Deadly Night by Heather Graham
‘Flynn Brothers’ trilogy Book #1
Mass Market Paperback: 400 pages – Publisher: Mira (October 1, 2008 ) – Language: English – ISBN-10: 0778325857 – ISBN-13: 978-0778325857
Back of the Book reads:
The Flynn brothers have inherited more than a New Orleans plantation. They’ve inherited a ghostly presence … and a long-kept secret.
Aidan Flynn, a private investigator and eldest of the Flynn brothers, scoffs at the haunted-house rumors – especially since Kendall Montgomery, a tarot card reader who has been living in the mansion, is the one to tell him the tale of a woman in white. But when he finds a human bone on the grounds and another by the river, Aidan delves into the dark history of the Flynn plantation.
Forced together to uncover the truth, Aidan and Kendall realize that a serial killer whose victims seem to vanish into thin air has long been at work … and that their own fates are about to be sealed forever unless they believe in the unbelievable.
5-Nov-08 to 7-Nov-08
Review: A ‘hauntingly’ good mystery.
Aidan and his two brothers, Jeremy and Zachary, have inherited an old plantation in New Orleans from an aunt they didn’t even know existed. The Flynn plantation has a hauntingly sad but beautiful back-story. Their ancestors have been depicted in the history books as two cousins who killed each other over a woman. Later, the story is cleared up do to an old diary. Seems they hadn’t killed each other over a woman, but rather a case of mistaken identiy while defending said woman.
But Aidan doesn’t believe in ghosts or hauntings. He’s found two different thigh bones, both belonging to different women, one on the grounds of the plantation, the other down by the river. Aidan, a private investigator, is a man who prefers to deal with facts. What he wasn’t prepared for was Kendall.
A tarot card reader, Kendall has a degree in psychology, and she doesn’t really believe in ghosts or hauntings either. Until the Death card starts to literally laugh at her. Every time the Death card has ever laughed at her, the women whose cards she’s reading seems to disappear without a trace.
Aidan doesn’t like Kendall; he believes she’s a quack right from their first meeting, not knowing her background. Kendall doesn’t like Aidan; he’s arrogant, a jerk, and because he believes she’s a quack when she really isn’t. He doesn’t approve of tarot readers – he believes they are nothing but frauds. And that gets her back up.
Thrown together, albeit reluctantly, both are determined to find out what’s going on.
**There’s a reason why I like Heather Graham’s novels. She’s an awesome writer. She intrigues a reader with a mystery that’s not always easy to figure out. I, for one, was surprised at the end when I found out who it was. I hadn’t suspected him whatsoever. She writes with simply, incredible details to her scenery so that you can picture everything vividly. Her characters always seem real and interesting. And when she adds her ghostly presenses, they seem real, even when the characters don’t believe what they’re seeing.
I loved the sad history of the plantation. The mistaken identity while both cousins are defending one’s wife.
Aidan and Kendall; while I did feel like they were attracted to each other, I didn’t really feel that spark that should be there. I think that could have used a little ‘oomph’, just a little more of a spark between them. They argued, they irked each other, and I think I’d have felt a bigger spark if they’d had a huge fight, a monumental argument between the two.
And there is an error in the book, one that shouldn’t really make a difference but it does sit uncomfortably with a reader. When one victim is supposed to be vacationing in one place, and yet the investigation is routed somewhere different (a huge difference between Ireland and Venezuela.)
I also found it a tad slow. I think there should have been more action, whether on the heros’ part or the villain’s. Disfigured and dismembered voodoo dolls and being plunged into the dark wasn’t enough. The end of the story almost makes up for it. Would I recommend it? Yes!
Rating: 
