The Ghost and the Goth by Stacey Kade

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The Ghost and the Goth
by Stacey Kade

One of the dead narrator novels I read this week was Stacey Kade’s The Ghost and the Goth. It tells the story of newly dead Alona Dare and her spiritual connection to Will Killian, who can see spirits just like his father did before he committed suicide.  Will just wants to survive the last few weeks of his senior year so he can graduate and then move somewhere less populous, this decreasing the number of dead ghosts vying for his attention. His plans to graduate are complicated by his troubled relationship to Principal Brewster and psychiatrist Dr. Miller, both of whom believe Will is just a troubled teen with psych problems; Brewster would like nothing more than to have an excuse to expel him, and Dr. Miller wants to send him to a psych hospital for further treatment. Will and Alona form an uneasy alliance  so that if Alona can help keep the rest of the ghosts at school at bay, Will will do what he can to help her move on to the rest of her afterlife. As the story unfolds, the narration jumps back and forth between chapters narrated by Alona and chapters narrated by Will. We discover that despite her perfectly constructed outward appearance, Alona’s home life was a shambles with divorced parents; mom’s response to the divorce was to become an alcoholic mess. Will is additionally hunted/haunted by an unnamed spirit of negative energy, which Will at first seems to think is what’s left of his father after his suicide. Ultimately, he discovers that it’s the projection of his best friend Joonie, who is riddled with guilt, shame, and anger due to her part in the accident of their mutual friend Lily. Will knows that whatever spirit had been in Lily before the accident is now gone, and there’s no coming back. Lilly is brain dead. But Joonie still hopes that she can somehow summon Lily’s spirit and put it back in her broken body to make her whole. The novel ends with Joonie finally accepting forgiveness for her part in the accident, since Alone writes to her via a Ouija board, Will explaining to his mom that he sees dead ghosts, and Alona forgiving her mother for her part in Alona’s death.

I have to admit, I had a hard time getting through this novel.  Had it not been required reading for class, I think I would have set it down after a few chapters.  In my mind, Kade takes a long time to develop Will and Alona as anything more than just clichés of the troubled goth kid and the self-important cheerleader.  While we eventually learn more about the two characters, I still think they are very flat stereotypes more so than believable teens. Perhaps it might have some teen appeal, but I think there are better books out there that have more compelling story arcs and better fleshed out protagonists.  I was also reminded of our earlier module on alternating narrators.  I think there are books that handle this literary device more adroitly than here.