My regular readers will recall that back in September I was asked for the first time to actually review a book by an author who, had themselves become a reader of my blog. That book was ‘Cooking for Ghosts Book 1 - The Secret Spice Cafe’ by Patricia V Davis and was set on the Queen Mary, which is famously moored at Long Beach, California as a floating hotel. I genuinely enjoyed it, with a good story line and some really fascinating facts about the Queen Mary and its colourful history, I gave it a rating of 8 of 10. Well Patricia wrote a sequel to Cooking for Ghosts in ‘Spells & Oregano’ and she has asked me to read it and give an honest review of it, so hear goes.
The story starts with a prologue set in 1991 in Brooklyn and surrounds two young twins from an Italian background with one of them hiding in a kitchen cupboard as his estranged parents are having a blazing row. His brother is with his Grandfather on the Verrazano Bridge enjoying themselves when he feels something isn’t right and wants to rush home. During their row the husband pushes his wife and she falls to the ground banging her head on the kitchen table and breaking her neck killing her instantly. In shock at realising what he has done, the husband shots himself in the head twice before the police break in and whilst all this is going on, the son hiding in the kitchen cupboard sees this all happening.
We then step forward 22 years and the two young twins are grown men and are successful illusionists performing to crowds in Las Vegas. Cynthia and her daughter Sarita who are co-owners of The Spice Cafe on board the legendary Queen Mary in Long Beach, are in Vegas with Cynthia’s husband to celebrate Sarita’s birthday. Sarita still struggles with the psychology effects from events ten years previous along with keeping her grip on her powers of foreseeing things and seeing ghosts.
After a sumptuous meal, the trio head to the theatre at Caesar’s Palace to watch the The World’s Greatest Magic Show presented by twins Santi and Luca Miceli. Prior to going on stage the twins argue but walk on like professionals and start their show turning a dozen white doves into blood red roses which Luca hands to a certain young lady sat in the front row who is celebrating her birthday. The show goes as planned until Santi’s final illusion, being performed in front of an audience for the first time, when tradegy strikes and Santi dies much to the shock of all those in the audience and his brother Luca.
Nine months later and we catch up with the owners in The Spice Cafe, where Rohini and Cristiano are happily married, Sarita is now manager, Angela is feeling young again after a breast enhancement whilst Cynthia is travelling with Raul and Jane is in Italy. After seeing the ghost of her cousin Gina, who has been dead for other 20 years, Angela wants to bring her dead cousin’s son to The Spice Cafe to train as a chef. Low and behold this chef is Luca who after losing his brother falls into an unrelenting drunken stupor and is wasting his life away. Cristiano is against Luca joining the team and apprehension and tension filters through the team including Sarita.
Upon Luca’s arrival the ghosts of Queen Mary react and strange things once again begin to happen on board ship. The story takes us into more detail about many of the characters from the first book as we understand more about their powers, their feelings towards others and how much they all really care for each other. Eventually Luca is accepted as part of the team but all is not as it seems as Luca and Sarita start to fall for each others charms, Cristiano and Rohini stop seeing eye to eye on a number of things including Luca and Angela is struggling to cope with her son, his partner and her love life. The question is, is all this being caused by Luca, The ghosts, Cristiano’s imsecurities or something or someone else unconnected to He Secret Spice Cafe.
Yet again, Patricia V Davis’ book had me hooked early on when normally a supernatural story would not appeal to me. I really like some of the interesting facts that we continue to find out about the Queen Mary and many aspects of the story are believable (even more so with the fact that the Queen Mary is widely acclaimed to be one of the world’s most haunted places !!). The fact that this book is set on a liner should provide plenty of intrigue and interest to readers of this blog seeing as many of you have either cruised or are planning to cruise in the near future and for myself I would have to rate ‘The Secret Spice Cafe Book 2 - Spells & Oregano’ the same as book 1, with a whopping 8 out of 10 as I so enjoyed it.
So when to read it on your forthcoming cruise ? Well firstly, if you haven’t read book 1, my suggestion would be to read book 2 after book 1 !! Secondly, when book 1 has been read, keep Spells & Oregano for a bedtime read especially when you are reading the chapters when the ship’s ghosts are making an appearance !!
A third book in the series is due shortly so keep an eye out for that review and in the meantime if you want to find out any more information on Patricia V Davis visit :
http://patriciavdavis.com/
Feel free to take time to comment on this review and the book itself.
Happy Reading 😊
No comments:
Post a Comment