Review: Summer Love meets a Ghost
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 06 25, 2014
In a genre that has been over-run by werewolves and vampires, it stands to reason that other preternatural and paranormal critters would join the fray. There are authors who are writing paranormal romance about gargoyles, angels, demons and other things that go bump in the night, and now there is an influx of ghost romances. This isn’t exactly new, but it’s becoming more common within the genre. The Possession by J. D. Spikes isn’t the typical ghost romance because one of the lovers isn’t a ghost, as is the norm. Instead, the two young people at the center of this Young Adult romance find themselves, for lack of a better term, possessed by the spirits of their ancestors in order to help solve the mystery behind their deaths. As the story progresses, we discover that this is not the first time that two people in love have been accosted by these two spirits.It does seem that the predominant way of telling a Young Adult story is through the use of the first person narrator. I like that because most young adults are rather self-absorbed, and telling the story from their point of view just makes the telling of that story more realistic. In the midst of the mystery at the center of the story, Daphne and Zach are also faced with the blush of first love, and the realities of what might happen at the end of their summer. They are confronted with the discrimination present when a couple is of mixed race and how they face that is a beautiful part of the story.While there are sexual overtones to several of the encounters between Daphne and Zach, there are no actual sex scenes. I would recommend this book to readers 14+ and to readers who love a good historical mystery and a good romance.