Sawkill Girls meets The Hazel Wood in this lush and eerie debut, where the boundary between reality and nightmares is as thin as the veil between the living and the dead. If I could have a fiddle made of Daddy’s bones, I’d play it. I’d learn all the secrets he kept. Shady Grove inherited her father’s ability to call ghosts from the grave with his fiddle, but she also knows the fiddle’s tunes … ghosts from the grave with his fiddle, but she also knows the fiddle’s tunes bring nothing but trouble and darkness.
But when her brother is accused of murder, she can’t let the dead keep their secrets.
In order to clear his name, she’s going to have to make those ghosts sing.
Family secrets, a gorgeously resonant LGBTQ love triangle, and just the right amount of creepiness make this young adult debut a haunting and hopeful story about facing everything that haunts us in the dark.
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“I’d never say it out loud, and even admitting it to myself gives me chills, but if I could have a fiddle made of my daddy’s bones, I’d take it. I’d take it and play it and learn all the secrets he kept, all the sorrows he bore inside his breast.”
‘Ghost Wood Song’ by Erica Waters is a story that unfolds in one of those beautifully, unearthly atmospheric settings. Even before we start to learn about Shady Grove, the girl named after an old bluegrass song that her late father played for her growing up, the tale comes across like an eerie dreamscape.
Early on, it’s not even necessarily the family’s ability to call ghosts to them, using a fiddle said to belong to their family for generations. As I was reading, I kept getting a sense of a dark misty thicket.. nestled somewhere in the Appalachian Mountains. And though the music they played centered around old bluegrass numbers, my mind kept conjuring images of ‘Cross Road Blues’ and deals that can only end badly. My thoughts were not related to the story directly, but the writer’s way with the weight of words, still injected them into the feeling I got from the book.
“My family history — everything we’ve lost, all our ghosts and all our griefs — those feel like the truest part of me, the beating heart of my music. Playing Sarah’s way is like taking an ax to my deepest, most secret roots.”
Shady is a deeply complex girl, shrouded in poor, rural stereotypes. She lives in a trailer at the edges of town with her mama, her brother Jesse, little sister Honey, and her stepdad.. Jim. Her mom is the traditional type.. at home taking care of Honey or worrying about having dinner on for her husband Jim, who’s the typical loud, kind of mean-spirited man of the house. Jesse is rebellious, full of anger.. especially towards their stepdad, but he’s extremely protective of Shady, even though he’s kind of a jerk to her sometimes too. He’s carrying a lot of baggage and you can really see it on him like a second skin.
It’s interesting that though Waters uses the kind of stereotypes one might expect in a story like this, she doesn’t rely on them. They’re just a framework from which the real depth of each character grows and changes, seemingly before our eyes as we begin to see beneath the veneer. All of the characters that have any real focus in the story, are richly painted, each layer laid bare for the reader to see.
There’s a love triangle between Shady, her best friend Sarah, and this ‘rodeo boy’ as she calls him, named Cedar. Sometimes these can become too heavy for the story or too convoluted, redirecting attention that should be on the plot to what choices are going to be made, but it’s just more of a soft exploration of what she really wants. Somebody steady who steps up and puts their cards all on the table.. or someone who seems to be incredibly uncertain, warm one moment and cold the next. The result is lovely and though as often happens in these cases, Shady is a little slow to commit, what I like is that at least there’s an honesty about it. She’s sincere and she’s open about her struggle and she tries to do her best not to drag it out any longer than she has to.
“I know how powerful grief is. I’ve felt it pound through my body like ocean waves, leaving me half-drowned.”
When Shady’s brother is accused of murder and her family is thrown into chaos, she has to dig up long buried family secrets in an attempt to save him. She has to figure out how to ferret those secrets out of the dead.
I genuinely loved this book. I absolutely fell for Shady and Cedar. I loved and hated right along side her. The secrets are deep within the roots of the family and they’ve grown toxic, affecting everything they touch. There are a lot of references to old bluegrass songs and poems strewn throughout the novel, effective catalysts to help nudge you in the right direction emotionally to really hear the story the author’s telling. In fact, I listened to some of those songs, read some of those poems and their stories as well.. as I made my way through the carefully lined path the author offers up.
If there’s anything at all that I feel Waters could have done better, it’s the origin of the fiddle. It’s not that how it came to be isn’t good enough, quite the opposite. Rather, the origin is really good.. but to equal the power of the story she’s woven here, the presentation was not as impactful as it could have been. When its story is told, it’s a bit more casual than I expected. It’s good.. but it could have been great.
This debut is not to be missed. Erica Waters is going to do amazing things in her writing career.. and you are going to want to be there to witness them. ‘Ghost Wood Song’ is easily one of the best reads of the year.
(More reviews like this at Betwixt The Sheets.)
(I received this title as an ARC. All opinions are mine and freely given.)
Ghost Wood Song Is such a haunting and spellbinding read. Erica Waters has imbued the novel with enough southern charm to keep the tone smooth. Moreover, she has also filled the novel with enough fantasy and magic to balance out the eerie atmospheric and contemporary feel the novel gives off. Ghost Wood Song is a thought-provoking and compelling because it has not only character development but exceptional story development.
Compelling Story
From the beginning, the Ghost Wood Song submerges readers in the ghostly atmosphere. There is a strong sense of something magical happening on the fringes of the story, balancing out that haunting feel. Early on, the reader sees the connection Shady has to the ghost that haunts her, from ghosts hanging around her to her fathers’ fiddle calling to her.
This fantastical and haunting balance gives the story powerful tension, guiding the reader into Shady’s complicated life.
The tension is ultimately what makes Ghost Wood Song so captivating. The movement and tone, they flow beautifully, bringing to life the music in the story. It is so rich and haunting, keeping the reader engaged. The atmospheric setting, the evolution of the story and characters, make the Ghost Wood Song so engaging because of how they all balance each other out, shifting and evolving into something more than just a ghost story.
A New Ghost Story
The fantastical elements and magical fiddle make than more than a ghost story. It is the fiddle that is key in making the story interesting. The fiddle is the connection Shady has with the ghosts, but there are more layers to that connection than meets the eye. The fiddle and the ghosts give the story layers to evolve, offering readers a fresh and unique take on the ghost story genre.
The idea that ghosts are connected to grief is something relatable and reminiscent of Shirley Jackson. Ghost Wood Song is an emotional read as it ties the ghosts to strong emotions, highlighting how people can create their hauntings. Ghost Wood Song highlights the impact of emotions, like hate, rage, grief, and love and how strongly they connect to ghosts. The emotional spectrum this novel explores gives the story depth and makes it relatable to the reader. It creates a novel full of complexities that are worth exploring.
Strong Characters
What is also great here is the LGBTQ representation. Shady Grove herself is a bisexual character, and while she is dealing with her family drama, she also has to contend with the complex emotions she has for two other characters. Sarah is a lesbian whom Shady is attracted to but their dynamic does not flow because they are so different as people. There are times when Sarah is unlikable because she is just a bad friend. This is not to stay the novel shames the LGBTQ community because Sarah grows and with Rose, another lesbian, they grow, and their romance gets the attention it deserves to develop the characters.
The complexities surrounding the romance highlight the complex nature of the characters and how life sometimes just gets in the way. Shady is bisexual, and exploring the complexities that go into being bisexual makes the story engaging and creates real characters.
All the dynamics between Shady and her friends are well developed. There is much tension between them but their friendship, what ties them together, does not disintegrate. It evolves alongside the story, matching up with the range of emotions that drive the novel forward and give its tension. These are multidimensional characters who are also relatable, highlighting Water’s ability to create strong characters.
Final Thoughts
Ghost Wood Song is a brilliant novel. Waters give the story a strong core, one that evolves and blossoms into such an unforgettable, haunting, and beautiful novel.
“The dead are always with us, even after their ghosts move on, but it’s the life pulsing through our veins that makes the music.”
A murder mystery, ghosts being raised to unearth secrets long buried, and a magic fiddle that makes it possible at a steep cost. That’s the tip of the iceberg for Ghost Wood Song.
After her brother is accused of murdering, Shady turns to the magic fiddle she inherited from her father, which can compel the ghosts around her to come forward and communicate. She intends to discover who is really responsible and exonerate her brother, but she gets more than she bargained for. Solving the puzzle requires her to dig into the family history and uncover generations of secrets that are haunting them.
Unraveling the secrets long buried is woven into the fabric of her personal journey as she navigates the treacherous waters of figuring out who she is, what she wants, and the person she wants to become. I really appreciated that parallel and seeing Shady learn to let go of the past piece by piece and move forward into a life that isn’t what she thought she wanted, but is one filled with what she needs to thrive. The focus on loving supportive family, no matter how difficult they are or the secrets they keep, resonated strongly with me. As did Shady’s experiences navigating the murky waters of her sexuality as what it means to be a young bisexual girl following her heart.
A theme that resonates throughout the book is grief. Grief is an overwhelming process and Ghost Wood Song really explores – explicitly and implicitly – the kind of power it can have over us. It can control us, holding us to the past, until it even warps our perception of the world and people around us. Grief can be all-consuming and burying it and letting it rule can keep you forever haunted. A powerful message that shines through the fog of ghosts that haunt Shady (literal and psychological) is that missing those who are gone may never go away. But that doesn’t mean we can’t move forward and carry them with us. Once she opens herself to feeling the pain and facing it head on, she’s able to let the ghosts rest and pull herself back to the world of the living to start building a life for herself. She’s able to transform her music from pain and suffering into light and happiness.
Ghost Wood Song is a story of grief, hope, and forgiveness. It combines the power of sorrow with excellent LGBT representation and a reminder that our past is something we carry with us, but we don’t have to live there or let it define us.
*** I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher and voluntarily chose to review. ***