Ghost Story Anchors Its Plot in a Florida House

A ghost named Hot Dog begins her tale in New York City, standing over a hot dog cart. Pages later, she has moved south to haunt a Florida residence, where the bulk of E.G. Young's young adult novel A (Dead) Thing Like Me unfolds. The book's Florida footprint stops at the state line: Young lives along the Gulf Coast, and the house in the story could sit in any of a hundred other places. The setting does not carry the novel; the writing does. Young handles the genre with a light hand, and the result reads as a clever, otherworldly story rather than a standard haunted-house tale.

The plot turns on how Hot Dog died and why her story opens at a cart in Manhattan. Those answers stay under wraps. The book is short on Florida detail and long on character, which does not keep the reader from turning pages. Young writes for young adults, and the material works for readers who have aged out of that category. Wonders of Shadow Key offers a comparable reading experience, and readers who liked that book will find familiar footing here. The novel is available now, and the timing suits a seasonal purchase.

Young's biography ties the book to the Gulf Coast, where the author lives. The story's events stay inside a single Florida house for most of its length. No further geographic detail appears in the book. The novel does not mock the state, and its Florida connection stops there. The Gabber, a Gulfport newspaper founded in 1968 by George Brann to hold the city council accountable, published the review. The paper's staff and most of its freelancers live in Gulfport and St. Petersburg. Donations to the paper support local reporting; the owners take no income from it.

The book's ghost begins in New York, moves to Florida, and haunts a house there. Young's handling of that premise keeps the story from reading as a conventional haunted-house novel. The genre does not constrain the work, and the author's age does not matter. The book is available for purchase.