The Chick and the Dead

By Casey Daniels

In the first book, Don of the Dead, Pepper Martin hit her head on a headstone and developed the power to see dead people. After she solved the mystery of the Don's murder, Pepper assumed (and hoped) that was the end of seeing ghosts. But it wasn't.
Now she is being visited by the ghost of Didi Bowman, who, it turns out, wrote the great American novel, So Far the Dawn (a Civil War epic similar to Gone with the Wind) only to have it published after Didi died under her sister's name. Now Didi wants justice, not only for herself, but for her granddaughter, who is living in foster care and struggling. Didi finally has a chance because her sister is coming to town to celebrate the opening of the family home as a museum dedicated to the famous novel. And it is up to Pepper to expose the fraud and gain for Didi and her granddaughter all the rights and benefits so long denied them.

This was a pretty good story, typical murder mystery, with the added fillip of a private detective who sees ghosts. This gives the main character, Pepper Martin, amateur and rather unwilling sleuth, the inside track. But it doesn't do her as much good as one would think, since her ghostly clients are not completely honest about their pasts and deaths.