The Tipsybibliophile

This book is for sure one of the most outrageously entertaining reading experiences I’ve had in this genre, and for sure one of the best books of this year for me. Oh baby this was delicious! Fish and Ghosts the first installment of the new paranormal Hellsinger Series (THANK GOD THERE ARE MORE!!) by Rhys Ford is creative, funny, rich with wonderful action, and just an overall seriously entertaining read from beginning to end. Think The Sixth Sense and Ghostbusters have a gay baby, which is a book.

To me the key thing about this book was that it felt UNLEASHED. I feel like Rhys went where she wanted to go on instinct, and what she wrote was whatever the hell she wanted. Something different, colorful, humorous, with a touch of darkness, a strong, yet tasteful dose of weird that all came together as a fantabulous read. Trystan Pryce and Wolf Kincaid LIT UP MY LIFE…For real.

Trystan Pryce…He talks to dead people. Or at least that’s what he’s been telling his family for years. He is the guardian of his family’s ancestral home, and after his uncle Mortimer died and left his as sole heir of the home. He assures his relatives that he MUST stay at Hoxne Grange and serve as a portal to the souls that move on through the house…I mean SURE, maybe it sounds a little weird to other people that he is basically running a B&B for dead people, but it is, what it is…Not so much though…His other uncle is pissed he got yipped out of the family’s home and he’s sending in the big guns to finally prove that Trystan is one big box of fruit loops. In comes Wolf Kincaid *swoons*…Wolf goes into homes with “other worldly” activities and pretty much debunks myths…There are lot of people taking others for rides, and his job is to find these con men out. He’s good at it too. He’s got his team and his equipment and if there is anything that is not on the up and up, he’ll find it. He is more than a little curious to see what the heir of Hoxne Grange is up too, and cannot wait to make the guy come clean.

Only thing is, Trystan is delicious. All Wolf wants to do is tackle them man and make him sweat and pant for hours…Also he doesn’t really seem crazy or at least he REALLY believes the whole “Ghost B&B” deal is for real. Pretty soon things start getting strange. Wolf isn’t sure about much anymore, and the thing with Trystan is getting serious…When his crew members make a dumb move and hell starts breaking loose, Wolf has to face the fact that he might have been wrong about Trystan and Hoxne Grange. Then the worst possible thing happens…He has to call his mom for help.

Ok here’s the deal. This right here, this book, it’s Prime Time reading. The characters are fabulous, story solid. From Wolf’s cynical sexy beastness, to Trystan’s prickly hermit thing. Their romance made for a great slow burn, they were explosive together.The erotica was first rate. I had a lot of fun watching these guys make their way to each other. I enjoyed the secondary characters as well. Rhys built a wonderful cast, who brought a whole hell of a lot to the story. Wolf’s mom was phenomenal. Wolf’s crew gave us the sinister part of the strory. And that’s only the characters that were alive! The paranormal angle was OUTSTANDING. The entire thing was highly entertaining, Rhys took me somewhere unexpected and a bit scary, but I have to say I was right there with her the whole time. The action scenes were fun, fast and VERY VERY well rendered. It is easy to confuse when so much is getting built in one’s head from scene to scene, but the writing held here, and I was able to just enjoy the ride. The horror, the mystery, the lore, they were all fantastic. Being the first in a series, this book gave me enough to want the story to continue, but I did not feel like I was being set up. No delayed gratification here, just good reading.

I can’t say enough good things about this book, I LOVED it. Rhys is already a well established writer in this genre, with good reason, she rocked the house with this one.

An absolutely fabulous book, recommend it effusively.