The Graveyard Queen

 THE RESTORER

Amanda Stevens

MIRA

April 2011

I can't quite remember how I ran across The Restorer, as scary books aren't usually my cup of tea. I was glad to have found it however and recently re-read it in preparation for the next two books in the series coming out March-April. Even though I don't like getting scared much I am always ready for a good ghost story.

Amelia Gray, a young woman in her twenties, has been able to see ghosts since she was a child. The ability was passed down to her from her father and he has passed on some unbreakable rules. Never let a ghost know she can see them, never stray far from hallowed ground and never form a relationship with a "haunted man". The reason for this is: if they know she can see them, they will latch on and drain her energy and her very life. Draining a living person is how ghosts maintain a hold on the living world. Despite this Amelia has become a cemetery restorer known as The Graveyard Queen after the blog that she writes. Her father's rules have produced a secretive, repressed woman who has few friends and no confidants. By the end of The Restorer, Amelia has violated all the rules and life will never be the same.

Set in Charleston SC, Amelia is restoring a long neglected historic cemetery on the campus of fictional Emerson College. When the body of a brutalized co-ed is found in the cemetery she is called in by John Devlin, a detective on the Charleston Police Force. The attraction between the two is immediate. One problem though, Devlin is trailed by the ghost of his dead wife and daughter. Amelia knows she needs to stay away but more bodies are turning up, some of which are years old. A serial killer is using the cemetery as his playing field.

Amanda Stevens has wonderful descriptive powers. One can almost feel the heat and humidity of Charleston. She builds a claustrophobic atmosphere throughout the book and adds in lore from the "gullah" low country culture. There are all sorts of references to burial iconography and tradition that I found fascinating. I had figured out the perpetrator, but not how or why. That's the real corker!! In fact, after this second reading I will raise my rating from 4 to 5. Highly recommended!!!

Rating- 5 Tombstones