Review Detail

Marius lives near New Orleans, in a family mausoleum, since his family has dealt with ghosts in the cemetery for generations. His mother has passed away, although her ghost is still around to give him advice. He gets human money for being the caretaker, but he is interested in earning Mystical credit in order to bring his mother back from the dead. In order to do this, he traps more dangerous spirits in his book, and sells them to Papa Harold at the Habada-Cherie. There is a scale that extracts the spirit from the book and tells how much should be paid. Boogeymen aren't too bad to capture, although Marius occasionally has to hide in a child's bedroom to do this. When he is not earning enough, he agrees to take on more serious monsters, although not everyone thinks that this is something children should be doing. Marius also has a secret; his best friend is a mermaid. Not the sparkling, happy, Disney type mermaid, but a creepy Southern one with a frightening maw and endless appetite for flesh. We don't quite know why their bond is so deep, but Rhiannon has never hurt Marius, and helps him in his monster hunting frequently. In between going to school at Madame Millett's small academy (and having to deal with her daughter, who taunts him and calls him Mary) and taking care of the ghosts at the cemetary, Marius takes on increasingly difficult monsters. Papa Harold sends him after a candy lady who ends up being a much more dangerous boo hag in disguise, and he earns a lot of Mystical credit, but he uses it it to save the soul of one of his teachers, who has sold her soul to a demon in exchange for the health of her children. To earn more, Marius eventually agrees to capture a terrifying rougarou. This isn't easy, and it takes all of his skill as well as help from Rhiannon to subdue it. Will this be enough to bring back his mother?