Review: Must Love Ghosts by Ani Gonzalez

Posted August 27, 2016 by Lola in Contemporary, Fantasy, My To-Be Read List, Review, Romance / 22 Comments

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My To-Be Read List is a meme hosted by Because Reading is Better Than Real Life where at the beginning of the month visitors can choose which book I’ll be reading this month. On the first saturday of a month the poll will be up, then on the second saturday of the month I’ll announce the book that won and on the last saturday of the month I’ll post my review of the book.

Must Love GhostsMust Love Ghosts (Banshee Creek #1)
by Ani Gonzalez

Rating: 3 stars

Blurb:
Seducing the Rational Skeptic…

Abby Reed believes in folk songs, faery tales, and ghosts, but she doesn’t believe in love. She lost her soulmate when her fiancé died while deployed in Afghanistan, but she still has her music, her crazy spectre-filled town, and her pen-pal-slash-best-friend, Mike Stone. It’s a good life and she’s happy, but when Mike arrives in Banshee Creek after his last tour of duty in Afghanistan, Abby starts to have doubts, about music, ghosts and, most importantly…love.


Like a good soldier, Mike Stone follows the rules, and Rule #1 is: Don’t Fall For Your Buddy’s Fiancée. His relationship with Abby has been strictly platonic, and will remain that way, if he has anything to say about it. But when he arrives in Banshee Creek, a town where the impossible is an everyday occurrence, he’ll find out that sometimes rules are meant to be broken.

My Review:
Must Love Ghosts is a fun and lighthearted romance novel with a bit of heat and a hint of the paranormal. I had fun reading this one and while it didn’t completely wow me, I am still glad I picked this up and am planning to read more by this author. This book is as fun and cute as the cover suggested. There’s also a bit of heat to the romance, which I hadn’t expected, but fit the book nicely. The paranormal aspect was very mild, mostly hints about it and a scene at the end. The setting of Banshee Creek was a lot of fun and I hope to return soon to this town!

For some reason I thought this book was about a girl falling in love with a ghost, yes I probably didn’t read the blurb too well, but the cover grabbed my attention and the box set was only 0.99$! So I grabbed it without reading the blurb too closely. This book is actually about Abby who’s fiancé has died two years ago and she is now in love with her best friend Mike, who comes to visit to banshee Creek with leads to some fun scenes. The town of Banshee Creek has a big Halloween party and they love all things paranormal. But there’s very little actual paranormal in this book, mostly hints about what the towns people believe in and stories and a few mentions of things that might be supernatural in origin. I didn’t mind that too much, but I had expected more paranormal. It reads more like a romantic comedy or a contemporary romance set in a Halloween town most of the time than a paranormal book.

Abby the main character believes in everything supernatural and she likes to sing and hopes to make a career out of it. She was quirky with her unicorn sleeping bags, her house decorated with vintage items and her love for everything supernatural. And donuts! This book made me crave donuts. She was a character who went after what she wanted and wasn’t afraid to voice her opinion. I liked her.

Then there is Mike who was the best friend form Cole, Abby her dead fiancé. Mike has always worked for the army and now is taking a break to deliver something to Abby. I am normally not a fan of books with death previous love interest as it feels like part of the character their heart will always belong to them. I thought here it was pretty done well as Cole has been dead for two years now and Abby had healed and is ready to start a new relationship. But I still wasn’t too happy with the bit of conflict surrounding that. And the delivery Mike has to make is this big things in his mind and it felt a bit blown out of proportion. Mike seemed like a nice enough guy, although I did feel like we got a better feel for Abby.

Abby and Mike have known each other for a long time. This meant that the romance developed quite fast, a bit too fast to my opinion as I didn’t fully feel their connection and how they already knew each other. So must of their friendship develops before this book and we only get to see the point it turns into romance. I liked these two, but I never got fully invested in their romance. There is very little drama, which I did appreciate. There is a bit of conflict surrounding Mike being Cole his best friend and how he still sees Abby as Cole’s girl and the object he has to deliver. The conflict didn’t fully work for me. I did enjoy seeing Abby and Mike together and how they worked things out. The romance also had a bit of heat, lots of flirting and touching and talk about sex, but the actual sex scenes are behind closed doors.

My favorite part of this book was probably the setting in Banshee Creek. It just seemed like this quirky town were everyone believed in the supernatural and with the costume party, the mothman hunt and the interesting cast of side characters it really brought the town alive. I also liked the owl that made an appearance and the last scene was interesting.

To summarize: this was a fun and light read with some romance and a hint of paranormal. It isn’t really a ghost story as the title suggested and the paranormal element is very mild. The town of Banshee Creek does really play up it’s love for everything supernatural and the setting was one of my favorite parts of the book. I liked Abby the main character, she was quirky and open. She voiced her opinion and went after what she believed in. Mike was okay, but I felt like I got less of a feel for him than Abby and I just didn’t like him as much as Abby. The romance was nice, but most of their connection is built off screen and we only see how it develops into a romance here. I never got fully invested into the romance, but I did like reading this book. All in all it was a fun read and I am curious to read the rest of the books in this series.

3-star

Links:
Goodreads
Amazon
Ghosts and Kisses Box set on Amazon

Do you like reading books about ghosts? What was your latest read with ghosts?

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22 responses to “Review: Must Love Ghosts by Ani Gonzalez

    • Maybe later books will do more with the paranormal aspect. But overall it still was a cute and fun read and I want to continue the series soon.

      And no problem for the not voting, there’s always next month again :). I’ll have to decide on which books to list for that soon. I think I had some ideas jotted down somewhere.

    • Glad to hear I am not the only one who thought she would fall in love with a ghost form the cover and title. It was a fun read 🙂

    • I didn’t mind there was less paranormal, but I would’ve liked to know what to expect before I started reading. Although I probably should’ve read the blurb better.

  1. I do like characters who go after what they want and aren’t afraid to voice their opinion, but, other than that, this wouldn’t be a book for me. Just doesn’t fit my tastes. That’s too bad that there was very little paranormal and that the romance happened too fast for you, but at least you liked the setting and had fun reading it!

    I’ve actually been reading a lot about ghosts lately without even meaning to. The last two books I read, one had a ghost MC and the other had a dead ghost boyfriend. Then there was those books in that M/M series I read recently with the dead ghost boyfriend. So lots of ghosts for me lol.
    Kristen @ Metaphors and Moonlight recently posted…The Weekly Update: 8/28/16My Profile

    • Yes overall it was a fun read and I am looking forward to read the rest of the series. I just had expected the paranormal to be present, it’s more hinted at in this one, but that’s probably also due to me not reading the blurb fully.

      Yes I remember that M/M series with the dead ghost boyfriend, it sounded interesting. I am looking forward to your reviews for those two recently ghost books you read. They can be fun to read about.

    • It’s mostly a town that believes in the paranormal and a group of friends of the main character who take it all very serious and go on a mothman hunt and such. And there was a ghost, it just didn’t play as big a role as I had expected. So I hope the next book works even better for me now that I know what to expect.

    • Yes I went a bit wrong with my expectations for this one. It was very light on the paranormal aspect, which is okay if you know that before going in. But overall it was still a fun read 🙂

  2. Hmmm…my spirits about this one are a bit dampened, but it still sounds like a fun, light read for when I don’t want too much drama or high emotions. I’ll keep it in mind.

    • Yes it was a fun and light read without too much drama or emotions. Perfect for when you’re in the mood for that and I definitely look forward to continuing the series.

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