I've stepped back a bit from reading and reviewing this year. Now that I'm retired I have so many more options for my time. For that reason, I haven't been reading as many new authors, or maybe I should say authors I haven't read before. I tend to read what I want to read by those I'm already familiar with. That being said, when Gaby Triana reached out to me requesting I read and review her new book, Island of Bones, I was a bit hesitant, until she mentioned Tim Waggoner had suggested she contact me. Tim is one of my favorite authors and I've been fortunate to read more than a dozen of his books in the six years I've been reviewing horror. So, his recommendation was good enough for me.
"I was Ellie Whitaker, unmarried, childless, and twenty-six years old. And I'd been dreaming. I wasn't dreaming as myself. I was dreaming as Nana."
When Ellie's Nana, Leanne Drudge, passed away, it was decided to return her ashes to her old home in Key West, Casa de los Cayos. The problem was that was a long time ago and Ellie had no idea where the house even was. Not to be deterred, Ellie set's out on her quest and battles the owner of the current property, a category two hurricane, and ghosts to return her grandmother to her ancestral home and find the truth about her history.
"Nostalgia for a place I'd never known hit me hard. The drink wasn't helping either. Everyone had someone to party with, and I was alone with a ghost in my purse and memories of a place I'd never been.
The author has a light touch in telling her ghostly tale and fills her story with believable characters, some charming, others disagreeable, but all richly developed.
The title, Island of Bones, comes from the English translation of the original Spanish name for Key West, Cayo Hueso.
All told, Island of Bones is one of the better pure ghost stories I've read recently, and one I can easily recommend.
The work is self-published and is available in both paperback and e-book formats.
From the author's bio - Gaby Triana is the bestselling author of horror and YA novels, Island of Bones, Cakespell, Wake the Hollow, Summer of Yesterday, and many more, as well as 40+ ghostwritten novels for best-selling authors. When she's not obsessing over Halloween, Christmas, or the paranormal, she's taking her family to Disney World, the Grand Canyon, LA, New York, or Key West. Gaby dreams of living in the forests of New England one day but for the meantime resides in sunny Miami with her boys, Michael, Noah, and Murphy, her husband Curtis, their dog, Chloe, and four cats—Daisy, Mickey Meows, Paris, and Bowie.
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