• 
• Barnes & Noble
• Amazon

Review

The Spirit Girls is a fun paranormal mystery novel that is very quick, easy, and enjoyable to read.

Rylan sees ghosts. She talks to them, she helps them cross over, and she has a YouTube channel (and a BFF for a camerawoman) to share her tales of ghostly encounters while also picking up clients and helping their ghosts cross over.

Rylan is a great character. She’s both easy to understand, and also complex. What I love about Rylan is that she has secrets and baggage, namely that her mother was murdered in the house and still haunts her bedroom where she was killed. (This is revealed in chapter 2, so not really a spoiler.) Rylan is also a hoarder. It’s hard to tell exactly how extreme her hoarding is, but… it’s pretty bad. I’m super curious to see how this progresses as the series goes on. I don’t think I’ve ever met a book where the protagonist has a hoarding disorder, so this was a unique and welcome addition to Rylan’s character.

In this book, Rylan becomes involved in the ritualistic murder of a teenage girl, when the ghost of said girl guides Rylan to her body and then disappears. As the bodies begin to stack up, and the murder investigation hits closer to home than she’d like, Rylan feels as though she has no choice but to solve the crime herself. 

I loved the mystery in this book. I had suspicions about who the killer was, but I didn’t really know until the big reveal. I loved the characters. I loved the pacing. But I have one major gripe, that I really hope will be resolved before publication—after the first chapter or two, the author quits using contractions, leaving the dialogue feeling very stilted and unnatural. If we were talking about one character who doesn’t use contractions, that would be a character quirk. But no. This is every character from about chapter 3 til the end. It drove me batty. It wasn’t enough for me to quit the book, but it did pull me out of the story. 

With that said, will I continue with this series? Absolutely! There are the beginnings of a potential romance and I’m really curious to see how that progresses and what it could mean for Rylan’s hoarding issues. And I’d love for her mother to cross over and find peace at some point. 

If you can overlook the lack of contractions, this is a paranormal mystery you don’t want to miss! 

Huge thanks to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review!

Whats New With Me

I think spring is finally here in Minnesota. After a brief few days in April of 70* weather, we had yet another snow storm. It was a very snowy winter, and I am forever grateful to have been recruited to a (mostly) work from home day job!

It’s finally back up to the 70’s and as I write this, I am sitting on my back patio with the sun shining and the birds chirping. I don’t think there are any sounds better than this!

Yesterday I hauled compost from the country yard waste site and topped off my raised garden bed, and today I planted some squash seeds (Kuri and Sunrise varieties) that I saved from some squash I bought from the farmers market last year. I’m hoping I get a nice yield, as I’m giving up half my raised garden bed for this trial! (The last time I grew squash, pumpkin, and melon, it was in the ground in another part of my yard that we have grassed over.) The other half of my raised bed will be home to some peas, beans, peppers, and 1-2 tomato plants (last year I had maybe 5 tomato plants and soooo many went to waste because I couldn’t consume them that quickly!) I’m very excited to start growing veggies again.

In the writing world, I’m (very) slowly re-reading Something I’m Good At and taking notes so I don’t make any continuity errors in the yet-to-be-titled stand alone sequel. After essentially 4 years of zero inspiration/motivation to flex my creative muscles with writing, I think I’m ready. I have a lofty goal to finish this book before the end of 2023, but let’s be honest, that’s unlikely. Once I finish my notes from book 1, maybe I’ll set myself some shorter goals, such as: Complete Outline by ___. Write X chapters by ___. You get the drift.

Also in the writing world, I have about 18,000 words written in my “monster” book that I started a few years ago and have been revisiting from time to time. It’s also a YA romance. I’ve hit a wall though, so that’s on the back burner while I work on the SIGA sequel.

In life, like I said before, I’m loving my WFH job. My manager/supervisor are great. The work is typically not too challenging, so my stress level is way down from my previous job. And getting to sit outside on my patio and work in the spring/summer is so good for the soul. I’m also pretty good at my job, so that’s always nice, right?

I’m also very excited because in June I’ll be attending the Taylor Swift Eras Tour in Minneapolis. I have my Folklore/Evermore outfit ready to go! (I’m low key keeping my eye out for cheap tix for the second show. Don’t tell my husband! 🤫) I also won tickets from the radio to see Ed Sheeran in Minneapolis in August, so I’m pretty stoked to take my 16 year old to their first ever concert… and all it’ll cost me is parking!

Aside from that, my time these days is spent keeping my house standing, driving my youngest to lessons, trying to eat healthy and get back in the exercise habit (I’m trying running again… Ahhh!), and working my publishing side gig for Melange Books (and its imprints, Satin Romance and Fire & Ice Young Adult Books). I love the work that I do for them—cover design, web updates, and formatting—and honestly, if it paid the bills I would quit my day job in a heartbeat!

So… that’s what’s new! Leave a comment below if you have anything exciting happening in your life!