Private detective Duncan Andrews's best friend Gina is a witch. His dog is a zombie. And his dead boyfriend, Robbie, is a ghost. So it's hardly any wonder that he uses his connection to the supernatural to help him solve cases. Good thing, too, because Duncan has his hands full. Janice Sanderson, the richest woman in Indianapolis, wants him to find her stripper daughter, Brenda, and another client is having some trouble with a specter haunting her family home. On top of that, Duncan has decided to add dating into the mix, though after Robbie's death, he's not sure he's ready.
When Duncan meets Nick while tracking down a lead on Brenda's boyfriend, he shelves his doubts and agrees to a date. Robbie doesn't make it easy on him, showing up to spoil his chances, but that is the least of Duncan's worries—because one of his clients' husbands is missing and there's a serial killer on the loose—one Duncan fears isn't human.
The paranormal is very big these days and because of that we get a lot of fluff novels using it as a theme. Stephen Osborne avoids all of the clichés often used in writing about the supernatural and gives us a delightful mystery about private detective Duncan Andrews. Duncan’s best friend, Gina, is a witch, his dog is a zombie and Robbie, his dead boyfriend, is a ghost who hangs around. As a detective, these give Duncan a good deal of help when he uses the paranormal to solve cases. Because he is so good, he is always busy but when the richest person in Indianapolis, Janice Sanderson, asks him to find her daughter, Brenda, who has been missing. Brenda has shunned the family wealth and took a job as an exotic dancer and she and another of Duncan’s clients and being haunted by something from the supernatural world. Duncan is eager to get on the case and he has also begun a social life for the first time since Robbie’s death.
As Duncan gets into the case a coincidence occurs when he meets Nick during his investigation. He decides to go out with him even though he is still not sure that it is too soon to start dating again. Robbie, as I said, is lingering on and is set upon spoiling whatever chances Duncan might have at finding romance. At the same time one of the husband’s of one of Duncan’s client is missing and it appears that there is a serial killer at work. Duncan’s own experience with the paranormal lets him think that the murderer may be one of the non-human kind.
Granted the plot sounds far-fetched and perhaps even a bit silly but once you begin reading you are pulled in. It is Osborne’s clever style and character development that makes this such a good book. I had never read anything by him before but based on my opinion of his book, he has found a new fan.
