'The Perfectly Fine House' – Stephen Kozeniewski & Wile E. Young (Grindhouse Press)

Disclosure time... I really enjoyed Stephen Kozeniewski and Wile E. Young's contributions to the 'Clickers Forever' anthology so jumped at the chance for a free read of 'The Perfectly Fine House', in return for a fair and honest review of course. As it happens, I couldn't work out how to get the file onto my Kindle, and I hate reading off my computer (I've found out...), so ended up buying a copy for my Kindle and reading that instead. Sometimes, I can't believe that I work in IT... Don't worry though, the review will still be fair and honest.

It took me longer than I'd intended to get round to reading 'The Perfectly Fine House' but the title alone meant that I'd be on it sooner or later. It's a title that tells you that Kozeniewski and Young are not afraid to set themselves a little challenge and I needed to be there to see how it all went down.

And I was there to see it. The second I finished work yesterday, I picked this bad boy up and finished it in one sitting. Let me tell you all about it...

In an alternate reality where ghosts are as commonplace as the weather, the most terrifying thing imaginable is a house not being haunted.

Donna Fitzpatrick runs a surrogacy agency, where ghosts can briefly possess volunteers in order to enjoy carnal pleasures. She’s also working herself into an early grave. But that’s no big deal because death is no worse than puberty. That’s particularly evident in Donna’s twin, Kyle, a self-absorbed roustabout who spends most of his time high on sage. Kyle’s been in arrested development since his motorcycle accident fifteen years ago.

When Donna has a panic attack, Kyle insists she take a vacation at an abandoned mansion. There’s just one small problem: there isn’t a single ghost in Jackson Manor. And while an unhaunted house seems no worse than an oddity at first, soon ghosts go missing, natural disasters consume entire cities, and every afterlife on earth is threatened by the terrible secret behind . . .

THE PERFECTLY FINE HOUSE.

I don't want to give too much away as I really believe that you need to go and buy this book right now and read it for yourself. All I'll say is that 'The Perfectly Fine House' is not the book you're expecting it to be; it certainly wasn't the book I was expecting and the lead up to that revelation and the revelation, itself is just masterfully done. I wish I could bottle up that moment when I realised just exactly what was going on and what it meant for everyone in the book. It pretty much just blew me away.

'The Perfectly Fine House' is only two hundred and thirty pages long but there's so much going on that you'd be forgiven for thinking that it's much longer. That's no bad thing either as there's plenty to ponder off the back of one simple question, what happened at Jackson Manor and why? Okay, two simple questions but they both drive a very smooth and efficient plot to that conclusion. I had to keep reading, that's all there was to it.

It's not just the plot either. You've just read the blurb so it's no secret that this is an alternate reality, an alternate reality where Kozeniewski and Young really go to town exploring just what it would meant to live in a world where ghosts outnumber the living. When I wasn't into the plot itself, I was loving the level of detail on show here, up to and including ghostly voting habits and a look into a world of apathetic parents who know that the Grandparents will always be on hand to babysit. We may never live in a world full of ghosts but 'The Perfectly Fine House' is the next best thing as far as that goes.

If I had one small quibble, it would be that the pace feels a little off when the focus shifts away from Kyle and onto Donna. Kyle's at the heart of things and so it feels like the plot is moving him forwards. Donna though... Don't get me wrong, Donna is brilliant but her human life can slow the plot down. Which is kind of the point, in a way, but still slowed things up when they really needed to maintain that fast pace.

It's a small quibble though and certainly won't stop me from recommending 'The Perfectly Fine House' to you, you and also you. And definitely you too. If you're partial to ghost stories with a twist, 'The Perfectly Fine House' delivers.