From SHANI STRUTHERS, the bestselling author of the first in the series, THE HAUNTING OF HIGHDOWN HALL.
“This isn’t a ghost we’re dealing with. If only it were that simple…”
Eighteen years ago, when psychic Ruby Davis was a child, her mother – also a psychic – suffered a nervous breakdown. Ruby was never told why. “It won’t help you to know,” the only answer ever given. Fast forward to the present and Ruby is earning a living from her gift, running a high street consultancy – Psychic Surveys – specialising in domestic spiritual clearance.
Boasting a strong track record, business is booming. Dealing with spirits has become routine but there is more to the paranormal than even Ruby can imagine. Someone – something – stalks her, terrifying but also strangely familiar. Hiding in the shadows, it is fast becoming bolder and the only way to fight it is for the past to be revealed – no matter what the danger.
When you can see the light, you can see the darkness too.
And sometimes the darkness can see you.
Professional Reviews
Spine Tingling
Finally, I’m getting around to writing this review. After reading the first book in this series, The Haunting of Highdown Hall, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on this book. Let me just say, I grew up on dark supernatural and horror. From a young age I probably saw more movies and read more books in the genre than I should have. I had nightmares because of James Herbert and Stephen King books, and one of the first movies on our home cinema(a projector and screen) was The Masque of the Red Death. So I don’t scare all that easily.
I knew from teasers and the author that this would be a darker story that the first. I more or less laughed it off. Reality is so much more frightening than fantasy, the idea that something could happen rather than something that is impossible. Shani Struthers knows how to take a scenario right up to the line of possibility. That’s what makes this book so creepy.
In saying all that, it took me longer to get through than I expected. It was a lot to take in and even when I wasn’t reading it, I was still thinking about it.
Ruby and the team at Psychic Surveys are back, along with Ruby’s matriarchal psychically gifted family. The book starts out as expected with Ruby and co. helping spooks to find their way back into the light. It quickly takes on a darker tone when she is called to the home of a deeply troubled young man convinced he is being stalked by something evil. Ruby tries her best to help him but the encounter opens a doorway in her memory to a dark encounter of her own.
“I see you, Ruby, I see you.”
Colour me chilled to the bone with that line.
And so begins an escalating fight between good and evil where Ruby is the prize. Ruby isn’t about to lose herself so easily, and neither are her friends and family, especially her mum, Jessica, who has been little more than a zombie for many years.
There is a lot of detail in this book, a lot of history on Ruby’s life before the first book, on spiritualism and the history of occult. It’s a meaty read but I found, especially in earlier chapters, that the reader gets a little break to digest while characters went about their daily lives and give a real sense of who they are and what they are about. This is important to making the reader want to root for them. This story is layered and deep, thought provoking while not being pretentious.
Shani Struthers once again shows why she is an automatic buy for me. Her writing is fantastic, her prose tight and realistic with enough description of surroundings and characters to completely submerge the reader in to the world she has created. Everything was tied up at the end, there were no characters left dangling over cliffs. I got a sense that there may be more darkness to come in future books.
It’s difficult to talk about this book without giving too much away, so I’ll leave it there. It’s a must read, especially for those who read books or come out of a cinema shrugging at what was meant to be spine tingling.
Great Supernatural Horror Story
The opening prologue of this stunningly unusual second book in the series, instantly grabs you by the throat. We meet Ruby, a young psychic child, one already well used to communicating with spirits, finding herself confronted with one who is not human or ever was.
Fast-forward 18 years and Ruby now runs a successful domestic spiritual clearance business, called Psychic Surveys, using psychic detection to solve old crimes.
In the course of her job, she encounters an angry ghost and tries to help it move on, but this turns out to be no ordinary haunting. Usually good at her job, she finds herself confronted by something very unexpected. Something she may not be able to do anything about, as something from her past comes back to haunt her.
On a lighter note, all psychics have a spirit guide, and Ruby’s is far from ordinary. Hilariously different and fiercely protective, Ruby’s guide is a dog called Jed.
This book has everything. Well written with very believable characters.
A nightmare ending, brilliantly suspenseful and gripping.
I enjoyed reading it immensely.
A Fabulous Continuation of a Wonderful Series
Ok when I say this is a five star book I'm lying but only because this book deserves way, way more than five stars, in fact it deserves a galaxy full of stars!
I really, really enjoyed the first book in this series and really could not wait to get my hands on this book. For me the first book was perfect and I will admit I wanted desperately to see where the wonderful Ms Struthers was going to take me and I was not disappointed in the least.
This story is a rollercoaster ride from the very beginning and a dark one at that. Hell it terrified me in places and yet from the darkness came so much light, not only in the book but in my perception of the words that Ms Struthers imparts. I was truly thrilled to see the wonderful Jed appeared throughout this book as well as all the other characters. Ruby, Cash and the team were magnificent and I found myself being pulled along by them as their story unfolded, almost to the point where I was there with them living the story although thankfully I finished reading this in the daylight otherwise I would have scared myself silly.
Ms Struthers truly has surpassed herself with this story and for me she is my Mistress of all things paranormal.
I highly recommend reading this series as quite frankly for me it is true perfection.
In a near-future Baltimore, an unemployed bipolar journalist and a teenage hacker are the last hope for a dystopian world controlled by a giant media corporation.
Let your children enjoy the wonders and adventures of pets that join a family, bringing joy and heartwarming moments to their everyday lives. This story is about Tubby and Riley, two dogs who needed a good, loving home.
The Psychic Dimension, Part II (558 pages) is a collection of 36 sci-fi/paranormal stories and the new work is the companion book to Jay Dubya's The Psychic Dimension.
