The House on Tradd Street, by Karen White

Finished 11-10-09, rating 4/5,  fiction, pub. 2009

I recalled that when I was a child, before I’d learned to ignore such things, if I were paying very close attention, I could hear the murmur of very low voices all the time as if someone had left a radio on in a distant room.  But tonight all I heard was silence, and the pressing thought inside my skull.  The photo album.

I put on my robe and slippers and headed toward the guest bedroom, turning on every light as I went.  Regardless of how many times I saw them, it was always easier to see dead people when the lights were on.

Chapter 11

Melanie Middleton is a very successful real estate agent in Charleston, an expert at selling historical homes while having no love for them at all.  When she visits a new client one day and becomes the owner of his historical house a few days later due to his death, she is not happy.  She is forced to live in the house for a year and is given an allowance to restore it.  Only she is not the only one in the house.  The spirits who stay there both fight her and push her into solving a generations old mystery.

Her best friend Sophie and estranged father are both on board to help, as well as a good-looking true crime author working on his next big story.  Before long Melanie is forced to confront her past with her father and accept the help of a man she knows is silently grieving.  And these ghosts are not the Casper kind.  They can do real damage.

I really liked this book.  Melanie is a feisty 39 year-old woman who has relied on no one to achieve success and I was rooting for her to comes to terms with her father and grow to love the house.  The mystery of the missing diamonds was one that had me guessing til the end and the ghosts, while unnerving, added depth to the story. 

White writes with great humor and attention to detail and I am looking forward to the next book with Melanie.

This was a library book.