Book Review 25. Miramont's Ghost

Book: Miramont's Ghost
Author: Elizabeth Hall
Genre: Paranormal Fiction
Pages: 336
Published: February 1st, 2015

Synopsis: Miramont Castle, built in 1897 and mysteriously abandoned three years later, is home to many secrets. Only one person knows the truth: Adrienne Beauvier, granddaughter of the Comte de Challembelles and cousin to the man who built the castle.
Clairvoyant from the time she could talk, Adrienne’s visions show her the secrets of those around her. When her visions begin to reveal dark mysteries of her own aristocratic French family, Adrienne is confronted by her formidable Aunt Marie, who is determined to keep the young woman silent at any cost. Marie wrenches Adrienne from her home in France and takes her to America, to Miramont Castle, where she keeps the girl isolated and imprisoned. Surrounded by eerie premonitions, Adrienne is locked in a life-or-death struggle to learn the truth and escape her torment.
Reminiscent of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, this hauntingly atmospheric tale is inspired by historical research into the real-life Miramont Castle in Manitou Springs, Colorado.

WARNING: This book and it's review may contain triggers.

★ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

"Having family does not ensure that one won't be lonely."

I feel sort of bad for tearing into this book since it has so many bad reviews already, but I can't help it. This so far seems to be a book every person either absolutely loves or despises. I fall into the latter. Miramont's Ghost is simply not a good book. I was actually disappointed. I really liked the first few chapters of the book. Sure, the beginning lacked a real plot (which we never got anyway) but the overall setup was good. I thought it would be one of those books that just told a person's life story, and in a way it was.

Miramont's Ghost followed the tragic life story of a young upper class French girl born shortly after the fall of Napoleon. She's where our problems begin. Young Adrienne, the main character, is an idiot. By the time something resembling a plot finally does appear and she's pretty much kidnapped by her aunt 60% of the way into the book, Adrienne does nothing to prevent herself from being forced into her aunt and cousin's servitude. A normal person would try to run after pretty much being enslaved, but Adrienne just mopes around, waiting for her boyfriend to come and save her (spoiler alert: he never does. He dies.). She does nothing to solve her problems, and just sits waits around for years. YEARS. She has years of imprisonment when literally at any point she could of escaped by just pretty much leaving and going into town when no one was looking, which was most of the time. Or maybe by growing a backbone and not just letting people ruin her life while she sits there and sighs. Also, it annoyed me her only character trait was moping. All she did was feel sorry for herself. And yeah, her life did suck, but that's because she did absolutely nothing to try and improve her situation!

Also, for some reason Adrienne was a psychic. I don't know why, the story could of pretty much gone on exactly the same by replacing it with her having a brain cell, but apparently it was necessary for the story to progress. It doesn't. She sees into the future in several occasions, but never once does anything with the information. I thought it was going to play a bigger role, or for that matter, any role.

Additionally, the antagonists of the book are terrible. They are evil for the sake of being evil. You don't get their full back stories until you've already gotten 80% into the book, and even then their back stories suck. "Oh, my dad was distant." Better kidnap my niece and force her into slavery. And that was literally the most reasonable motive into the whole book. They had no redeeming qualities at all. The book was meant to tell the story of this ghost's life, but honestly the entire thing was a mess.

The only characters I liked were Grand-pere and Lucie, neither of whom make it into the second half if the book. The first 20% of the book actually was pretty good, before it got overly dark and disgusting. Adrienne's character as a 4-year-old had infinitely more depth and flavor than when she was grown up some how.

All I can say, this book was terrible with one-dimensional characters and no plot. Thank God this book was free to me through the Amazon First program, because if I had paid a cent I would demand a refund.

-Claire

Some other reviews of "Miramont's Ghost" (may contain spoilers):
Popcorn Reads
Honey Badgers Book Club
Witch, Wine, Words