Lost by Gregory Maguire

Rating: 4.0

What it's about:
Winifred Rudge, a bemused writer struggling to get beyond the runaway success of her mass–market astrology book, travels to London to jump–start her new novel about a woman who is being haunted by the ghost of Jack the Ripper. Upon her arrival, she finds that her stepcousin and old friend John Comestor has disappeared, and a ghostly presence seems to have taken over his home. Is the spirit Winnie's great–great–grandfather, who, family legend claims, was Charles Dickens's childhood inspiration for Ebenezer Scrooge? Could it be the ghostly remains of Jack the Ripper? Or a phantasm derived from a more arcane and insidious origin? Winnie begins to investigate and finds herself the unwilling audience for a drama of specters and shades –– some from her family's peculiar history and some from her own unvanquished past.

In the spirit of A. S. Byatt's Possession, with dark echoing overtones of A Christmas Carol, Lost presents a rich fictional world that will enrapture its readers. - from the editor

My thoughts:
I really enjoyed the mystery of this story. There are actually two mysteries evolving as we read. There is the mystery of the ghost in the chimney and also the mystery of what happened between Winnie and John. It was so much fun traveling to London with Winnie and seeing the mystifying events unfold. The parallel story of Winnie and John made Winnie seem more human. It reveals she's sort of a broken heroine with her internal problems as well as the external problem of the ghost in the chimney. The characters are unique and loveable in their own ways from the crazy old cat lady to the gay reader of tea leaves. I won't soon forget this book or it's colorful cast!