This third installment in Simon R. Green’s Ghost Finders series does not disappoint, but fans of the Nightside and Secret Histories beware: while the series happens in the same world and timeline, this one is significantly different from the other two.
Ghost Finders is harder to put your finger on, you’ll never know what you’ll get ’til the next volume is ready and published.
The first one, Ghost of a Chance, was distinctively more gruesome and horror than we’ve come to expect from this author. The second one, Ghost of a Smile, was far more sci-fi meets horror.
With this third part, Ghost of a Dream, Green has written a novel in the style of classic ghost stories, but without ever being truly scary (and I scare of ghost stories easily, I’m not ashamed to admit it).
I quite enjoy this incoherence in style, but I can imagine that some might find it very annoying.
The main characters: Our Carnacki Institute A-list team of ghost finders composed of J.C., Melody and the perpetually miserable telepath Happy is, of course, starring in this tale and off again to punish the supernatural unruly and lay the restless death, well, to rest.
We discover more about the big villain of the tale and I do really wonder where the author is taking this particular meta-plot. I have to admit that it really feels like the quiet before the storm with this novel.
Steampunk fans will eat their heart out: Victorian villains, steam trains, ghosts, steampunk science, mediums and all manner of creepy befitting the genre without being genre in itself, just as we’ve come to expect and love from Simon Green.
I have to admit that it has taken a while for the Ghost Finders series to grow on me and while I still don’t love it as much as Secret Histories, and especially the Nightside, I am really enjoying it and I look forward to the next installment a bit more with each book.
As always, you don’t actually have to read this Simon R. Green series in chronological order, so if you’re just into a good ghost story and nothing else, don’t fear, you could still read this easily.
