Ghost Roads series

## Genre Information

Urban Fantasy
Ghosts

 (Series Content Ratings Click on Explicit Ratings for details.)

## About the Series

* **Genres:** Urban Fantasy, Ghosts
* **Theme:** ghost story told from the ghost's perspective.
* **Narrative style:** Told in first person by Rose and is alternately presented in present day and flashbacks.

## Series Description

This is a book of ghost stories about the afterlife of Rose Marshall, the sixteen-year old prom date who never actually made it to the prom. She's a "hitcher" now, a type of ghost who haunts the roadways looking for a ride. If a living person loans her a coat or a sweater, wearing it makes her solid again—until she takes it off, or dawn, whichever comes first. Sometimes she can identify and ride with people who are heading for an accident. Sometimes she can help them not get killed. Other times she can't stop them from dying, but she can lead their soul through the twilight to where they need to go. The author has created an interesting twilight world, where spirits of the dead occupy various levels and have various roles to play. Rose Marshall, despite having died at 16 in 1952, is a fully developed character who is believable as a person (ghost?), and I was rooting for her all the way.

## Books in Series

1. Sparrow Hill Road (Ghost Roads Book 1) (2014)
2. The Girl in the Green Silk Gown (Ghost Roads Book 2) (2018)
3. Angel of the Overpass (Ghost Roads Book 3) (2021)

#### Shorts, Novellas, Anthologies and Guides

* 0.9. *Good Girls go to Heaven* (Ghost Roads 0.9) (2010)
* 1.1 *Train Yard Blues* in "Coins of Chaos" an anthology (2013)
* 1.2 *The Ghosts of Bourbon Street* (Ghost Roads #1.2) (2014) (51 pages)

## World Building

### Setting

* Last Dance Diner: Rose's hub; run by Emma, a bean sidhe—safe haven for Rose and other Hitchers;

### Fantasy Elements

Ghosts, ghostroads, twilight world, spirits, rulers of the crossroads, route-witches, other supernatural road creatures, bean sidhe, cars imbued with spirits, , , ,

### World

Welcome to the midnight America, the place where people go when they slip into the cracks between light and darkness, a world of routewitches and oracles, demons and ambulomancers. It's the place where a man named Bobby Cross sold his soul to live forever...and where one pretty little dead girl is racing to save herself and stop the killings that began on Sparrow Hill Road. The rules are different here, and everyone's playing for keeps. Be careful. Be cautious. And listen to the urban legends, because they may be the only things that can save you from the man who waits at the crossroads, hunting souls to keep himself alive.

Welcome to the ghostroads.

Sparrow Hill Road (May 2014, DAW) is the story of Rose Marshall, who was the first victim of the man called Bobby Cross, although she was far from the last—and unlike most of them, she did not go easy into that good night. Sixty years down the line, she's still kicking ass, taking names, and more than a little bit pissed off about the way that she died. You want a good little ghost who'll stay where she's put and only haunt the people who deserve it? Go to a sleepover. You want the real story of the American ghostroads? Come and have a word with Rose.

### Protagonist

Rose Marshall
Everyone knows the urban legend about the girl who asks for a ride home; the one who turns out to have been dead all along. But where did she come from? Who was she? And how did she die? She's been called a lot of things: the Phantom Prom Day, the Girl in the Diner, and the Spirit of Sparrow Hill Road. Around here, we call her Rose.
Rose Marshall was sixteen years old in 1952, pretty as a picture, and in the wrong place at the wrong time. A drive along Sparrow Hill Road turned into a fight for her life—a fight she was destined to lose. Her story could have ended there, but a lucky break and a well-timed ride home set her on a different path. She's been running down the ghostroads ever since, one more casualty who never made it home.
A lot of people have said a lot of things about her; she's been called everything from angel to devil, from ghost story to myth to something more. They whisper her name everywhere from Michigan to Maine, from Wyoming to Washington...but no one knows what really happened that long-ago night at the top of Sparrow Hill. — Not until now.
## Book Descriptions

Sparrow Hill Road (Ghost Roads Book 1) (2014)
Rose Marshall died in 1952 in Buckley Township, Michigan, run off the road by a man named Bobby Cross—a man who had sold his soul to live forever, and intended to use her death to pay the price of his immortality. Trouble was, he didn’t ask Rose what she thought of the idea. It’s been more than sixty years since that night, and she’s still sixteen, and she’s still running. They have names for her all over the country: the Girl in the Diner. The Phantom Prom Date. The Girl in the Green Silk Gown. Mostly she just goes by “Rose,” a hitchhiking ghost girl with her thumb out and her eyes fixed on the horizon, trying to outrace a man who never sleeps, never stops, and never gives up on the idea of claiming what’s his. She’s the angel of the overpass, she’s the darling of the truck stops, and she’s going to figure out a way to win her freedom. After all, it’s not like it can kill her. You can’t kill what’s already dead.
The Girl in the Green Silk Gown (Ghost Roads Book 2) (2018)

> *Once and twice and thrice around,
>
> Put your heart into the ground.
>
> Four and five and six tears shed,
>
> Give your love unto the dead.
>
> Seven shadows on the wall,
>
> Eight have come to watch your fall:
>
> One’s for the gargoyle, one’s for the grave,
>
> And the last is for the one you’ll never save.*

For Rose Marshall, death has long since become the only life she really knows. She’s been sweet sixteen for more than sixty years, hitchhiking her way along the highways and byways of America, sometimes seen as an avenging angel, sometimes seen as a killer in her own right, but always Rose, the Phantom Prom Date, the Girl in the Green Silk Gown.
The man who killed her is still out there, thanks to a crossroads bargain that won’t let him die, and he’s looking for the one who got away. When Bobby Cross comes back into the picture, there’s going to be hell to pay—possibly literally.
Rose has worked for decades to make a place for herself in the twilight. Can she defend it, when Bobby Cross comes to take her down? Can she find a way to navigate the worlds of the living and the dead, and make it home before her hitchhiker’s luck runs out?
There’s only one way to know for sure.

> *Nine will let you count the cost:
>
> All you had and all you lost.
>
> Ten is more than time can tell,
>
> Cut the cord and ring the bell.
>
> Count eleven, twelve, and then,
>
> Thirteen takes you home again.
>
> One’s for the shadow, one’s for the tree,
>
> And the last is for the blessing of Persephone.*

Angel of the Overpass (Ghost Roads Book 3) (2021)
*Lady of shadows, keeper of changes, plant the seeds of faith within me, that I might grow and flourish, that I might find my way through danger and uncertainty to the safety of your garden. Let my roots grow strong and my skin grow thick, that I might stand fast against all who would destroy me. Grant to me your favor, grant to me your grace, and when my time is done, grant to me the wisdom to lay my burdens down and rest beside you, one more flower in a sea of blooms, where nothing shall ever trouble me again.*
Rose Marshall died when she was sixteen years old and on her way to her high school prom. She hasn’t been resting easy since then—Bobby Cross, the man who killed her, got away clean after running her off the road, and she’s not the kind of girl who can let something like that slide. She’s been looking for a way to stop him since before they put her body in the ground.
But things have changed in the twilight world where the spirits of the restless dead continue their “lives.” The crossroads have been destroyed, and Bobby’s protections are gone. For the first time, it might be possible for Rose to defeat him.
Not alone, though. She’ll need every friend she’s managed to make and every favor she’s managed to add to her account if she wants to stand a chance…and this may be her last chance to be avenged, since what is Bobby Cross without the crossroads?
## References

1. ↑  Goodreads reader reveiw
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Seanan McGuire's Website: Sparrow Hill Road