Looking for Love in All the Haunted Places: 10/06/24

Looking for Love in All the Haunted Places by Claire Kann (2024) is another ghostless haunted house story. Imagine The Haunting of Hill House as a romance.

Lucky Hart has been hired as the caretaker of Hennessee House and the star of a ghost hunting show also known as The Caretaker. The previous caretakers all quit by the third day. Lucky, though, is convinced she'll last.

Although Lucky is asexual she has an immediate affinity for the show runner, Maverick, and his plucky tween daughter, Rebel. Her friendship with them is the in she needs for understanding Hennessee House and succeeding at her new job.

Lucky can read people and get to their core truths. She only gets one read per person. If she reads too many people in a row she ends up physically ill. It's that same skill that she'll ultimately use to "read" the house.

Hennessee House is another of a long list of "sentient house" stories I've read in recent months. The house is by far the most interesting character in this novel and I wish more time had been spent in it and learning about it.

But this novel is less focused than Kann's previous works. The reason for that is explained in the afterword. I'm sorry she went through what she did and I appreciate the effort it takes to be creative after illness or disaster, but this is where professional editing comes into play. Her editor and publisher did her a disservice.

In the middle of the sentient house story there is a tangential plot where Lucky and the others go to a "historic amusement park" that is said to be haunted. The idea is to give Rebel a safe place to do what her father does. In all honesty, though, Hennessee House was the safer location.

Amusement parks date back to the 1920s and there are absolutely ones still in good working order that date back that far. Here's a point where the author's editorial team could have pointed out that fact and had her change the age of the place. The other problem is that this road trip takes the reader right out of the plot as things are getting interesting.

Claire Kann's book always include an asexual main character. I think by the seventh book, one can take it for granted that the main character is asexual. Although there's chemistry between Lucky and Maverick, there isn't any need for an actual romance between them. The sex talk that's included in the book feels shoehorned in. I feels cut and pasted from previous books. Why is it even in here?

Four stars

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