A Specter of Justice

September 28, 2015
In de Castrique’s lively fifth Sam Blackman mystery (after 2013’s A Murder in Passing), Sam helps organize a ghost tour of Asheville, N.C., to raise money for the two orphaned children of a client, Helen Atwood, after Helen’s abusive husband murders her. When Sam finds one of the actors in the ghost tour hanging from a noose on a bridge, he quickly transforms from volunteer tour guide to investigator. Later, after more actors start dying, suspicion for the deaths falls on Sam’s employer, DA Hewitt Donaldson. Little seems to be at stake in the languidly paced investigation, despite the high body count, but the complex relationship between Sam, a man dedicated to bringing criminals to justice, and Hewitt, a lawyer often willing to bend the law to save his clients from jail, will keep readers turning the pages. Agent: Linda Allen, Linda Allen Literary Agency.

October 1, 2015

When two murders mimic old Asheville, NC, ghost stories and the evidence points to a friend, defense lawyer Hewitt Donaldson, PI Sam Blackman, and his girlfriend must work to find the real killer and free Hewitt. The fifth entry in a well-written regional series (after A Murder in Passing).

Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 15, 2015
Two little boys are orphaned when their parents are killed during a domestic-violence trial. The people of Asheville, North Carolina, plan a fund-raiser for the boys. Private investigator Sam Blackman, who had been testifying when the murders occurred and feels guilty, agrees to help out when his girlfriend, Nakayla, asks him to work with the Asheville Apparitions, who want to create a fund-raising ghost tour of the town, using members of the group as reenactors. Sam agrees to act as storyteller at the bridge where a woman hung herself years earlier. When the first tour group comes by, an actual woman tumbles down from the bridge, dangling from a noose and very much dead. Then another of the reenactors dies in a re-creation across town, and the hunt is on for the killer. Sam and Nakayla work with the police to help solve the murders, while more of the town's history unfolds. Lots of interesting characters and some nice twists help make the pages fly by. A good choice for anyone who enjoys small-town mysteries and ghost stories.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)