This has to be the worst book I have ever read and I'm seriously not kidding either. It was boring with uninteresting characters. I kept reading thinking that it would get better and neatly come together at the end, but it never did. The bizarre, disturbing ending stamped it as the worst book ever for me. I never read a Bradford novel before and certainly expected something better than this. Don't even ask me how I was able to get through it, but somehow I did!

I only got about 1/3 through this book because it was written in the first person and I couldn't relate at all to the weird narrator or any of the other unrealistic characters, plus it was boring.

Even though I am no a big fan of this author I did find this book to be very entertaining even though I threw it against the wall of my prison cell many times. But Over all it was a good read. In prison there aren't a lot of good things to read. Heck I even told my mother about it and she had a tough time reading through it. But in the end she liked it too.

I am a BTB fan but I feel this book was rather basic for her. I liked the story and there were many points that really made me thing and gave me hope for the future. I was disappointed in the length though and wished the story had continued. Overall a good read.

This novel had a very timely twist to it which made it a real page turner. It was much too short and I wanted to know more about some of the characters that were brought up such as Samantha -- what ever happened to her? Overall I enjoyed every page of the book and can't wait to read more of this author's works. This book was not cluttered with lots of characters and made for a quick and easy read!! Thoroughly enjoyable!

I loved this book because it is a wonderful short story by an author always known for extensive (400+ page) novels. The story is captivating and leaves the reader wanting more! Too bad this was only a short story. It was also a wonderful TV movie!

I had waited sooo long for this novel to come out, and when its all been read and done, it was bad. boring and slow, with no intrest at all the novel just never hit it off. I love Barbara Michaels, but this just was not her.

I've never read anything by Michaels (who also writes under the name Elizabth Peters), but this seemed mildly interesting (although I gather this book is nothing like her other works). The premise here is neat enough, we are taken to an old-fashioned gentlemen's club somehere in time and allowed to eavesdrop on a convocation of experts on trickery, pschology, and the paranormal, including Harry Houdini, Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle, a veiled Sigmind Freud, Nandor Fodor, and one or two others. They gather to share their research on unexplained paranormal events and propose solutions based on their own theories. The first tale is about the "Bell Witch" hauntings in Tennessee (which I had never heard of). The "ghost story" just barely maintained my interest, but when the sleuths started proposing their solutions, the writing got overly clever in trying to replicate the mannerisms of each. The second story "The Phelps Case" failed to hold my interest and I moved on to other things. If you're into ghost stories you might like this, but otherwise I'd suggest giving it a miss.

I had not read any of her works as either Barbara Michaels or Elizabeth Peters before, so this was my introduction to her work. This mystery is actually two stories in one, with each story around 100-120 pages long. I preferred the first to the second; both dealt with families being tormented by a spirit of some kind or poltergeist activity. At the close of each story, the ghostly gentleman's club - including Harry Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - draw various conclusions. Thus there is not just one right answer, but instead various opinions and scenarios. Good work, quick read, fun for classic mystery / poltergeist fans.