Monday, January 9, 2023

BOOK REVIEW: The Weird Epistles of Penelope Pettiweather, Ghost Hunter by Jessica Amanda Salmonson

 

Penelope Pettiweather is a seeker of ghosts and legends, particularly those of the Pacific Northwest, and these stories are framed as her letters to friends recounting her supernatural inquiries.

Each tale begins with a history of the haunting and the location. While some readers might not like these “info dumps”, they are an integral part of each tale and give the ghostly subjects a feeling of place and realism.  

The specters Ms. Pettiweather describes are quite diverse. There is the phantom of a drowned woman whose body turned to soap, a pair of vengeful laborers reborn as fire-wreathed hellhounds, a Native shaman preserving the sacred lands under a golf course, and more. 

Not all of the stories are about ghosts, though. Ms. Pettiweather also relates tales of a giant freshwater octopus living in a drowned forest; an electric sea serpent that may actually have been a Victorian submarine; and even the famous cryptid Ogopogo of Lake Okanagan.

Since the stories are told in an epistolary style, either recounting the tale after the fact or relating tales told by someone else, there admittedly isn’t much tension to the stories. One doesn’t get the sense of “being there” for the hauntings. But these fictional tales are not meant to spook the reader. Rather, they are an homage to real-life guidebooks to regional haunts and mysterious locales, as well as conversational ghost stories such as the Christmas ghost stories of M.R. James or the Carnacki tales of William Hope Hodgson.. They are also a love letter by the author, Jessica Amanda Salmonson, to the area around Puget Sound and the Pacific Northwest where she lives.


A particularly charming aspect of the stories is the affection Ms. Pettiweather has for all her supernatural subjects. She is no ghostbuster looking to exorcise every spook or exploit them for profit. She is an explorer probing the edges of the Unknown with curiosity, content to let these mysterious beings exist in peace. She even has empathy for the titular “Hounds of the Hearth” that directly try to immolate her. 

As a side note, I want to mention that author Jessica Amanda Salmonson is transgender and was very open about her transition back in the 1970s. While her fiction isn’t focused on trans issues, I feel it’s good for readers- Queer readers especially- to see that trans authors have always been around.

The Complete Weird Epistles of Penelope Pettiweather, Ghost Hunter is a great read for those who love books about local folklore- even if it's fictional. You can get a copy of "The Weird Epistles of Penelope Pettiweather, Ghost Hunter" here and here.