Once Haunted, Twice Shy (by H.P. Mallory)

Paranormal Romance

In exorcising a demon from her home, Peyton found herself inadvertently possessed by the ghost of a French speaking New Orleans police officer who died in the early 20th century. Now she can connect to the spirit world and all the ghosts of the city are running scared.

It soon becomes clear that something is very wrong and the demon they exorcised has decided to make the streets of New Orleans run red with blood, starting with Peyton.


There is a lot going on in Once Haunted, Twice Shy. At times it felt like a little too much, like there were too many players. Presumably H.P. Mallory is setting the scene for future books but that busyness didn’t help this story. Added to the mix this book has a love triangle of sorts (do I have to call a four sided love triangle a square?) which is one of those tropes I don’t particularly like.

That said, despite the shaky start, the book ended strongly with a voodoo battle to end all battles. If you like voodoo, ghosts and demons in your pages, this is a pretty good read.

Screen Shot 2014-02-16 at 4.32.33 pmMany thanks to Montlake Romance and Netgalley for providing me with this ARC

Yellow, Orange, Red –– what it means: http://wp.me/P2B7b5-9l

Ghouls Rush In (by H.P. Mallory)

Paranormal Romance

After escaping her domineering husband, Peyton moves into a rundown antebellum home left to her by a distant aunt. Needing to keep herself busy she decides to restore the home to its former glory and manages to get Ryan, a specialist in restoring homes to take on the job.

She soon discovers the home is haunted by Drake, a policeman who died sometime in the early 20th century, and as he visits her in her sleep a story unfolds about a series of brutal murders which terrorised the people of New Orleans in nearly 100 years earlier. And it’s possible that Peyton has inadvertently invited the spirit of the murderer into her home.

She finds herself caught between a ghost who is protecting her from the malevolence that has entered her home and the contractor who is still mourning the loss of his wife.

Ghouls Rush In is quite a surprising book. It wasn’t till page sixty that the ghosts arrived, until then it felt very much like a renovation romance. Even then it seemed liked a fairly cute and harmless ghost story. But at the half way mark it definitely got creepy. There were things going on in this book that had cold shivers running up and down my spine.

 
It’s really very good, and if books about ghosts, spirits and voodoo sound like your thing, this is definitely one of the better ones I’ve read.

 

Screen Shot 2014-03-17 at 5.42.32 pmMany thanks to Montlake Romance and Netgalley for providing me with this ARC

Yellow / Orange / Red –– What it means. http://wp.me/P2B7b5-9l