The Ghost Who Wanted Revenge is the fourth book in author Bobbi Holmes’ Haunting Danielle series. At this point, I’m comfortable saying you do have to read earlier books in the series to follow along with the story here. There are too many plot points that are built on events in earlier books. Even with a bit of a recap that Holmes gives the reader, I don’t think the story can be appreciated unless you’ve read the books that precede this one.

The series follows Danielle Boatman and her adventures as the owner of Marlow House. It was left to her by her aunt. Danielle had designs on running the large home as a Bed & Breakfast. However, she soon discovered that there was another resident of the house she couldn’t get rid of: the ghost of the late owner, Walt Marlow. Danielle has the ability to see and communicate with spirits. It’s something she’s had since she was a child, when her family all thought she was crazy.

In the previous book, The Ghost Who Wasn’t, Danielle helped to rescue her best friend, Lily, from having been kidnapped by Stoddard Gusarov and passed off as his niece. At the end of the story, Gusarov was arrested for his crimes. The Ghost Who Wanted Revenge has him back home, awaiting his trial date. Before that can happen, though, he is attacked in his home. He is still alive when the police arrive, and he names Danielle as his killer.

Once he’s dead, he spends his time outside of Marlow House menacing Danielle. More than anything, he wants revenge for her murdering him. The only problem is that Danielle didn’t do it. Stoddard won’t listen to her, though, so sure is he of what he saw with his own eyes. The local police know Danielle didn’t do it, but that doesn’t stop some people from having suspicions. Danielle must find out who really killed Stoddard and convince him that it wasn’t her before he learns to harness his powers and can seriously hurt her and others.

Complicating matters is Stoddard’s widow. Darlene has her own agenda when it comes to her late husband, and how she acts is often contradictory to what she says. It would be easy to pin it all on her until she turns up dead as well.

There were several instances of inconsistencies that caught my attention. It felt like the author made a mistake and caught it (or a proofreader did), but rather than go back and correct the mistake, she explained it away in a rather flimsy manner. Example: at one point, when Danielle is talking to Darlene’s ghost, Darlene states that she has an email account for online shopping, but never uses it to send correspondence to people. When she wants to talk to someone, she usually calls or texts. A page or two later, she then states that she never texts people! In an attempt to correct this, Danielle calls her on it, and she says something like “well, if I was going to do something like that, it would be a text.” It would have been easy to just go back and change her initial statement, but instead, we get a flimsy explanation that doesn’t really work for the overall story.

The mystery wasn’t really a surprise to me. I had it figured out all along who had Stoddard killed and why. I have to wonder why the characters in the story couldn’t see the obvious. This just wasn’t as well-written as earlier books in the series, and when you’re dealing with a subject that requires you to suspend disbelief to begin with, the rest needs to be plausible. The police in this town are really incompetent. One has a big grudge against Danielle for some unknown reason, and we learn some of why he is that way in this story. The other was once a possible love interest who put his job over his feelings for Danielle.

Danielle’s interaction with the ghost of Walt Marlow is what really makes the series fun. He’s getting acclimated to all of the new technology since he died nearly a century ago. Television fascinates him quite a bit. There’s a hint of romance between the two, but right now it’s more like a very close friendship. Walt seems protective of Danielle at times, but he’s unable to leave Marlow House and worries about Stoddard’s ghost. I think perhaps because Walt haunts Marlow house, that prevents Stoddard from being able to get in, but it’s one of those things that isn’t defined, and I just had to accept that there are some rules involving the afterlife that couldn’t be explained.

The narration is by Romy Nordlinger once again. I like her narration for the most part. I’ve heard better narrators, but she seems to suit the story, which is lighthearted for the most part, or at least as lighthearted as you can get when you’re dealing with death and ghosts. She gives the characters different voices, but doesn’t go overboard, so the narration doesn’t become laughable when it shouldn’t be. I enjoy listening to her work.

The Ghost Who Wanted Revenge has some issues. It’s not my favorite book in the series, but I am still enjoying it. I like that Danielle has people who know of her abilities and work with her, rather than her having to keep it a secret all the time. She seems to be growing into it more and more as well. I’m really curious where her relationship with Walt will go, as it can be very limiting with him stuck as a ghost confined to Marlow House.

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