Monday, May 25, 2026

The Vengeful Dead by Darcy Coates (Napier, IL: Poisoned Pen Press, 2025), 396 pp.  For those who have been following the “Gravekeeper” series, begun with The Whispering Dead (2021): Kiera, who had been found escaping from she didn’t know whom and, for that matter, couldn’t remember why or even who she was, gradually, over the series, discovers that she can see and talk to ghosts, and that, because of this, she is a mortal enemy of Artec, a corporation that was growing rich by selling energy by torturing captured ghosts.  In the course of the series, she develops a cadre of friends in the village of Blighty as she manages to solve a number of problems with ghosts and hauntings.  In this, presumably, final novel of the series, she is determined to destroy Artec once and for all. 

            For those who read this volume by itself, it seems a bit breezy in pace as it continues to escalate the danger and action, but it is, after all, the culmination of a long arc of narrative in the series. 

In her trademark form, the characters are generally positive despite eccentricities, and Kiera’s quest is entertainingly presented.  Despite the title, this is more of an adventure novel with a ghost-story subplot, not a horror novel but, on those terms, it is equal to the guaranteed standard of pleasure offered to Darcy Coates readers.