Ghost at Work (Bailey Ruth Mysteries, No. 1)

This has to be the most stupid piece of literature ever! Please, don’t waste your time. Ant 2nd grader could figure out the mystery..,, SCOOBY Doo is more advanced… Horrible waste of time.

I have read every "Death on Demand" book with great enjoyment. Not having enjoyed the "Henry O" series as much I was a bit apprehensive about a new one. What a DELIGHTFUL SURPRISE!!! Bailey Ruth is a hoot of a character who seems to find herself in more unusual predicaments with every passing moment.....and trying hard to justify her breaking of the Precepts to her mentor Wiggins. As a ghost she has a special knack for investigating the suspects in a murder case, even helping some of them to redeem themselves while she appears and disappears with seeming abandon. I loved this book and this character and can't wait for the next Bailey Ruth adventure!

Bailey Ruth Raeburn has been dead for quite awhile. She and her husband died when their cabin cruiser "serendipity" lost a run in with a thirty foot wave. However, Bailey thinks she has more to offer, she wants to offer her help to people in need. So she applies to Heaven's Department of Good Intentions, where she meets Wiggins, her new boss. Wiggins is in the middled of telling her the rules when they get an emergency call and Bailey is sent to earth without knowing the rules, without knowing what she's allowed to do. She appears at a murder scene, knowing only that she's to help the woman who appears to have committed the crime, but a quick perusal of the crime scene and Bailey can tell the victim died elsewhere and that her new charge is being set up. Bailey has to find the murderer and granted she has the ability to walk through walls, what ghost doesn't, she still has to apply a detective's skill in this novel that will have you glued to your chair. Carolyn Hart has put a new spin on mystery, it's ghostly and deliciously entertaining. Review submitted by Captain Katie Osborne

I'm very familiar with Ms. Hart's "Death on Demand" series, less so with Henrie O, so I was most interested to check out Bailey Ruth. It starts a little slow, which is understandable given that it's the first book and that we have to be given an introduction. The ghost/mystery combo is a bit unusual, but I don't find it off-putting at all. Neither the ghost part nor the mystery part are, in my opinion, hard core or overly scary or unsettling; I'd consider the book a "cozy." I hope to read more "Bailey Ruth" to see where this goes!

I had stopped reading Carolyn Hart's 'Death on Demand' series because I felt the characters had grown too cute to be endured. However, in this newest series, Hart has adopted an actual guardian angel as a leading lady and, suddenly, all the sweetness becomes perfectly understandable. Hart is quick to have her protagonist, Bailey Ruth Raeburn, point out that she is NOT an angel, since those are metaphysical beings and are not nor ever have been human; Bailey Ruth is a ghost, ala Topper (and the vastly underrated Black Jack Savage of brief Disney fame). In fact, I found the theological aspects of the story to be the most interesting. Hart describes heaven, a heaven that sounds, well, heavenly, and doesn't involve de rigeur white robes and harp practice. She casually explains a few other tricky elements that one has always pondered, at least briefly, such as "if there is a heaven, are my loved ones WATCHING me all the time?" a slightly creepy thought I think anyone who has ever contemplated heaven's existence at all will admit to having had, and does so in a truly comforting way. Once, long ago, I read a novel in which the afterlife of the deceased was determined by what they had believed while alive... hearty Norsemen and women caroused in Valhalla, while Puritans rather uncomfortably scurried about huge, echoing, and rather embarrassing mansions of gold. If, like those characters, Hart has created the heaven that she deserves, she must be a remarkable woman! While mystery writers invariably struggle with the dilemma of the amateur sleuth ("why does this civilian with no involvement in law enforcement keep tripping over murders?"), Hart has managed to side-step that by creating Bailey Ruth, a probationary emissary from heaven's Department of Good Intentions. The plot itself is entirely secondary to the interesting characters, and seems to lag at some points while speeding ahead at others, but I don't think this is a series you read for the mystery. In any event, I'll be anxious to find out what Bailey Ruth's next assignment will be!

While heaven is, well, heavenly, Bailey Ruth Raeburn, late of Adelaide, OK, makes it known to Wiggins, head of the Department of Good Intentions, that she wants to help someone on earth in "dire straits". Wiggins tells her she may do so, although due to her rash, impulsive and "spirited" nature, she will be on probation and she must remember all the precepts of being a ghost among the living. With a copy of the rules firmly in hand, she is immediately dispatched right back to Adelaide to find herself on the back porch of the Episcopal Church rectory just as Kathleen, the pastor's wife, is discovering a dead body. The victim, one Daryl Murdoch ,is not quite the upstanding citizen and dedicated church member he appears to be. It seems there are quite a few people who would rather have Daryl dead than alive. Bailey Ruth now has the ability to appear when the need arises or to be invisible when she wants , a useful skill in her job to find the real murderer and absolve the pastor and his wife of any accusations because as it turns out, they too might have had a motive. As Bailey Ruth investigates the crime, the reader will laugh out loud at all of her antics while she learns to function as a ghost with a mission. Being invisible is great for moving from place to place quickly and being one step ahead of the investigation. She begins to narrow down the suspects one by one and at the Halloween Spook Bash held at the church hall, the suspense builds when the lights go out and someone goes missing. It becomes evident to her, but certainly not to the reader, who the real culprit is. Along with a few pop-ins by Wiggins along the way, Bailey Ruth identifies the murderer and ties it all up nicely just before the rescue express sweeps into Adelaide and takes her heaven bound once again. Hart writes a classic cozy with all the traditional elements of the genre. What she adds is her own exceptional brand of wit and humor along with a fabulous cast of well fleshed out characters. As usual, Hart has such a wonderful way with descriptions, the reader feels they are right there on the scene. The plot is well developed with plenty of suspects, all with motives to commit the crime. This is a truly enjoyable new series with non-stop fun . If you are a mystery fan, this is definitely one not to be missed ! Highly recommended.