WRAITH

A spirit returns to the world of the living with a vendetta against the men who killed him and an old colleague in Bolton’s horror novel.

Warren has a drinking problem, a marriage on the rocks, and a life on the brink of disaster. It’s cut short when a “trio of street thugs” nearly kill his spouse and succeed in murdering him and his two children. Warren’s final rest is short-lived, however, when he reawakens as a ghost bent on murderous revenge. His targets aren’t just his assailants, but also his former business partner and friend, Jordan, who, it turns out, has been having an affair with Warren’s wife and embezzling from the company for the past three years. Warren compares Jordan’s financial scheming to convicted fraudster Bernie Madoff’s—an effective juxtaposition that helps to get readers on the undead hero’s side. There’s a delicious playfulness to Bolton’s tale of haunting, which is sprinkled with campy, italicized lines, such as “I’m ba-ack,” which the protagonist delivers to his colleague-turned-enemy. This expertly paced novel of gruesome vengeance will provide readers with a sense of unseemly pleasure as they watch it all play out. Behind all the ghostly drama, however, is an intriguing exploration of what it means to become someone—or something—else. Other ghosts act as foils to Warren’s retributive desire, casting the novel as a dialogue on what it means to indulge a desire to even the score. But although these moral questions are skillfully woven into the story, it feels like it sometimes loses its way when it turns its ghastly characters into moralized monsters. The most enjoyable parts of the book focus on the main character’s plotting against his one-time partner, providing readers with an evil but gleeful poltergeist jaunt.

A mostly solid revenge fantasy with a ghoulish conceit.