A House of Ghosts

A House of Ghosts is a shiver inducing beautifully written and immersive story – think Agatha Christie meets M.R. James but done in Mr Ryan’s own indomitable style, which if you’ve read “The Constant Soldier” you’ll know is pretty damn fine.

Its a perfectly pitched mystery, set in wartime, a place and time the author brings to descriptively vivid life. The story itself is most excellent, spies and nefarious goings on, in a haunted house cut off by a storm where nobody is being entirely honest.

Our two main protagonists, Kate and “Donovan” are wonderfully drawn and highly engaging plus ghosts. Yes well, it is a house full of them and not necessarily of the other worldly kind.

I loved it, from the claustrophobic and literally haunted setting to the intelligent mystery elements and all the way to the terror filled finale. Oh and there’s some thought provoking truths about that time in our history thrown in for good measure. A story with many layers which is overwhelmingly entertaining throughout.

Lots of brownie points for this one. Don’t be scared. The dead can’t hurt the living…can they?

Highly Recommended.

As October approaches, readers will be searching for a spooky, atmospheric tale and WC Ryan's story is perfect for chilly winter evenings. His post war setting rings absolutely true and he has combined a genuinely eerie ghost story with a twist ending that took me by complete surprise.. Very enjoyable.

I've had my eye on this for a while, mainly because I loved the cover, and the early reviews looked good. And im so glad I did. A House of Ghosts was a hugely enjoyable read.

From the get go, the story picks up and doesnt let go. I really enjoyed the 2 main PoV characters, Donavan and Kate. They worked well together, and theyboth have a shady past that we are slowly fed more info on as the book progresses. As a side point, there's still a lot more to discover about these characters, so i hope this means we'll be getting a series out of these two!

The story itself is a good old fashioned closed house murder mystery. The setting is perfect; cut off and cold. The supporting cast are varied and colourful. We even have an acceptance that ghosts are real and can be seen to appear throughout the novel, which i felt actually added to the creepiness of the tale.

What i did really love about this though, was the way that the First World War was woven throughout the story. From the grim brutality of life in the trenches and tunnels of the western front, to more subtle mentions of inadequate gas masks and faulty ordinance. These elements, added to the murder and ghost story, combine for a brilliant read.

As the weather turns more towards autumn, so also turns my reading taste towards the more mysterious and darker side of my reading list. I requested this ARC based on the cover and the description, and it did not disappoint.

The setting for this novel feels very reminiscent of And Then There Were None (which is part of the tagline, but definitely deserved) – a remote island off the British coast where a gathering of friends and colourful folk gets cut off from the mainland by a winter storm, only to discover that there are more than ghosts present in the old Abbey – someone with murderous intent walks among them.

We follow a cast of characters, though we only get a few point of views. Kate Cartwright, friend of the Highmount family, is currently in the employ of the British government as a code-breaker. She is teamed up with Donovan, a man of dubious history whose skills become more apparent as things get grimmer on the island – and not just become of the paranormal activity. While the story inherently is a murder mystery set on an island – always a good start – this novel adds to a paranormal edge that is refreshing. I had expected it would play a more significant role in the unraveling of the mystery than it did, but was still a new twist to an old tale.

Kate Cartwright is an main character full of initiative, full of determination not to sit on her hands but be useful, be involved – and finds herself immensely enjoying the thrill of the mystery and the investigation. Despite having some paranormal ability herself (I am still very intrigued about the ‘incident’ that Kate refers to causing such embarrassment for her at Blackwater Abbey previously – I expected it to be elaborated on!), she rarely relies on this to help her, instead using her own intellect and curiosity to further the investigation. Her partnership with Donovan is based on mutual respect for their abilities, as well as their ideas and opinions, which is a pleasant deviation from the trope where the main characters go behind each others backs, or the male character insists the female characters stay safe and protected at all times. Instead throughout the book they decide on their next steps together, and the consequences of this they face together as well.

The mystery itself was engaging enough, though could have been more elaborate. There were some leaps of logic, but the interaction between the characters and suspects was interesting enough to make up for any holes or vague points in the narrative. I highly enjoyed Kate and Donovan’s teamwork and chemistry, and I hope that we will get to see what happens in their next adventure – the ending left some room for a sequel, which I would very happily read!

If you like a country house murder mystery with the added ingredients of espionage and ghostly visitations, a combination of Agatha Christie and John Buchan then this could well be to your liking. Set just before the winter solstice of 1917 the story takes place at the eponymous creaking and groaning Blackwater Abbey which stands on a windswept isolated small island off the Devon coast. The war continues to decimate the youth of Europe seemingly without an end in sight and no one appears to be unaffected by it. The owner of the island Lord Highmount an arms manufacturer and his wife Lady Elizabeth are no exception and have recently lost their two sons on the Western Front.

It is against this background that the grief stricken parents arrange a gathering on the island of a group of visitors including mediums Madame Feda and Count Orlov with the hope of reuniting them with the spirits of their departed sons. But as the story unfolds it becomes apparent that there is another ulterior motive concerning unmasking the perpetrator of espionage who has recently supplied the enemy with certain details of Highmount's weaponry thereby threatening the country's ensuing war effort.

Also attending the gathering at the behest of the secret service are Kate Cartwright and Robert Donovan who will assist in tracking down and unmasking the spy. But this is more than a straight forward spy novel, for Blackwater Abbey is really haunted by ghosts and Kate possesses the ability to see them.

Ofcourse once all the guests have arrived the weather immediately deteriorates and the island becomes cutoff from the mainland until the storms subside. We are also aware from the opening pages that there is another uninvited guest who has made his way onto the island and will be living rough but who he is and what is his purpose will not be revealed until the conclusion of the story.

The plot itself moves along at a blisteringly pace which is helped by the short concise chapters which often end on a dramatic moment. The old house populated with a plethora of spirits and with its creaking floorboards and hidden tunnels becomes another character in the book. I also like how the author W.C. Ryan recreates the sense of loss, despair and melancholy that permeated all levels of society together with evoking the grim reality of war. If you are looking for a reasonably quick entertaining read then you may well find this of interest.

A very good read with lots of twists and turns. Atmospheric scenarios loaded with anticipation of scares to come! Definitely recommended.

A House of Ghosts by W.C. Ryan

The winter solstice of 1917 is approaching and Lord Highmount has arranged a meeting of spiritualists and friends at his old and creaking house, Blackwater Abbey, located on a small island off the Devon coast. Lord Highmount and his wife Lady Elizabeth recently lost both of their sons in the war. The boys disappeared from their lives and they’re missed desperately. Lady Elizabeth believes that mediums Madame Feda and Count Orlov will unite her with their spirits. There are other visitors to the house, including a doctor who believes that his patient, a traumatised soldier, is in touch with the dead due to his own traumatic near-death experience. They have come to the right place.

And then there are Kate Cartwright and Robert Donovan. Kate and Donavon are at the house on a mission from Britain’s secret service. Lord Highmount is a successful industrialist contributing to the war effort. There are reasons to believe some of his plans have ended up on German desks and this ‘house party’ will provide the perfect opportunity to trap a spy. But there is far more to Kate than meets the eye.

A House of Ghosts is a stunning novel, a thoroughly absorbing read that combines a chilling ghost story – because it is indeed set within a house of ghosts – with a tale of war. The First World War overshadows everything in this novel. Almost everyone in the house has either lost someone to the war or has fought in it themselves and is recovering from its nightmare. It’s hardly surprising that the dead are restless.

Blackwater Abbey provides the perfect location, especially as it is cut off from the land by a mid winter storm. The house itself might be frightening but the outside is no less deadly. There is no escape for our small group of suspects when one of their number is found murdered. This classic murder mystery scenario, so well executed here, is reason enough to enjoy A House of Ghosts but it is enhanced by its melancholic mood, the result of war and loss, and by the very real chill of its ghosts for this is a house where the dead far outnumber the living.

Kate Cartwright and Donovan are the characters we grow closest to and they’re an enigmatic pair. I particularly enjoyed Kate’s attitude to the spiritual world around her, which contrasts so vividly to the attitude of Madame Feda. Kate is enduring her own loss. There is someone she too would like to contact. But all are distracted by the murderer stalking the house – is this person real?

As the evenings draw in, A House of Ghosts is the perfect read. It’s so easy to lose yourself in it. It’s beautifully written – as you’d expect from the author of The Constant Soldier – and richly evocative of its time and setting. It’s frightening in places but also, rather unexpectedly, I found it comforting and warm, despite the chill of its winter storm. It provides food for thought, particularly on the devastating harm of war, and is impossible to put down.

Other reviews
The Constant Soldier

A genuine classic whodunit, with a touch of ghostly goings on! It really has all the ingredients. An island cut off by a storm, murders, seances, a diminishing cast of possible murderers.
One to enjoy on a winter's evening.
Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC

This story is a wonderfully clever cross between a detective story and a ghost story. The ghosts are very real, one of the main characters can see them all the time but whether they do or don't have anything to do with the sinister goings on forms a central part of the mystery.
The tale, set in the middle of the Great War, follows two people, an ex soldier and a young lady who works in military intelligence, as they are sent by C - head of the fledgling secret service, to an isolated island where a séance is to be held. C is interested, amongst other things, in finding out which of the guests has leaked weapons blueprints to the enemy but there is more to his motive than a simple case of espionage. The other guests at the former abbey all seem to have some secret and these are gradually revealed as the story moves forward. As a storm sets in and prevents help coming from the mainland attacks start to occur culminating in murder.
There is an obvious comparison to Agatha Christie's 'And Then There Are None' with a somewhat motley collection of disparate people ending up trapped together on an island but there the similarity ends. One of the lead characters, Donovan, is acting as a detective and the motives and past histories of the characters are more up front than in Christie's work.
The supernatural element adds a lovely twist as we know that the ghosts, some of whom are known to the characters and others who are not, are watching proceedings with interest.
Chapters are told, predominantly in an alternating fashion, from the point of view of the two leading protagonists with occasional diversions to other members of the party.
This is an effective technique as it keeps the action moving swiftly and, as the writing has that 'just one more chapter' appeal about it, makes the book hard to put down.
The ending resolves all the main plot points but also, happily, seems to leave open the possibility of more stories featuring our intrepid duo of investigators.
I loved the book and I hope that the author will tell us more about the characters in a sequel (or two or three.)
Highly recommended - I wish I could give it six stars!

I wasn't sure what to expect when I started this novel. Was it a ghost story? A thriller? A WWI novel? Well, it's really a mixture of all three,

By 1917, thousands of young men had died in the First World War, or had been reported missing. Many families desperate for closure turned to seances and spiritualists, even those who would never have countenanced such beliefs before the war. A House of Ghosts is riven with such losses, and chock-full of those happy to take advantage of grieving parents.

Lord Highmount has arranged a spiritualist gathering to contact his two sons who have been lost in the conflict, hosted at his country house, Blackwater Abbey, on an island off the Devon coast,

Kate Cartwright and the mysterious Donovan are sent (separately) by the Head of the Secret Intelligence Service to the island to join the house party. Their job is to try to unmask the spy who is passing top secret armament plans to the Germans. It's known that it must be one of Lord Highmount's guests - but which one? Then, a storm descends on the island, and the guests find themselves trapped. And one of them is subsequently murdered. But who did it? Was it the spy? Or are they the victim?

What is relatively unusual in this novel is how the ghosts are treated by the majority of the characters, which is in a very matter of fact way. I quite enjoyed the descriptions of Kate's 'special' gift, and how it impinges on her everyday life. I wouldn't describe this as bone-chilling, but there are some genuinely creepy moments in the dark!

I really enjoyed this novel; it feels as if the author has set this up to be a series which is good news, as I definitely want to see Kate and Donovan in action again!

As the dark autumn nights begin to draw in, WC Ryan gives us historical fiction in the form of a dark supernatural novel set on a isolated Blackwater Island, off the Devon coast. This takes place in the Winter of 1917 where a ferocious battle is taking place between Germany and Britain and its allies to win the war at any cost. In this story of the military intelligence services, there are concerns that key pieces of strategic knowledge are finding their way into German hands. Kate Cartwright is a woman with rather special talents and gifts working in the coding breaking section. She has lost her brother, Arthur, reported missing in action in the trenches in Europe and her fiance, Rolleson Miller-White has broken off their engagement, which fortunately she is not too upset about. Captain Robert Donovan has intimate knowledge of the horrors of trench warfare, but is now working in espionage routing out traitors.

Kate has been tasked to accept an invitation from family friends, the armaments manufacturer Lord Francis Highmount and his wife, Lady Elizabeth, to join a party of guests at their island planning spiritualist activities to contact the dead, specifically the sons they have lost to the war, Reginald and Algernon. She is to go undercover, taking her ex-fiance, Rolleson, pretending they are still together, and Donovan is to be Rolleson's valet. The weather is frightful, with heavy winter storms and snow blizzards, Blackwater Island and Abbey are cut off from the mainland. The Abbey is an atmospheric place exuding an army of ghosts from the past that can be felt by the present day inhabitants, some more than others. Two well known mediums have been invited, Count Dmitri Orlov and Madame Feda, to conduct the seances. A troubled soldier, a tunneler, Private Albert Simms, is under the medical care of Dr Reid. Kate has brought with her an old family heirloom, the FitzAubrey Glass Mirror, which yields its secrets only to the women in the family. Kate and Donovan find no-one is who they appear to be in this story of lies, deception, traitors and spies as danger in the form of murder, attacks and sabotage swirl around them as the worst of raging storms cuts them off from the outside world and help.

The supernatural elements are not key to the central focus of the novel but they do lend a tremendous amount of atmosphere to this almost Agatha Christie like tale of remote islands, aristocrats, an ancient haunted country house in the form of the Abbey, and, of course, a party of guests. There is plenty of tension and suspense as Kate and Donovan follow the leads to try and identify the perpetrators of the dark deeds that begin to take place in a creaking house full of ghosts and secrets. The war time losses, the need to hunt down traitors and get ahead of the Germans in the war are captured beautifully in this period piece. I found this a wonderfully entertaining read that is perfect for this time of the year. Many thanks to Bonnier Zaffre for an ARC.

I enjoyed this book but in a different way to what I expected, it defintely was more a murder mystery book than the supernatural kind I was expecting , don't get me wrong theres ghosts and bumps in the night a plenty but not as spooky as i was hoping. Great book , well told story and lovely little twist. Well worthy of 4 stars.

Reader, I read this.
In daylight as, well, I wasn't sure
But it was ghostly and spooky but ok....

Blackwater Abbey on a fictional island off the coast in Devon makes this sound very chilling and otherworldly. It reminded me early on of that house and island in the Agatha Christie novel And then There were None. The grey walls, the sharp and jagged rocks below, the howling winds and then there's the strange noises...

This is not a straight forward ghost story though as the ghosts are not what and who you think they might be. Well not exactly. It's hard to say too much without giving anything away but it's a goosebumpy ride getting there!

I think what really makes this a shivery read is the fact that the spiritualists are trying to get in touch with the ghosts of those lost in the war. And so the history and backstory of a lot of people comes out as do their secrets....and lies

An immersive read.

This novel is a mix of ghost story, mystery, with a touch of espionage and even a little romance. It is 1917 and WWI has been going on for three, long years. Almost every family in Britain has been touched by loss and this includes Kate Cartwright, whose brother was recently killed. Kate is working as a code-breaker, when she is asked by Captain Sir Mansfield Smith-Cumming (known as ‘C’ and Head of the Secret Intelligence Service) to take up the offer of a visit to Black Water Abbey, home of Lord and Lady Highmount, on Black Water Island; a remote island off the coast of Devon. She had, initially, refused the suggestion, even though her parents were visiting, as she was once engaged to Reginald Highmount, recently also killed in the war, along with his brother. The invitation had also included her fiancé, Rolleston Miller-White, but this relationship has also broken down.

As well as the awkward discomfort about her personal relationships, Kate is unwilling to attend the winter solstice at Black Water Abbey, knowing that the purpose for the visit includes two guests involved with spiritualism. Although Kate can, herself, see spirits, she has no sympathy with séances. However, when told that some Top Secret Plans have recently been taken from Lord Highmount, an arms manufacturer, and ended up in German hands, she knows she has no choice. Accompanying her, and Rolleston to the island, is Captain Donovan, masquerading as Miller-White’s ‘man,’ but really there as all of the guests now at the island were also present when the plans were stolen. Donovan and Kate need to join forces to keep Lord Highmount safe and protect sensitive documents.

All of the guests seem to have a motive for wishing Lord Highmount ill; many of which involve his production of weapons and the carnage wreaked by the war. The storm tossed island, with its assorted cast of possible suspects give a good sense of atmosphere. This is, in places, a little busy in terms of plot. There are secret passages, bad weather, an island cut off from outside help and more than a touch of mystery at every turn and that is not mentioning the stream of spirits that seem to surround Kate. I liked Kate and Donovan, though, and hope they return in further adventures, as I feel they have more to offer. I received a copy of this book from the publisher, via NetGalley, for review.