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annathepiperThis is a re-read for me, of course--any one of Barbara Michaels' books would be. But what with being sick this weekend, I felt myself in profound need of a comfort read, something that wouldn't engage too many of my weary brain cells, yet keep me occupied nonetheless. So to my stock of old favorites I went.
It's a bit hard for me to grasp that this book is forty years old as of this year; a part of me still remembers reading Michaels for the first time in high school, sharply and clearly, like I'd only just now put the books back on their shelves. And yet, it's been long enough since I've read this one that not only had I forgotten most of the plot and the characters, I'd pulled away from it enough that I could definitely see its dated-ness. Much of this is in the trappings: the styles of the clothes the characters wear, the references to the Beatles, to hippies, to protest music and recreational drugs--and less in the plot. But a lot of it is also in the plot: characters who are otherwise rational people stumbling across a genuine occurrence of the supernatural and having to figure out how to lay ghosts to rest is certainly a hoary old standby any way you look at it.
But the fun with Michaels is, she just does these sorts of plots so well. Dated-ness aside, this book gets points for having the POV character be the fortysomething aunt figure, not the twentysomething pretty young thing. Which of course also means that the primary romantic figure is the fiftysomething rugged guy, rather than the twentysomething, overly affected, foppish bearded youth. Yet these four characters, as the central core of the action, play off one another very well as they work together to ferret out the cause behind the haunting of Ruth Bennett's house. So yeah, not Michaels' shining best, but fun all around. Three stars.
It's a bit hard for me to grasp that this book is forty years old as of this year; a part of me still remembers reading Michaels for the first time in high school, sharply and clearly, like I'd only just now put the books back on their shelves. And yet, it's been long enough since I've read this one that not only had I forgotten most of the plot and the characters, I'd pulled away from it enough that I could definitely see its dated-ness. Much of this is in the trappings: the styles of the clothes the characters wear, the references to the Beatles, to hippies, to protest music and recreational drugs--and less in the plot. But a lot of it is also in the plot: characters who are otherwise rational people stumbling across a genuine occurrence of the supernatural and having to figure out how to lay ghosts to rest is certainly a hoary old standby any way you look at it.
But the fun with Michaels is, she just does these sorts of plots so well. Dated-ness aside, this book gets points for having the POV character be the fortysomething aunt figure, not the twentysomething pretty young thing. Which of course also means that the primary romantic figure is the fiftysomething rugged guy, rather than the twentysomething, overly affected, foppish bearded youth. Yet these four characters, as the central core of the action, play off one another very well as they work together to ferret out the cause behind the haunting of Ruth Bennett's house. So yeah, not Michaels' shining best, but fun all around. Three stars.
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