A review by demetria_books01
Ghosts of the Forbidden by Leanna Renee Hieber

dark emotional mysterious relaxing fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

3.5

‘Ghosts of the forbidden’ would definitely be a 4 star read if not for the dialogues. The plot was interesting although it would need extra 100 pages to properly develop and fully immerse the reader. Nonetheless, I had fun reading this book and I did feel drawn to this story, as well as to the romance (which, just like the plot, needed few pages more to become better) but it did make me feel butterflies and it definitely did make me cheer on Lilliana and Nathaniel. I loved the whole premise of them being some sort of reincarnations of the past lovers and both of them sharing part of their past selves’ souls. I found the romantic bits very cute and I really wanted to spend more time with these two.

I also enjoyed the darker parts of this book and found the whole curse plot very intriguing. Unfortunately, because the book is so short, I feel like the author wanted to create something way bigger than she had time for. The are many things about the curse that were underdeveloped or mysteries that were left unsolved (like why Martha from the start of the book had a heart attack or what exactly was hiding in the old mine).

I think the shining point of this book are the characters. There are quite few of them but somehow the author manages to build their personalities well enough, I could feel for them straight away. Which was surprising because again, the book has only 144 pages! 

Lastly, I want to circle back to what I said about dialogues. As much as I liked the book, the dialogues were awfully dry! They felt unnatural and I’m not sure it’s because the author tried to write them in an old fashioned style of speaking or is it because they were just bad. Because of this, I couldn’t fully immerse myself in many situations in this book because I was focusing so much on how robotic the dialogues were!

Anyway, even though it’s not one of the best books I’ve read this year, it was a fun read and I think if you want to read a short ghost story with romance, you should give this book a chance!