The Haunting of Brynn Wilder by Wendy Webb

 

I really, really, really enjoyed reading Brynn’s story. I cannot recall a book that has had such deep character personalities, and there were quite a few. Here’s a rundown:

LuAnn and Gary – Luann is the owner of the boardinghouse that Brynn was staying at for her summer in Wharton. Gary is the bartender. And boy what a story they have.

Jason and Gil – Summertime renters at the boardinghouse. Their story is quite interesting as well, how they came to be a couple.

Alice – Jason’s ex-wife, Rebecca and Jane’s mother. Alice is afflicted with Alzheimer’s, but she knows things … things she shouldn’t know.

Dominic – The very attractive man who is also staying at the boardinghouse and gets a lot of attention, being a newcomer to Wharton.

Simon and Jonathan – Another interesting couple who work at Kate and Nick’s inn.

Kate and Nick – Kate is Brynn’s long-time friend and Nick is her husband, who also happens to be the chief of police in Wharton.

Rebecca and Jane – Jason and Alice’s daughters. They don’t play a huge role, but they are important to this story.

The town of Wharton, a small town on Lake Superior. A place where folks go to recharge their batteries, so to speak, to escape their ‘real’ lives, if even for a summer.

Yes, it seems like there are a ton of characters in this tale, but each one has a specific role, some roles larger than others. This story centers around Brynn and her grief. She comes to Wharton at the insistence of her friend, Kate, knowing that she needs to reset her emotions. Along the way Brynn meets Dominic and there is an immediate attraction, but she can’t figure out why. Then come the dreams. Then the sightings she sees (of which no one is surprised, the boardinghouse is haunted after all). Then there is room five and what is so special about room five?

These pages contain so much … love stories, hauntings, visions, dreams, the past colliding with the present – or does it? The mystery surrounding Dominic and why Brynn feels so drawn to him. I think the author really nailed it with all the intertwining lives of these characters. Now, I have filled my shopping cart with all the books … I can only imagine what some of these characters get up to in each of them, as per the Acknowledgements, Wharton is a big part of this author’s writing.