Sparrow Hill Road (Ghost Roads, #1) in Readers Unbound

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Sparrow Hill Road (Ghost Roads, #1)

Seanan McGuire

Start date: April 1, 2020

Finish date: April 30, 2020

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Jul 21, 2020 John rated it liked it

Shelves: donated

This is a book that could be very puzzling unless you simply ask no questions of it, sit back, and let the excellent writing flow in whatever direction the author chooses. I did that and quite enjoyed the ride, so a very solid three stars from me.

Part of the potential puzzlement to inquiring readers may be due to the origin of this work (and my thanks to Melindeeloo for the lead) as a collection of short stories by Seanan McGuire that appeared in a semiprozine (online only?) called Edge of Propi This is a book that could be very puzzling unless you simply ask no questions of it, sit back, and let the excellent writing flow in whatever direction the author chooses. I did that and quite enjoyed the ride, so a very solid three stars from me.

Part of the potential puzzlement to inquiring readers may be due to the origin of this work (and my thanks to Melindeeloo for the lead) as a collection of short stories by Seanan McGuire that appeared in a semiprozine (online only?) called Edge of Propinquity, published from 2006 to 2011 and apparently still archived at . The collection was re-edited with the inclusion of new stories for release in 2014 by DAW as the present book.

The main character in all the stories is Rose Marshall, a legendary ghost who died in 1952 at the age of sixteen while driving along Sparrow Hill Road to the Buckley High School Senior Prom. Because of the manner of her death she became the type of ghost called a "hitcher," and this is where McGuire's brilliant originality starts to bear fruit. There are hundreds of types of ghosts, and not everyone who dies becomes a ghost; ghosts are special, and we meet only a few of the different types. Each type has a particular mission (if that's what I should call it--I did say this world was puzzling, didn't I?) and is influenced by powerful non-ghost supernaturals like routewitches and my favorite character, Emma, who gives wonderful new meaning to the word banshee.

And Rose's mission? Always appearing as a sixteen-year-old girl, Rose shows up along roadsides and at truck stops all around the country to ask for rides from drivers who are about to die in a road accident. She's drawn by a smell of lilacs and ashes to accompany them in both life and death because she's also a psychopomp, which in this case means a guide who takes a newly released soul along the ghostroads as far as the Last Dance Diner, where she points the soul in the direction it needs to go. The Last Dance Diner, which changes to the Last Chance Diner when things get dire, seems to be Rose's home base if she has one, and Emma seems to be in charge of it.

There's also the notion of ghost cars traveling on the ghost roads, the notion of daylight vs twilight vs midnight as sensual metaphors for three levels of reality, and the notion of moving by small stages between levels, for example being in daylight with a little bit of twilight--that last would be Rose along the highway, able to speak and be seen but still incorporeal like a hologram until someone freely gives her a coat, whereupon she becomes fully corporeal for a while. The world McGuire has built is totally original as far as I know.

I agree with Valerie when she says the writing "meanders and floats in a manner that is easily evocative of a haunting." That was exactly my feeling over the several days of following a multitude of jumps backward and forward in time between 1952 and 2015--something that worked well, I thought, in the film 21 Grams and works passably here, more to develop the characters than to flesh out a definite plot. I felt at the end that I was left with an ongoing series of overlapping stories, some of them sad and some of them even exciting, but inconclusive overall. I was particularly touched, though, by the final outcome of Rose's relationship with her teenage boyfriend Gary.

Recommended with the reservations I've given. ...more

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Apr 14, 2020 Tracy rated it it was amazing

Shelves: actual-book, first-in-series, own-it, paranormal-urban-fantasy, ghosts, group-read-ru, read-in-2020

This book is separated into 4 parts and reads like short stories that are all intermingled and feature the same main character of Rose. This was really unique, playing off of an urban legend that we have all heard some version of. Probably. I would definitely read the next book in this series.

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Feb 27, 2022 Brittany rated it really liked it

Shelves: audiobook, urban-fantasy, supernatural, read-2022

3.5 stars rounded up
This is a collection of what was once short stories fleshed out a bit for a complete story. Sometimes it is a little disjointed but I enjoyed it anyway. I found this to be a great way to learn more of the ghosts of the incryptid world. I loved learning little things that make what happened in the Incryptid series with the ghosts that much more intriguing. While that series does not need to be read to read this one I do think it increased my enjoyment.
This is Rose Marshal's st ...more

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Mar 07, 2014 Melindeeloo rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: ghost-hunters-ghost-whisperers, urban-fantasy

3.5 stars = I liked it. Rose Marshall died at sixteen, on the night of her prom but didn't move on, instead she became an urban legend, a hitchhiking ghost who rides with those who are destined to die on the road, saving those whose fates are not set in stone and helping the other to move on to the afterlife.

I liked Sparrowhill Road, while I was reading this it felt like a series of shot stories, which it turns out it actually was- originally published in Edge of Propinquity, a magazine. I liked ...more

1 like · Like · see review