to be ratted out by my guilty as charged expression.

Sometimes, it was innocent enough. I would be unable to wait to open at least one Christmas or birthday present. I would sneak down the stairs, placing one foot, then another on the far side of the stairwell.

Life was very simple back then. We had a bit of blue carpet that covered the stairs, except for the edges where I now depended on keeping my balance, my safety and my secret. In fact, falling down the stairs and breaking my neck would have been preferable to my mum or anyone else in the family catching me.

I wasn’t supposed to be out of bed. Young children were supposed to go to bed early, quietly, and stay there until the right time to get up for school.

Ugh.

School.

School itself was fine. Looking back, it’s hard to know exactly what we learned in class. I think we had fun for the most part. There was Miss McManus, who would teach us almost every lesson.

Maths, English, Music, she’d do it all.

Sometimes, we’d get Miss Oakley, who was a Nazi in a twinset. Okay, I’m being a little unkind. That sort of title was better reserved for Mrs Pearson (or Mizz Pearson, we were never quite sure and she was unlikely to explain her married status, or otherwise, to a class of school children) whose contempt for us was barely concealed.
Mr Flanagan would teach us Maths too, along with Geography.

P.E class would involve having to change with the other schoolchildren, which I disliked intensely. Not for the bizarre communal situation, no, it was just that certain boys would take it upon themselves to talk when they weren’t supposed to, and our class would be harder as a result.

“Today, we’ll be doing cross-country running.”

The teacher was probably going to let us play football, but decided on a change of lesson content just because one boy was sniggering or had been playing another boy up.

Now we would all pay for it.

“Hey,” they’d say to me, as we would go for the hated run in the mud, the rain, and the cold, “you had better keep up with the pack. The Witch of Hill Top Green is just behind one of the trees, waiting for you to pass.”

I’d fight back with words. “Witches wouldn’t hide in trees. They wouldn’t have to. And it’s you who needs to keep up with the pack, not me. You watch out for the bleedin’ witch!”

Ah yes, the Witch of Hill Top Green.

We’d all seen her, though no-one admits to it, at least, not openly.

We would run, and it would be pleasant enough. The September sun grazed our shoulders gently, unlike the harsh glare of early July. Honestly – two weeks before breaking up for the summer holidays, and they are making us run in blistering heat.

In contrast, I almost found myself enjoying the September run. Then, they’d start their annoying tales again.

“Roy’s gone missing,” said one of them. “I’ve lapped you lot twice now, and there’s no sign of Roy. She must have got him, her bony fingers must be gutting him out right about now.”

I would get a poke in the back when I’d attempt to ignore them, and continue on my run.

“Are you listening? She’s out there! Out here.”

No. I am not listening. I’m running, and will keep running until we get back to the school.

Usually, we would see the teacher over the course of the run. Where was he?

The Witch of Hill Top Green has got him, and Roy. Best be happy she hasn’t got you.

Yet.

---

END OF EXCERPT

Let me know what you think!

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Book Review: Walking Over Eggshells by Lucinda E Clarke

Synopsis (from the author): Walking Over Eggshells is an autobiography that tells the story of a mentally abused child, who married a "Walter Mitty" clone who took her to live in many different countries. They moved from England to Kenya, from Libya to Botswana and on again to South Africa. It took all her courage to survive in situations that were at times dangerous, sometimes humorous, but always nerve wracking. She had a variety of jobs, different types of homes, and was both a millionairess and totally broke. 

At one end of the scale she met royalty, hosted ambassadors, and won numerous awards for her writing and for her television programmes. At the other end, she climbed over garbage dumps, fended off the bailiffs, and coped with being abandoned in the African bush with a seven week old baby, no money and no resources. She admits to being the biggest coward in the world, but her survival instincts kicked in and she lived to tell her story. 

This book will make you laugh and cry, but also it also explains the damage being brought up by a mother with a personality disorder can inflict on a child. However, it is not all doom and gloom, and hopefully it will inspire others who did not have the best start in life either. All names have been changed to protect both the guilty and the innocent - and that includes the author as well!

Review: ** spoiler alert ** I'm definitely not one for reading stories about abuse, though I accept many stories would have much less impact as a result.

The book I am about to review was harrowing, with a parent who seemed to have no redeeming qualities at all.

The main character, Lucy, goes from life crash to life crash, sometimes on her own, sometimes with the man in her life.

Although just over two hundred pages, readers should take care to read the book properly. If you skip pages, it would be easy to miss things. In this review, it may be virtually impossible not to give out spoilers, so that's how this review will be presented.

From its opening pages, Lucy is treated as nothing by her mother. Well, perhaps not exactly nothing. It would be a wonder to know what her mother would do with her time if she did not have Lucy to direct her attacks towards.

The book shows Lucy from a young age to a middle aged woman, and not once does she appear to have gotten any love from her mother. As I read the book, I thought I would have gotten desensitised to the mother's actions, but no...my thoughts were along the lines of, Come on! This is your daughter! Try and be nice for once!

If this was a work of fiction, one might say that the mother was a one-dimensional baddie. But there comes a reveal near to the end that shows Lucy's mother might - just might have had a reason for all this behaviour.

It seems that if Lucy was thin, her mother would call her a stick insect. If she was fat, and in one scene she is, and her mother calls her out on it:-

"Lucinda, you are a fat girl and you will always be a fat girl."

This shocked me, but did not surprise me. However, I know all too well how sensitive women can be about their weight. I just couldn't imagine saying something like that to a family member, or indeed, to anyone I care about.

The story moves through different places - some I know, others I just have an awareness of.

From Dublin, the place of my mother's birth, through to Cheltenham - not a million miles away from me...then onto several countries within Africa including Libya and Botswana.

What's the reason for all this country hopping? There are valid reasons, but I advise you read this book so as not to give it away!

One of the things I absolutely loved was the naming of Lucy's car - Domino. There's a scene where Domino is in desperate need of a new battery (God, I've been there) and yet the hills in Bath (love that place) provide a solution. I believe you could have a 200 year old car with no battery and yet you would still be able to ignite the fuel to get and keep it going, such are the hills in Bath.

This story would risk falling on its face if not for the delicate humour placed throughout the book. Another memorable scene was where Lucy's husband karate chops a doorknob from its housing, and Lucy has to carry it in her bag at all times in order to open the door!

It's very difficult for me to review this book and give it any sense of justice. After all, this is a person's LIFE - who am I to review it or critique it effectively?

Hopefully, what I have done is give you a flavour of what is contained amongst its pages.

It's a wonderfully written book that sweeps you along with this girl, who in my view is a hell of a fighter, and there isn't a dry chapter in the whole book. Now that takes some doing.

I applaud the author for creating such an engaging book, but also heart wrenching at times. Still, I found I could not pull myself away from it.

It's definitely a five star book as far as I'm concerned. I'm sometimes told I am a little too enthusiastic with praise for authors. Not true. I will call it as I see it.

Don't Walk Over Eggshells to get this book. Make a stampede. It's excellent.

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Book Review: Violet Chain (Violet Chain, #1) by J Kahele

Synopsis (from the author): After catching her fiancé with another woman at their engagement party, Violet Townsend's world is turned upside down. 

Desperate to numb the pain, she falls into the arms of charming, young entrepreneur Chain Alexander. 

Chain, a notorious womanizer of Philadelphia, not looking for anything more than a night of pleasure with a woman, is drawn to Violet instantly. There is something about her that he needs and wants so desperately and it’s not just sex. 


But Violet is resistant. Can she open her heart again after having it broken so brutally? And more importantly, should she? 

Review: Easily one of my favourite authors, J Kahele once again gives us a strongly narrated adult romance, but with a heart. 

The opening scenes in the book show Violet being viciously and brutally dumped for a fleeting moment of sexual gratification by her ex-fiance Harrison.

He's an idiot, pure and simple. At this point in the story we don't know that much about Violet, but as the tale progresses it is clear that H made a mistake. Unfortunately for him, there is to be no second chance, as Violet becomes the focus of Chain, our main male of the piece.

There's also a wonderful scene featuring Violet's brothers, Vince and Victor - despite having the same initial which one might think leads to some confusion, it doesn't. I loved it, and it gave the book some light comedic relief.

It's fair to say that apart from Archie in Miss Kahele's Crazy on You, her male characters tend to be super rich, super good looking....something I can't relate to all that well! But Chain, for all his apparent good fortune, seems to be her best characterised male to date, and I for one am pleased to see this progression from the author.

The story it told from Violet's perspective, but also Chain's. This is something I am noticing in a lot of stories of late. If they are all as well written as this one, I won't be complaining.

Violet Chain works because the story - a broken heart, finds one to mend it. But this is the tale at its most basic level. It is much more than that, and ends strongly that will have you screaming for more.

Whilst fans of Miss Kahele await a possible third installment of the Mine series, this will do very nicely indeed!

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Weekend Writing Workshop #6 - You've Written Your Book, Now Become An Editor

The cold hard reality of reading your draft back after a given period.

"Your book is ready? Nuh-ah-nuuh. No. I don't think so."

Anyone who has ever written a first draft of a book will know that it is just that - a draft. The hard work starts afterwards, where you have to look at your work in a different way altogether. This is a discipline so hard for independent writers - not all of us of course, but in my case, making the jump from mere writer to hard-line-critique-spewing-red-pen-at-the-ready editor is difficult.

No wonder we hand this task over to someone who does this for a living.

In my own experience, the choice of an editor was the right one, however we have to accept that even they have limitations to their powers. An editor will view your book one way, you, as the author will view it another way.

And then, there is an army of readers ready to read it in their own unique way.

So the need for the author to get his or her book right from the off has never been more important. Authors need help too - it's a far bigger team all of a sudden, with editors, proofreaders, beta readers et al getting in on the act.

However, not all authors can afford all these professional services. One proofreading service I contacted said they charged £450 for the first 50,000 words. This may be reasonable enough, but if you are a first time author hoping that your book is going to make enough (quietly) so that by month two or three, that vital service or services are suddenly more affordable.

Getting your book professionally proofread and edited is a must for authors. As a first time author, you should take a step back, because although your book has been written, you might just find yourself seeking out all these services, which you could save a lot of time and money by doing some more of the ground work yourself.

My books have a three month gestation period. Whilst that sounds hideous, it is pretty necessary. I may want to make swathing changes to the book - not the story itself (because hopefully you've created an outline first and knew how the story was going to end), but grammatical changes, sentence and paragraph structure, and of course, the (eventually ending ) hunt for typos.

It's all too easy to send your book out to an agent, publisher or editor without the proper cooling down time being applied to the work. After all, you worked hard on it, and the narcissist in us will want it read (and praised!) as soon as possible.

But you should wait. Really, you should wait. The draft is not the final one. There's much work to be done.

We have to toughen up and take the hits. Not everyone will think what we have done is awesome.

"What? Don't you understand? My book is finished. You don't like it. What do you mean you don't like it? My mum likes my book. Why don't you? Ugh - you're mean!"

You've only just thrown off the shackles of being an author.

So how do you become your own editor?

The simple truth is, you can't do the job of an editor. Not perfectly. But if you can get into an editor's mindset, your book will be all the better for it.

An editor:-

• Will tell you what is wrong with the plot
• Point out character flaws that simply do not work in tandem with the story
• Highlight timeline issues
• Highlight glaring plotholes
• Simply advise you (you don't have to accept what they say, but you probably should)

Delusions that we have written a truly great story need shaking up. It may well be great, but be realistic. You can be truthful to yourself and win more readers as a result.

"I finished my book. And yet it seems amongst the praise, you dare to criticise it? Allow me to find something that will convince you that I am right."

As the author of the work:-

• You may think your draft needs work, but that the story is brilliant
• You may think your story is rubbish, even though it has potential 
• You will speed read it, missing loads of errors, instead of going through it line by line
• You will not see the story as it needs to be seen
• Look at the point directly above, again

That is not to say that editors are the first, last and final word on everything. I have a paperback book from the Writer's Workshop - a very highly regarded entity, that contains a glaring mistake in a chapter about not making spelling errors. Something tells me that there is some irony at play here. 

Still, the book is excellent, so I would look over something like that.

The one month to three month holiday that your eyes gets from your draft allows you to come back, fresh, energised and most important - with some level of ability to effectively edit your work.

Don't try and write one book in the morning, and edit another in the afternoon. It really can mess you up - i know it did for me. So as appealing as writing new stories maybe be, hold off until you have finished your book properly. 

There's an argument that authors who suffer writer's block should go and work on other projects. Maybe - but I am inclined to disagree. If you are writing a book about vampires, and another about mermaids, if you don't split yourself properly from the respective works, you will end up merging the ideas.

This in itself is not always a bad thing. Darren Aronofsky, one of my favourite film directors, had the idea for a story where a ballerina fell in love with a wrestler - the highest art meeting the lowest one (that's not my quote or my belief - all arts are valuable to the one who practises them) - but the story would not gel, so DA split the ideas.

The result was the excellent The Wrestler with a powerhouse performance from Mickey O'Rourke and an Oscar winning turn from Natalie Portman in Black Swan.

So step back, take a breather, and become the Odile to the more comfortable Odette. If you really can't critque your work, do - really do give it to someone else. Editing isn't evil - it just needs to be done, done again, and done to death. You'll come to the point that you actually hate your book.

Now you're ready.

Previous WWW tips are here

Book Review: Going Under by Silas Payton

Synopsis: (from the author) While investigating three unexplained deaths, Inspector Bill Roberts finds himself in the middle of a retaliation, after a biker gang moves in on mafia territory. With few leads and increased scrutiny by the Chief of Police and the Mayor of Toronto, he tries to track down whoever is responsible, making himself a target in the process. 

Bill Roberts, an Inspector with the Toronto police, has decided today was the day to drag himself back to the gym, for the first time since a recent arrest attempt left him with a broken leg. A mishap on his first day back sets the tone for the next twenty hours. When he gets called to the scene of a murder, he finds a wife has shot her loving husband, for no apparent reason. He and his team of detectives investigate, finding bizarre connections to a local biker gang, the mafia, and the Mayor's office, throwing themselves in the middle of a much larger scandal. 

With few leads, Inspector Bill Roberts must connect three strange deaths and find the person responsible. When he suspects the connection is a psychiatrist, Dr. Barry Nelson, the Inspector's priority becomes finding him before he leaves the city, onto his next job. What he doesn't realize is the doctor has one more job to finish... to eliminate Bill Roberts. 

This is a thriller laced with humour. It will keep you intrigued and on the edge of your seat to the last sentence, while giving you a few laughs along the way. If you like the books of J.A. Konrath, Blake Crouch, Jude Hardin, or Tracy Sharp, this book is for you.

Review: This book just screams COOL, doesn't it? From the stylistic artwork, top title, and super cool author name I was intrigued by this intelligent looking thriller. Chapter One opens with a fantastic Law & Order: Criminal Intent type scene that utterly grips the reader.

The writing is superb, as is the characterisation. Bill Roberts is an interesting protagonist, as his detective is a smart cookie, and far from the worn out representations I have seen in some other books, even by authors I absolutely adore.

Going Under follows a murder trail that seems an open and shut case, but as the story unfolds, and is unveiled through different characters (there are many in this story apart from Bill), and I liked the author's engaging and irreverent style. 

This is only a minor gripe, but I felt the main character Bill was the one I wanted throughout the story - when other characters fronted the chapter, I felt less engaged. Perhaps that is because Bill towers over everyone else in my view as the most interesting character.

Going Under is well paced, brilliantly plotted and virtually unputdownable. For a debut novel, it packs a hell of a punch, with wit and style that will make you grin. 

How does it all end? Through the many jumps, hoops, swings and roundabouts this tale puts you through, you will want to know.

Some detective thrillers take themselves way too seriously, or are high on the ick factor. Fortunately this is a story that is taut, smartly told, and should be high on your read list.

Go for it, you won't be disappointed.

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Book Review: The Hidden Blade by Sherry Thomas (Heart of Blade Duology, #1)

Synopsis:

In the waning days of the last dynasty, in a quiet, beautiful corner of imperial Peking, a young girl's blissful ignorance is shattered when she learns that she is the illegitimate daughter of an English adventurer and a Chinese courtesan. What future is there for such a girl? But a mysterious figure steps forward and offers to instruct her in the highest forms of martial arts--a path to a life of strength and independence.

Half a world away in England, a young boy's idyllic summer on the Sussex downs implodes with the firing of a single bullet. Torn from his family, he becomes the hostage of a urbanely sadistic uncle. He dreams of escaping to find his beloved friend--but the friend is in China, ten thousand miles away.

The girl trains to be deadly. The boy flees across continents. They do not know it yet, but their lives are already inextricably bound together, and will collide one fateful night when they least expect it.

'Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon' meets 'Downton Abbey,' this remarkable tale of friendship, danger, and coming of age will stay with you long after you have finished the last page.

A prequel to MY BEAUTIFUL ENEMY.

Review:

I was recommended this book having read the author's Luckiest Lady in London (review to come at some point!) but also because the one recommending it to me knew I had a background in martial arts, to put it mildly.

Sherry Thomas has a writing style that I can only believe creates a sense of sheer wonder for readers, but partial envy for other authors who read her works. Truly, this is an author who can craft a story with such style and panache, that sometimes you have to take a step back from what one has read,

Although not a long book, I read and consumed The Hidden Blade over several days, and I'll admit the martial arts aspect of the tale was a huge draw for me. As part one of a duology, The Hidden Blade works wonderfully as a historical piece that is lighter on romance than one might expect from Miss Thomas. I do expect part two - My Beautiful Enemy to fulfil the wishes of any reader who wanted more romance in this book.

That is not to say the book lacks romance, far from it. Telling the story of young Chinese girl Ying-Ying who is taken under the considerable wing of her teacher Amah, there is a dual story running with a pace-perfect and a seamless narrative, as the story of upper class English gent Leighton goes through many jumps and hoops (not all of them pleasant).

For me, whilst the story of Ying-Ying and Leighton is engaging (but in the best tradition of tales like Brief Encounter, where there is an attraction but barely exploited....and Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon..with Shu Lien and Li Mu Bai definitely attracted to each other but restrained by age old customs and beliefs) - the romance is hinted at here, but I expect it will be more craftily developed in the follow-up.

What makes The Hidden Blade an exceptional book....well, where to start. Ying-Ying is cool, and whilst I can understand the nod to wuxia films like CTHD, it is but one of many that were made in China, it just so happens that particular film was made with a Western audience in mind. The martial arts scenes are brilliantly depicted - I especially loved a scene between Ying-Ying and her master where her Chi (Qi) was being developed. 

Contrary to popular Western belief, it's really hard - nigh on impossible in fact, to find a martial arts master of repute in China. It took me seven years to find my current one. But for reasons that the story must move forward, Ying-Ying is introduced to her teacher early on in the story.

As Leighton makes his improbable but necessary journey to the East - no doubt to reckon with his destiny, I am wanting to know how the worlds of a Chinese girl and Western man will collide.

He seems bit down on his luck, unable to catch a break for large parts of the tale. You'll root for him, as I did. But you will also want Ying-Ying to outgrow her master one day, and in this regard, Amah teaches her student (brutally) well. It seems a mis-match to me, which makes it all the more intriguing.

I rarely have such high praise for a book, but it is so well done, if I could give it six stars, I would. Let''s see how the series wraps up with the intriguing title of My Beautiful Enemy.

Rating: Five Jade-coloured stars.

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Book Review: Newborn Nazi by Rhoda D'Ettore

There's a number of reviews here and as I scan through them, I am not sure what I can add.

What I can say for my own part is that Newborn Nazi starts with and continues for many of its pages at a blistering pace. This is a remarkable feat given the rather dry and unsettling nature of the SS.

It is a very dark tale, but told with great style and panache. The author, Rhoda D'Ettore, is an exceptional story teller.

The book has a little 'middle of the story' lag but maybe this is welcome.

After a particularly delicious build up between Hedwig and Johann, I still could not predict what was coming. After the event, I was unsure where the story would go.

But herein lies the author's talent. Through a myriad of excellent main and support characters, the author weaves a multi-layered and intelligent story.

At times, the dialogue is a little too much, but given the length of the story, blocks of heavy narration may have been off putting, so I congratulate the author for making a motley crew so engaging to read.

The ending is interesting, not what I expected, and very well done.

If you want a story that takes you away from a YA story filled with werewolves and mermaids, go for this very unique tale.

I loved it and think you will too!

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