A ghost is a dead person with a job. In life, Charlie Harmer was a disc jockey with a lot of suspicious friends. In death, he makes creepy songs play on the radio and whispers in the ears of the living when they get too close to places they shouldn't be. It's a good gig, or at least it was until the new boss showed up. The new boss used to be a serial killer. The new boss is bad news.

Charlie and the boys have been talking. The new guy has got to go. To make that happen, Charlie's going to need help from someone with a pulse.

A year ago, Ashanda was in a juvenile detention facility. Now she spends her days as a high school student and her nights working with her aunt as a medium. Ninety percent of the time, she's a con artist, telling the living what they want to hear, but when you talk about ghosts too often sooner or later they're going to show up at your doorstep.

Charlie needs a favor. Ashanda doesn't like dead people, but Charlie's putting a lot of money on the table. In the short term, the job involves a road trip. In the long term, it'll involve dead gangsters, the hidden history of the music business, a zombie siege of a roadside diner, and a brief descent into hell.

Brendan Detzner is the author of White Rabbit Society, Beasts, Scarce Resources, Millersville, and a lot of other stuff. Stories featuring Charlie Harmer have appeared in the Book of Dead Things anthology and the Pseudopod podcast. This is his first time appearing in a full-length novel.


"Brendan Detzner displays wit, imagination, and an utter disregard for his readers' sense of safety and comfort. A budding master of dark fantasy." Rory Leahy, Response Scenario

"An up-and-coming voice worth following." Harold Holt, Zora Neale Hurston-Bessie Head Fiction award winner

"Brendan Detzner grips my imagination and doesn't let go until I've finished the book." Angelica Davila, HEAUXS Magazine