An Enchanting Case of Spirits

By: Melissa Holtz

Narrated by: Piper Goodeve, Aaron Shedlock

When a fortieth birthday celebration leads to a ghostly visitor, four friends find themselves navigating surprising mysteries and spiritual hijinks, in this clever debut from Melissa Holtz.

Alyssa Mann isn’t adventurous, not since her husband died and she found herself the single mom of a teenage daughter. But there’s no way to avoid celebrating the big 4-0, so when her best friends drag her out for drinks and a tarot reading, she throws caution to the wind and decides to see what the spirits have to say. It’s all fun and games, until she wakes up the next morning with a wicked hangover—and a ghost perched on the edge of her bed.

Sheer panic sends her running to get help from Nick West, the (very attractive) detective who lives next door. When he finds no one inside, Alyssa has to accept that she really did see a ghost. As the dearly departed keep appearing, Alyssa and her friends do their best to learn how to control her newfound power. Trading insults with ghosts, tracking down family heirlooms, and getting closer to the skeptical but helpful Nick is more fun than Alyssa imagined. But when looking into one ghost’s past reveals unexpected—and unwelcome—facts about Alyssa’s late husband’s death, she discovers she just may be in over her head.

©2024 Melissa Holtz (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

"Part rom-com, part ghost story, part love story, and all heart. This is a fun novel with a little bit of everything for everyone."—Red Carpet Crash

“An Enchanting Case of Spirits is a book I would typically classify as a cozy mystery, but this book definitely has more teeth than your average book in that genre. Still, it has all the right ingredients including romance, mystery, murder, and even a collection of opinionated ghosts.”—Game Vortex

"An Enchanting Case of Spirits by Melissa Holtz is a must-read. Its blend of cozy mystery and paranormal abilities is a recipe for a captivating read that will keep you turning the pages long into the night.”—Tessa Talks Books

Flawed but fun

This story is one of those books that needed an editor. The entire opening is one giant whiplash of the author setting us up for one thing then giving us another. The friends are ridiculous (“you need to go out and live a little so let’s see a psychic” then “omg how could you want to contact your dead husband, can’t you just live on?”). It’s forced and aggravating. And the relationship with her daughter Ava? If my teens talked to me that way we’d have seriously problems. Not to me til that’s just not how actual teens communicate (I have 2, I listen).

The concept is fun, the narrators are fine, but these wrinkles make it hard to just enjoy the story. A good developmental editor would have caught these holes and helped to smooth them. So if you’re looking for fluff and do t mind bumpy character building, this is fun. But if you’re looking for a good story to fall into? Try another.

All over the place!

The story idea is interesting but poorly executed. The writer misuses words, such as spinster, which is an outdated judgmental term referring to an unmarried woman of whatever age society used to think was too old to be unmarried. It does NOT mean a divorced or widowed woman or single mother. If a writer is going to include ghostly characters, it would be a good idea to learn that, for example, a poltergeist is not a special kind of ghost. Stylistically the writer overuses double negatives and other trendy language, such as variations of ‘you’re not wrong’. The “friends” seem to morph into other characters with other qualities which may be intended to indicate growth but winds up being confusing. They don’t even seem to like each other very much. The MC starts out disrespecting nearly everyone, which doesn’t make any sense. Possible attempts at humor fall flat unless humor wasn’t the goal. Overall the book could have used better editing to avoid some of these problems. The male narrator does a pretty good job. The female narrator doesn’t do much to distinguish female characters, which adds to the overall confusion. It wound up not being as much fun as I’d hoped.

it was different and unique.

I liked the characters how they developed the spirits, have humor, something different. I really liked it. can't wait for the next one. it has my curiosity going.

Delightful Tale!

Melissa Holtz is a clever, engaging storyteller who weaves together the serious and painful with the humorous and light-hearted. I appreciated the quick pace and the way I always wanted to see around the next corner. Delightful tale and highly recommended!

Stilted storytelling

Stilted story. The writer focuses too much on describing facial expressions and not on developing the characters. I didn’t enjoy this.

More interesting at the end than where it started

I feel like this might have been better if I had read it instead of listened to it. It took awhile to get going and was fairly predictable till it hooked me. But the premise did end up being unique and I found myself wondering what would be next. It definitely ended with a cliffhanger and I think despite my better judgement I’ll end up listening when it comes out.

A Fun Cozy Mystery!!

I LOVED THIS!!! I LOVED IT SO MUCH!!!!

This story had me from the get go and I didn’t want it to end!! It’s a Cozy Mystery filled with so much goodness!! It is emotional because the FMC lost her husband in an accident they were both in two years earlier. She is still mourning his loss, of course. Now it’s her 40th birthday and her friends want to take her out, she forces herself to go and it ends up changing her life in enormous ways!!

The characters are so real and so likable. The FMC’s friends, the ghosts and the sexy cop neighbor. This was so much fun!! I need book two!! Highly recommended!! And the narrators were FANTASTIC!!