FIRST CONTACT
Sloane Osborne is a paranormal real estate agent in the business of selling haunted houses, but, in truth, she’s only searching for one ghost. And her time is running out.
It’s the 366th day after her fiancé’s death. Michael used to like putting things off for “a year and a day” - so tonight’s the night. Sloane will do anything to make contact with him before the clock strikes midnight. When she gets a call to check out a home in Waukesha, Wisconsin, it’s the last place she thinks Michael would contact her.Sloane is dead wrong.
Kat Green is really the alias of authors KAT de Falla and Rachel GREEN.
Rachel Green has always believed in ghosts but saw her first full body apparition while working at an old movie theater in college. When she met Kat de Falla at a writer’s workshop, she knew she’d met a kindred spirit – one who was also sensitive to the hereafter. And after bonding on a few ghost adventures, Kat Green was born.
Kat lived in a haunted house for too long. When things really heated up, she had several paranormal teams investigate, but things only got worse. When her mother suggested they contact a shaman, she agreed to come, saying she had been waiting for Kat’s call. The home was cleansed and sold. When she paired up with Rachel Green, the idea of co-writing a book with a paranormal real estate agent seemed perfect.
With their combined paranormal “experiences,” they decided to combine their creative mojo. That’s when Sloane Osborne, Paranormal Real Estate agent, and the HAUNTS FOR SALE series was born.
Kate Tyler is an audiobook narrator and producer with several published audio books available on Audible, iTunes and Amazon. A background in drama and a successful career in voiceover, Kate lives with her family in San Diego and enjoys swimming, running, cycling and stand up paddleboard. Website
HALL
WAYS REVIEW: When I saw the cover of First Contact, the first book in a new series called Haunts for
Sale, I was immediately interested in
this book. CREEPY! Then I read the premise of the story revolving around a
paranormal real-estate agent, and I was MORE interested. UNIQUE! Additionally, it
is a short audio book, clocking-in at just under five and a half hours, which
was all I needed to seal the deal, as it was only a one-day commitment. PERFECT.
The story has an excellent
opening hook, and when main character Sloane Osborne uttered her first “Arrrrgh”
in frustration, I laughed because you just gotta love a character who says “Arrrrgh.”
And though First Contact is primarily
a horror story (with the living often scarier than the dead), Sloane is sassy
and there are more than a few humorous scenes sprinkled throughout the story.
Even though I connected with
Sloane’s pirate-like utterings and sass, that was about my limit of connection.
Overall, I didn’t particularly care for the character. She’s uneven – at times,
she is smart, clever, quick-thinking, and resourceful; at most other times, she’s
a twit who ignores the obvious and exhibits no common sense at all. And then
there is this unnatural yearning for Michael, a man, when among the living,
sounds like he was an overbearing a-hole, and with whom the relationship was
full of red flags. (Umm, when I fella tells you to quit the job you love
because he doesn’t like it, and if he speaks to you like a two-year-old, saying
things like, “I said NO,” it’s time to kick him to the curb.) When a horribly misplaced and groan-worthy
(not in a good way) sex scene shows up in the story, I decided that the mind-blowing
sex had blinded Sloane to all the shortcomings in the relationship -- and it
had made her a twit. It happens.
The other characters in the
book are vastly more interesting than Sloane – there are some seriously pissed-off
ghosts and some seriously evil (and slimy!) humans, who author team Kat Green bring
to awful life. Talk about loathsome! It is in the ghosts and the bad guy(s?)
where the authors’ characterization skills really shine and have readers
begging for some comeuppance. Bad Guy? Guys? No spoilers, here, though this
and other elements are abundantly obvious early-on. There is also the seriously fascinating and
complex, Jonah. He is a sensitive in more ways than one, and he is who will be
the biggest draw for me in the upcoming second book in this series. There are
hints that we might see some growth in Sloane via Jonah, and I hope that the holes
in their back-story are filled in there.
Speaking of holes…there are
a lot of them, and the weight of suspending one’s disbelief is heavy. First Contact is a story that asks
readers to just go with it and accept it as it is. Once I did that, the story
was more fun and listening became easier when I wasn’t trying to make the pieces
fit together. I also didn’t like the F-bomb dropping that begins about half-way
through the story. Not necessary.
As far the audio book
experience, regular speed was too slow and overly pause-y. (I bumped it up to
1.25x/1.5x.) Narrator Kate Tyler does a great job voicing the numerous characters
and their wide range of personalities and emotions. There are three things that
didn’t work for me, but these are completely subjective and examples of how a
reader’s/listener’s own experiences make an impact: Jonah’s southern accent, the
sudden echo-y thing in the voicing of ghostly Karen towards the end, and the
overall lack of projecting fear. I haven’t read the print book, but it seems to
me that it might be a better option if you want to up the scare factor – the scenes
should have made my skin crawl and looking over my shoulder. They didn’t.
So, would I recommend First Contact? Yes. It isn’t a big time investment and there is more than enough there
to pique a reader’s interest. I am also operating under the assumption that
more back-story will come out, tying-up the loose ends and puzzlers from book
one.
One Winner: $25.00 Amazon Gift Card!
Ends 2/20/18; Open Internationally
First Contact Giveaway: $25 Amazon Gift Card
Feb. 13th:
Dab of Darkness Audiobook Reviews
Feb. 14th:
La libreria di Beppe
Turning Another Page
Feb. 15th:
Loves Great Reads
Next Book Review
Feb. 16th:
The Bookworm Lodge
T's Stuff
Feb. 17th:
Jazzy Book Reviews
From the TBR Pile
Feb. 18th:
The Book Addict's Reviews
The Voluptuous Book Diva
Book Lovers Life
Feb. 19th:
Hall Ways Blog
Buried Under Books
Bookworms Corner Blog Spot
➜Sign up as a host here
It's interesting what you say about the speed of the audio - never thought about it before.
ReplyDeleteHi Kate! Thanks for stopping by! I very rarely can listen to an audio book at its recorded speed, but I have to be careful with some, too. Some narrators, when sped up much, sound too excited! I wish I could be more patient with listening.
Delete