Lipstick Voodoo

By: Kristi Charish

Narrated by: Susannah Jones

Kincaid Strange, not your average voodoo practitioner, is back in the freshly imagined and hugely entertaining second book of Kristi Charish's urban fantasy series.

Kincaid Strange cannot catch a break. After dealing with a spate of paranormal murders, there's barely time to recuperate - let alone sleep in - before there's a new problem in Kincaid's world of paranormal activity. When her roommate, Nathan Cade - the ghost of a grunge-rocker with a pathological lack of self-control - comes home bound to a dead body, it's up to Kincaid to figure out how to free him. Ideally before her new mentor, Gideon, a powerful sorcerer's ghost, discovers that Nate is trapped in the body he'd coveted for himself.

When Aaron, a Seattle cop on the afterlife beat - and Kincaid's ex - calls her in to help out with a cold case, she takes the chance to mend fences with the police department. The problem: They want to interview Nate's ghost, which she can't produce. Then people from Nate's past start showing up dead, and what's killing them doesn't seem to be human. And the way it's killing them is especially brutal. Nate's hiding something, but he's Kincaid's friend, and she wants to help him. But she also wants to stay alive....

©2019 Kristi Charish (P)2018 Audible, Inc.

Fun series

Enjoyable series. Good clear reading. Author developed many characters and plots so doesn’t need to include trashy sex scenes (too many of these light reading books substitute sex for actual plot... sadly). I will look for more of her books.

Another fun and entertaining listen

Lipstick Voodoo takes place about two weeks after the events in The Voodoo Killings. This time around Kincaid is working a lipstick séance (a term coined by voodoo practitioners referring to seances where no really wants to hear what the ghost/ zombie has to say. In this case, it’s a family fighting over a will of a cheating husband. Kincaid is working gigs like this because she lost her job with the Seattle police department, thanks to the new chief who doesn’t believe in the paranormal.

Aaron, Kincaid’s ex-boyfriend is a cop and works under the chief. He has tried to help her out as much as he is willing to without losing his own job. He contacts her in hopes she will help him with a cold case from the 1990s. This case happens to have a connection to Kincaid’s ghost buddy, Nate.

Nate was a 90’s grunge rocker who died around ‘95-’96. He also knows the victim in the cold case, but he and Kincaid already have their hands full with a problem from the end of The Voodoo Killings (won’t say more so as not to spoil you). This issue, plus the cold case is the major storyline for Lipstick Voodoo.

Kristi Charish has done a great job building a world surrounded by paranormal creatures like ghouls, ghosts, zombies, Jinn, poltergeist, and wraiths. They are all part of the Otherside. The mystical world that allows people to become these creatures after they die. While the rules are not completely clear, yet. We get more info in the second installment and it seems more will be forthcoming with each book in the Kincaid Strange series.

Like similar series such as Charley Davidson and White Trash Zombie series, the Kincaid Strange series deals with mystery cases in each book with an overall story arc coming from book to book. I wouldn’t say each book ends on a cliffhanger, but Charish knows how to keep readers intrigued with a teaser for the next big thing in the overall plotline at the end of each novel.

The Kincaid Strange series has become an audio-only series for me all thanks to Susannah’s brilliant delivery of the characters. I rarely change the speed of an audiobook when I listen but I was rushed to relisten to The Voodoo Killings so I could listen to Lipstick Voodoo. After listening to the whole book at 1.25 speed when I tried to listen to Lipstick Voodoo, Susannah voices for the returning characters sounded a little off to me and I quickly realized it was because I was listening to it as normal (1.0) speed. After adjusting the speed I felt like I was listening to the same narrator. After listening to both books, Susannah is now the voice I have in my head for Kincaid and I can’t see myself reading any following books in the series.

Love this series

Kinkade Strange and her bevy of ghosts and zombies are at it again. Very entertaining and love the reader.