Light Beneath Ferns

This contemporary ghost story begins on a suspenseful note, with narrator Elizah Rayne warning readers, “If death and the dead make you afraid, you better just stop reading and go take a nap.” However, heavy foreshadowing and transparent characterizations mar the overall effect. In order to escape the scandal of her father's sudden disappearance, Elizah and her mother move to a different town, where Elizah resists making friends with her new classmates. Her interests are limited to bones, specifically the human jawbone she found in the woods, and Nathaniel, a mysterious loner she meets under a bridge, whose touch (a “mingling of coolness and heat”) reminds Elizah of “light beneath ferns.” Evidence mounts that Nathaniel is a ghost, but Elizah remains skeptical until a local psychic helps her piece together the puzzle of Nathaniel's history. While Spollen's (The Shape of Water ) story offers some evocative imagery of the spirit world, Elizah's real-world conflicts—her isolation from peers and her ambiguous feelings toward her absent father—seem to be swept under the rug. Ages 12–up. (Feb.)