Death Watch

In this thought-provoking gothic fantasy, Berk makes the jump from interactive/novelty books (William Shakespeare: His Life and Times; The Secret History of Mermaids) to full-fledged novels. What results is a leisurely, digressive, yet genuinely eerie tale, first in the Undertaken trilogy. A year after his mortician father vanishes, 17-year-old Silas Umber and his mother go to stay with his father’s brother, moving into the family mansion in nearby Lichport, a town where ghosts lurk in every corner and the restless dead roam. Quickly estranged from his alcoholic mother and his increasingly unsettling uncle, Silas spends his time exploring Lichport and seeking his father’s fate, even taking up the family role of Undertaker to Lichport’s many spirits, acting as “part therapist, part lawyer, part travel agent and... part deportation officer.” As he grows into the role, he learns many of Lichport’s secrets, including his family’s darkest moments. Berk’s setting is atmospheric and creepy, fleshed out with a wealth of funereal traditions and folklore. The narrative occasionally drags, and some of the characters are broadly drawn, but it remains an intriguing opener. Ages 12–up. (Nov.)