Tanz the actress/psychic detective is back! Huzzah!

Following the events of the previous book in this series, Tanz is feeling lost when the New Age store that she was working at suddenly closes, her new clairvoyant mentor and friend is busy working, her lover is off traveling the world and potentially meeting other, cuter people. She has also decided that she’s over and done with talking to dead people. Her life seems like it’s at a standstill, but when her agent finally calls with a role in a British crime drama on location in Newcastle, Tanz heads off and soon sees a ghostly little boy in the historical Black Gate. When she finds that a dark spooky entity has attached itself to her BFF Milo, can she get her friend out of danger, manage the chaos on set, and figure out who the little dead boy is who needs her help?

I enjoy this series so much. It’s tone is very British and a bit boozy, Bridget Jones-esque. Tanz is someone who lives a very different life to the average reader, being an actress and an accidental psychic, but she’s also the kind of girl you’d be friends with in real life. She’s funny, kind and brave, messy, and always up for a G&T. She’s often struggling financially and emotionally, but also always gets it together in the end. There’s a small cast of side characters, like her cat, her best friend and her parents, that are all playfully drawn and nice to spend time with as you read.

I love the on-set antics of these books. I have a small amount of knowledge of life on set, with it’s feast and famine times, it’s creative differences, and the way it seems like it would be glamourous but often isn’t. These books capture this and I love it. Also, these books have one of my other favourite themes: haunting and mystery. Last time we had a more recent ghost story, but this time we go into a more historical haunting and mystery about what happened. This was a direction that I was looking forward to these books going in and I really enjoyed it.

A few things about this book, first of all, you don’t need to have read the first book to read this one. Secondly, while the plot of the book is that there’s a haunting and Tanz is going to investigate, it’s more a backdrop that the characters are strung on. I wanted to know what was happening and why, and I did get to know that, but the book in some ways is more about the funny/dark vibes and hanging out with the main character. Personally, in this book, I liked this, but if you want more of a straight mystery, or genre mystery, it’s not all about doing that. I also wanted to mention, that while this book made me smile or laugh sometimes, there are some really dark themes in this one towards the end, and it might not be OK for some of you. After all, the ghost is a child, which means that there is a child death here being looked at. (The humour is based around Tanz and her approach to life, not around death or murder or anything. It’s not that kind of dark)

This book, for me, is not to heavy and not too light. Sometimes we’re skimming along, watching things go wrong on set or hoping Tanz will meet someone cute, or hanging with her family or friends, but then there’s a bit of depth as she thinks about death and the afterlife, and then there’s a bit of darkness, murder, and things like that. It’s a really nice balance for me. Not mawkish and depressing, but not being silly or overly woo woo. I really am enjoying this series, and once again, I’m looking forward to more.

Read It If: you like cats, gin and tonic, believe in ghosts and/or have ever worked in a creative field. Funny and with a bit of bite.

Thank you to PGC Books for the copy of this book for review.