Spirit Walk (Walk #1-2)
Author: Richie Tankersley Cusick
Published: 2013
On Goodreads
My Rating: 
Rated S for good ol’ fashioned southern spirit shaking and heart quaking.
Caught up in whispers…
After a hurricane destroys their home, Miranda and he mom come to Louisiana to stay with her loony grandfather. It’s not long before she discovers that the two of them share a unique and terrifying gift. They see and talk to spirits. Now, it’s time for Miranda to take her grandfather’s place and help them find peace. Luckily, her newfound friends aren’t letting her do it alone. Still, will she be able to handle it? Hopefully she can or she may join her grandfather and be called crazy too.
This started out pretty good and then went downhill. Miranda, very much a loner introvert, comes into the family legacy of seeing and helping ghosts when they whisper pleas for peace. In the town she lives in, rich with Civil War battle stories and sites, that’s intriguing. Even so, I struggled. I felt like there wasn’t enough focus on the ghosts of this 2-in-1 book.
The characters were strong with their own individuality and at times got me laughing, but I couldn’t get past how some of them acted, specifically Roo. While I admired the way she danced to the beat of her own drum as an emo, Victorian styled punk, I didn’t admire her overshare. It came off as petty and jealous and I can’t stand people like that in real life, so I definitely wasn’t a fan of Roo. There was no sign of progression either, so I was hoping she’d get possessed by a ghost or something. She did it mostly when it seemed that Gage and Miranda were getting close. She’d humiliate Gage horribly and there was no clear reason why.
There was chemistry. I say it like that because Etienne was one hell of a looker and was as sweet and smooth as honey, but as I got further in the book he came off as more of a tease. He and Miranda never got anywhere with their flirtation. The back and forth between two people where one seems really interested in the other and then acts like nothing happened in the next chapter will lose me so fast. If it’s back and forth and the tension is growing and it’s obvious something will come of it then I’m hooked, but that wasn’t the case at all.
While the flow of the narrative was pretty good and the setting of the story beautiful, the writing made me hiccup from time to time. With lines that were laughable and cringe-worthy, I was left confused at times. It made the story less believable and tricky to get into. When the dialogue is poor then there goes half of the book, sadly. And the plots…there wasn’t enough on them. So much was happening that the main plots got scattered and then lost for me.
Overall
Not a fan favorite from me. I don’t enjoy sassing and dissing a book, but I can’t ignore what made a book unreadable and unenjoyable. There was promise with this one, but there was too much of some things and not enough of others that seemed more important. The story seemed to get lost amid attempted teen angst and then lose my interest. There was just too much that was an issue for me and I couldn’t get past it. Heading to the donation pile with this one.
Quotables:
“Yes. I’ll help you. And I’ll Listen. And I won’t turn you away.” (Miranda, 328)
“The answer’s waiting for me. At some unknown time…but soon. At some unknown place…but close.” (p. 339)
More to come soon…
-K.
Song Today? Down by Jason Walker.
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The Scarlet Reader 
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