The Cottage on Ghost Lane by Christy Barritt

The Cottage on Ghost Lane by Christy Barritt
Series: The Beach House Mystery Series
Publisher: River Heights on July 1, 2021

REVIEW BY STACI TROILO

The Cottage on Ghost Lane by Christy Barritt is the first in a four-book Christian romantic suspense series (The Beach House Mystery Series). I believe these works all stand on their own, and if the initial installment is any indication, they will be fast and easy reads.

The book opens with Cole Dalton, an EOD specialist (retired) whose wife died in an automobile accident. Given the danger of his work, he expected to be the one to pass first, but instead he lost the love of his life. A year later, he’s still grieving. He returns to the beach house he and his wife had been restoring to process his loss and say goodbye. 

He planned on finishing the renovation. He didn’t plan on fighting for his life. 

Walking in on a violent intruder should have been the most perilous moment of his trip, but the danger keeps increasing. Someone wants something in his house, though he can’t imagine what. And they’ll do anything to get it.

In addition to his unknown enemy, Cole meets a few other people on the beach. He even finds himself on his first date since losing Caroline. The author balances high-stakes action with introspective  moments to create a comfortable progression throughout the book.

The faith element is clearly expressed in times of both physical danger and overwhelming emotions, but it never feels heavy-handed.

God and her faith in Him were the only things that had gotten her through these past months. When she felt like she couldn’t take any more, she’d gotten on her knees and simply prayed to Him. She had to rely on His strength, knowing it was greater than her own.

Christy Barritt, The Cottage on Ghost Lane

I usually enjoy this author’s work very much, and I found the concept of this story quite compelling. Unfortunately, I have to subtract points for both character and pacing. 

With respect to characters, they felt flat. The leads had true emotional traumas, but they weren’t fleshed out. We only got the surface pain and not the deep-rooted issues, so the protagonists never really came to life for me. And the secondary characters were easy to figure out. I knew their roles immediately and wasn’t surprised by anything they did. Also, there were no red herrings. I prefer having to guess who the enemy is, and I felt cheated of that chance. 

With respect to pacing, everything just unfolded too fast. I suspect if we’d had more character development and more suspects and clues to investigate, that wouldn’t have been an issue. There was a lot of gold in this story, but the author chose not to mine it. She left the best parts unexplored, and the story suffered for it.

The plot itself was interesting, and the author did a nice job of setting a mood, particularly during raging storms. But that wasn’t enough for me. These characters never got a proper arc because we never dug deeply into their traumas. 

If you like plot-forward Christian thrillers, you’ll enjoy this. I personally prefer character-driven stories (thriller or not), and so I have to take away 1.5 fishes on this one and give it 3.5.

_{I read The Cottage on Ghost Lane through Kindle Unlimited.}