Reviewed by Carissa

 

TITLE:  Spirit

AUTHOR:  John Inman

PUBLISHER:  Dreamspinner Press

LENGTH:  214 pages

BLURB:  

 

Jason Day, brilliant designer of video games, is not only a confirmed bachelor, but he’s as gay as a maypole. One wouldn’t think being saddled with his precocious four-year-old nephew for four weeks would be enough to throw him off-kilter.

 

Wrong. Timmy, Jason’s nephew, is a true handful.

 

But just when Timmy and Uncle Jason begin to bond, and Jason feels he’s getting a grip on this babysitting business once and for all, he’s thrown for a loop by a couple of visitors—one from Tucson, the other from beyond the grave.

 

I’m sorry. Say what?

 

Toss a murder, a hot young stud, an unexpected love affair, and a spooky-ass ghost with a weird sense of humor into Jason’s summer plans, and you’ve got the makings for one hell of a ride.

 

REVIEW:  

 

In which John Inman scares me off children’s cartoons for the rest of my life…

 

Jason’s sister, Sally, and her louse boyfriend Jack have decided that they need a vacation.  A month free of stress, work…and Sally’s four-year-old son, Timmy.  So Uncle Jason is called in to act as babysitter.  And while Jason loathes Jack, and has a love/hate relationship with his sister, he kinda loves the kid, so it really isn’t a big problem.  The kid doesn’t have much of a family anyways, what with his dad, Paul, skidooing not long after Timmy was born, so it will be nice for them both to get to know each other.  So…a month watching over one kid, looking after his old dog, and trying to finish up his latest project–should be a piece of cake.

 

If it wasn’t for the ghost that seems to be playing with Jason’s house like it is his own personal arcade.  Or Paul’s brother, Sam, showing up right out of the blue.  Or the fact that Jason would very much like to get into Sam’s pants–almost as much as he would like the ghost to get out of his house.  Or the fact that someone forgot to tell him that babysitting a four-year-old is like trying to wrangle a Tasmanian-devil hopped up on speed.  If it wasn’t for all that…yeah, total piece of cake.

 

This book was, at times, both hilarious and terrifying.  Granted, some of what terrified me is probably not what is going to terrify other people, but throw a four-year-old at me and I am likely to run screaming into the hills (though, when I am writing this, I am currently residing on the side of a hill, so it isn’t exactly like I would have to run all that far).  As always, Inman’s humor was really well done.  I think we just really mesh when it comes to sense of humor, which I am grateful for since I like reading his books.  The addition of the kid in this story did a really good job of lightening some of the darker aspects of this book, at least enough that I won’t be hiding under the covers any time soon.  Unless I see bugs bunny.  Then all bets are off and I’m getting the salt and a very big gun.   But while Timmy was used to add humor to the story, he also added a certain creepy element all his own.  I mean, kids terrify me on the best of days, slightly-possessed children make me want to move into a salt mine or call up the Winchesters (the brothers from Supernatural, not the gunmakers…although they might come in handy as well).  I don’t know what it is about ghost and children that spook me so bad, but this book certainly had the creepy down to an art.  Not so much as I wanted to run away, but not so little as to make it seem trite.

 

I also enjoyed how the mystery of the ghost played out.  I was pretty much decided early on, what with the house’s decided lack of love for Jason’s phone (personally, I would have just opened a window and chucked it outside, but to each their own), but I think I understand why Jason was so persistent in his denial.  Even if it was getting to head-buried-in-sand proportions by the end there.  There were some points where I really just wanted Sam to shake some sense into Jason, but I guess throwing accusations as to who did what to whom wasn’t going to get him all that much nookie.  Even if it was so bloody freaking obvious.

 

I guess I am a little unsure as to why Jason didn’t take the kid and run away after the stove. Or the second phone.  Or the creepy as hell interview with a Looney Tune.  Personally I would have been three states over, bunking in a convent if even half these things had happened to me.  Although…do they even have convents anymore?  Well, whatever the holy-ground equivalent I could find, I would most certainly be camping out there till either the house burned down or the ghost took himself off to whiter-lights.  I get why they didn’t call the cops…since “the cartoon character told me so” isn’t going to go over all that well, but maybe a couple of days in a Holiday Inn or something?

 

Also…at no point does a four-year-old need to see a dead body.  Especially if the body might turn out to be dear-old-dad.  I get not wanting to let Timmy run free (and cause havoc and mayhem while doing so) but to put him up right there, as you and your laddy-love go a diggin’?  Yeah, no.  Jason keeps going on about how much he wants to be a parent, but I’m pretty sure on the list of things you might want to avoid doing with your child, grave-digging is in, at least, the top fifty.

 

This book seemed to hover between humor and horror, not really settling on one or the other.  The creep-factor was definitely there.  The combination of Timmy’s talks and Bugs Bunny is going to keep me in freaky nightmares for a while (thank you very much), but it never really settled on pure scare-tactics.  Mostly because when they were not being actively haunted Sam and Jason were basically living in each other’s pants.  I can’t really stay scared when I am contending with hot table-top blowjobs.  Mostly I just felt off balance for the majority of the book.  I was not sure if I was meant to be scared, or I was supposed to be shrugging the ghost off.  And the combination of both was a tad bit unsettling.  It was a good book, and an entertaining story, but it never felt settled for me.  I think on the second reading I might start to feel it, though, cause I am sure that there is a lot there that I missed when I was just going along for the ride.  And well, I’ve always found John Inman’s books to be well worth the effort.

 

RATING:  

 

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