The Perfect Ghost by Linda Barnes

The title refers to both a ghost writer and a character in Hamlet, which turns out to be semi-relevant in this muddled mystery. Em Moore and Teddy Blake are a team--he does the interviews and she writes the books, a series of biographies. He's outgoing and charming, she's nearly agoraphobic and prone to suffer from anxiety attacks. Halfway through their book on charismatic actor/director Garrett Malcolm, Teddy dies in a car crash and Em is forced to finish the interviews and the book on her own. That is the premise and it's a good one.

But in reality, this book doesn't work. Em does the narrating and she is not the most sympathetic character in the world. And she is telling the story to the dead Teddy, which wears thin pretty quickly. Without giving away the ending (which came out of nowhere, in my humble opinion), halfway through the book, mousy Em suddenly undergoes a personality transformation, which seemed very implausible. However, if you accept that, you can accept the ending. I didn't.

I have read the much better Carlotta Carlyle series by this author and was hoping this book would be equally enjoyable. Alas, it was not to be.