100 Pages A Day...Stephanie's Book Reviews

Adrienne Beauvier, granddaughter to the Count of Challembelles has always had visions, a gift of clairvoyance, just like her grandmother.  To a young Adrienne, her visions are nothing but fun stories and insights into the lives of others. However, to most everyone else, Adrienne's visions cause distress and they believe her to be troubled, much like her late grandmother was.  Adrienne's Aunt Marie, a domineering and manipulative force in the family is especially unsettled by Adrienne's stories of her visions and does not want any more rumors about her family flying around their small French town.  As Adrienne grows, the two people in her life who provided security with her gift are taken away from her.  Aunt Marie believes she has the perfect solution to the her family's issues with Adrienne; she will bring Adrienne to her home in Colorado, the newly built Miramont Castle, to live with her cousin, the Father Julien Morier.  Once Adrienne arrives at Miramont, however, she realizes that there are no limits to her Aunt's meddling ways.

This book was not at all what I expected, but I was still on the edge of my seat the entire way through.  First of all, this is not a story of a haunted house, but rather about how the life of a person might cause them to haunt a house.  Adrienne's story is tragic and there is no happy ending here, even though at points the story seems similar to a fairy tale with an evil aunt, a  locked away gifted girl and the hopes of prince charming coming to the rescue.  This is a story that grows with suspense and has many little mysteries, from Adrienne's first visions there is a growing feeling that something just isn't right. The writing does a beautiful job adding to the foreboding atmosphere, there is a lyrical prose and abundant detail to set the scene and create the unease of the characters surrounding Adrienne.  Most interesting to me was that the story included many true details from the actual building of Miramont Castle and the actual mysteries surrounding the building intrigued me even more.  Overall, Miramont's Ghost is an emotional, tense and unsuspected read for someone not looking for a happy ending.

This book was provided for free in return for an honest review.