When a fortieth birthday celebration leads to a ghostly visitor, four friends find themselves navigating surprising mysteries and spiritual hijinks, in this clever debut from Melissa Holtz.

Alyssa Mann isn’t adventurous, not since her husband died and she found herself the single mom of a teenage daughter. But there’s no way to avoid celebrating the big 4-0, so when her best friends drag her out for drinks and a tarot reading, she throws caution to the wind and decides to see what the spirits have to say. It’s all fun and games, until she wakes up the next morning with a wicked hangover—and a ghost perched on the edge of her bed.

Sheer panic sends her running to get help from Nick West, the (very attractive) detective who lives next door. When he finds no one inside, Alyssa has to accept that she really did see a ghost. As the dearly departed keep appearing, Alyssa and her friends do their best to learn how to control her newfound power. Trading insults with ghosts, tracking down family heirlooms, and getting closer to the skeptical but helpful Nick is more fun than Alyssa imagined. But when looking into one ghost’s past reveals unexpected—and unwelcome—facts about Alyssa’s late husband’s death, she discovers she just may be in over her head.

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

We all know she’s about as comforting as sitting on a cactus.

“Have your cell phones ready in case we have to call 9-1-1; this looks like a potential sex trafficking situation,” I call over my shoulder to Nina. Lanie turns to me, nose scrunched and eyes squinted in something like disgust. “We’d be a bit past their target.”

When death comes for me, I want to head straight to that promised beam of light and be whisked off to the land of wine and chocolate.

“Listen, Alyssa, I’m a man of few words for good reason. My dad always said, ‘If you don’t speak, you don’t say stupid shit.’” His head dips and our eyes connect. “It stuck with me. But sometimes, I forget that sage advice and say stupid shit anyway.”

My Review:

 

I adored this cleverly penned tale of realistic woo-woo. Melissa Holtz has wickedly strong word voodoo and quickly had me ensnared with her witty arrangements of words. The storylines were lively, engaging, highly amusing, and creative, as well as insightfully written, and poignant. The characters were an interesting mix of quirk among both the living and the dead.

I so want to be a member of their Gin and Tarot Club and am already looking forward to more from this wily wordsmith and am fervently hoping she continues on with this one as a series.

Melissa Holtz is a former publicist and marketing expert in the romance genre. Now in an advisory role to several bestselling authors, she consults on industry marketing trends. An Enchanting Case of Spirits is her debut novel.