I can’t believe it’s time to wrap up the R.I.P. challenge. It can’t be, I still have more spooky books to read! Well, I’m happy to report that I completed my challenge. I signed up for Peril the Second for which I read Dracula by Bram Stoker and Delia’s Shadow by Jamie Lee Moyer and I also read several short stories from The Big Book of Ghost Stories.

I enjoyed my reads a lot (one of them is going to be a favorite of the year I’m sure) and I just wanted to say a big thank you to Carl V. for hosting this wonderful challenge. Can’t wait to do it again!

Now Halloween is here and I plan to visit a poetry haunted house. Isn’t that great? I’m too scared to visit a real one so this is perfect. I hope you enjoy the tour and if you are too scared to visit here’s a Halloween poem for you:

Lamia (Left to herself)
By John Keats

Left to herself, the serpent now began
To change; her elfin blood in madness ran,
Her mouth foam’d, and the grass, therewith besprent,
Wither’d at dew so sweet and virulent;
Her eyes in torture fix’d, and anguish drear,
Hot, glaz’d, and wide, with lid-lashes all sear,
Flash’d phosphor and sharp sparks, without one cooling tear.
The colours all inflam’d throughout her train,
She writh’d about, convuls’d with scarlet pain:
A deep volcanian yellow took the place
Of all her milder-mooned body’s grace;
And, as the lava ravishes the mead,
Spoilt all her silver mail, and golden brede;
Made gloom of all her frecklings, streaks and bars,
Eclips’d her crescents, and lick’d up her stars:
So that, in moments few, she was undrest
Of all her sapphires, greens, and amethyst,
And rubious-argent: of all these bereft,
Nothing but pain and ugliness were left.

“Each ghost that passed through me deepened the clammy chill that shivered over my skin. Voices filled my head and faded again. I heard cries of pain and pleas for help from those trapped under rubble after the quake, felt the heat of the fire steal a last breath. Age and sickness stole life as well, seldom peacefully. Touching death again and again brought me closer to tears. I gritted my teeth and held on. People would truly think me insane if I began to cry for no reason.”

Delia’s Shadow by Jamie Lee Moyer

Delia Martin thought she had escaped the ghosts she saw when she moved to New York to teach but when the ghost of a young woman appears to her she knows she has to return to San Francisco and face her fears. San Francisco is home and where her best friend, Sadie, lives but it also holds painful memories of the parents she lost in the San Francisco earthquake.

When she arrives Sadie is busy planning her wedding to a police officer but all is not happiness as she’s also taking care of her dying mother, Esther, who also helped raise Delia. The friends try to make the best of things and when Sadie suggests going to the Pan Pacific Exhibition so they can consult with Dora, a spiritualist. Of course, Sadie doesn’t miss an opportunity to play matchmaker and also invites police Detective Gabe Ryan to go with them.

For Gabe and Jack, Sadie’s fiance, escorting the women to exposition is a good way for them to keep watch on what is going on at the fair. There’s a serial killer who is taunting the police force and will probably strike again soon.

Delia confides in her friends about the ghosts she sees and as they put the pieces together of the images, Gabe and Jack realize that Delia’s ghost was a victim of the serial killer they are hunting. Delia is willing to put herself at risk to bring justice to ghosts but will she come away unscathed?

The backdrop of the San Francisco earthquake, the excitement of a fair and the appearance of the ghosts is the perfect stage for a thrilling story. All characters are likeable and Delia’s and Gabe’s romance was sweet but there was one flaw I had with the story and that is that everyone was so willing to accept Delia’s ghosts. That no one questioned what she saw and trusted her implicitly seemed too easy. I would have preferred a bit more of Delia fighting to be understood or accepted. It was a fairly predictable read but overall it was enjoyable and a quick read.

Source: Advance Review Copy