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Melanie Chambers was born in South Carolina in the early twentieth century to a wealthy family. She lives in a breathtaking traditional mansion that her ancestors built as they arrived in America. Living in the house is not the only family tradition she keeps alive. The women in her bloodline are said to have a way of "knowing" things. Fortunately, they also kept their thoughts in detailed diaries. Another, more peculiar legacy is the regular presence of a ghost—that of her grandfather (many times removed), Josiah Jackson. He is a cousin of the more famous General Stonewall Jackson. Stranger still is the female relatives' ritual performance of spectrophilia with the ghost.
There is an abundance of strange folklore surrounding each generation of this family. The most famous story is a classic love tale of a more romantic time. Melissa and Josiah's courtship and marriage seem like pages from a novel. There are also rumors about how their wealth was acquired. Was it piracy during the Revolutionary War? Melanie uses humor and a sense of wonder to relate the history of her predecessors.
Shores skillfully creates a vibrant setting with intriguing characters. The use of diaries provides intense insight into their thoughts and emotions while building suspense. Artful language brings a wide range of interwoven stories together into a mysterious, odd tale. The narrative focuses on steamy, graphic scenes of eroticism with interludes of romance and secretive plots to uncover. Readers will be enticed by the myriad of wild discoveries about the family's history and seduced by the guilty pleasures.