Monday, February 20, 2012

ON THE DAY I DIED: STORIES FROM THE GRAVE by Candace Fleming

Review ARC courtesy of NetGalley.com.
Release date: July 10, 2012

ON THE DAY I DIED by Candace Fleming is the best bunch of ghost stories I've ever had the pleasure to read.  I wanted to savory each story, but at the same time, I couldn't wait to start reading the next one.

It all begins with Mike.  He picks up a young girl alongside the highway.  She appears to be drenched and tells a tale of a lake and a boat and a near drowning.  Mike proceeds to offer her a ride home and later drops her off at an isolated lane. 

Shortly after dropping her off, Mike glances at the floor on the passenger side of the car and sees a pair of saddle shoes.  Still the kind, Good Samaritan, Mike turns around and heads down the country lane.  When he arrives at the lone house at the end of the lane, he is greeted at the door by a woman who informs him that Carol Anne has been dead for fifty years.  If Mike truly wants to return her shoes, he'll have to take them to the cemetery.

Mike decides to do just that only to discover a decomposing pile of saddle shoes covering Carol Anne's grave.  He also discovers that the cemetery if filled with the graves of only young people.  And so begins his night of adventure as one by one the ghosts of those young people appear to share the tales of their final days.

Mike learns of fires, revenge, haunted wallpaper and a father's teeth, Al Capone, a possessed hood ornament, and even a monkey's paw.  Each story is more fascinating than the next.  The storytellers reveal the tragic circumstances of their deaths in often disturbing detail that is sure to captivate readers just as they captivated Mike.

Author Candace Fleming connects the dots from one story to the next in her comments at the end of the book.  All the stories have a Chicago backdrop even though they stretch from mid-1800 to the present.  ON THE DAY I  DIED would make a fine addition to any bookshelf.

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