Haunted on Bourbon Street (Jade Calhoun series, Book 1) by Deanna Chase

1 out of 5 stars.

This book is about an empath, Jade Calhoun, who moves from Idaho to an apartment above a strip bar on Bourbon Street in New Orleans. She starts making friends, including her sexy landlord, Kane, but being an empath isn't easy when trying to form relationships. She tries to keep her gifts secret, but when a ghost starts terrifying her friend Pyper, it's up to Jade to use her unique abilities to save her. She needs Kane's assistance as well, but when he betrays her with a secret of his own, she is not sure she can trust him.

I totally loved the idea of this story which is why I decided to read it. Unfortunately it wasn’t what I thought it was. I was under the impression that it was a ghost story with a bit of romance. What it ended up being was a paranormal romance with a bit of ghost story. Don’t get me wrong, I can enjoy a good paranormal romance book, especially when they are well written with well-developed characters and an interesting plot. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case here.

So what was wrong with it? Simple. Everything. The characters were one dimensional and never developed. Their basic descriptions were incredibly lacking and not once did I feel like I “knew” them. They felt like strangers to me and to each other throughout the whole book. Jade, the main character, especially irritated me. She was annoying and quite honestly, a hypocrite. An example: Her relationship with Kane gets tarnished when she finds out that the sexy dreams she’s been having about him are in fact, actually him, dreamwalking. She gets upset and feels violated. She mentions how intrusive it is and tells herself that she hates him for it. Bare in mind that she regularly reads people’s emotions and feelings, quite often without their consent, which I imagine if people knew that, they would feel violated. It was almost laughable. She really has no reason to get mad. I wasn’t a big fan of her to begin with and really ended up disliking her after that.

The other problem was the location.  Supposedly the main character lives in New Orleans, but so little was mentioned about it that I kept forgetting that’s where it was taking place. Given the fact that Jade is an empath, I would have thought the city would be more incorporated into the story and Jade’s gifts would be used to, I don’t know, do something. But sadly, it wasn’t and they weren’t, which I feel was a real missed opportunity on the author’s part.

As far as the ghost story, that never made any real sense to me. The ghost that haunts Jade is apparently too stupid to realize that she is not his wife and the love of his life. I had an issue with this because I would think you would remember what your spouse looks like and wouldn’t confuse some random stranger for them, but whatever. There was also so much focus on Jade’s feeling for Kane that the ghost part kind of became more of a distant secondary part of the story that never fully came to light.

The romance part of the storyline, which was the majority, was awkward and weird. There was no connection between Jade and Kane. It seemed to progress very quickly but without passion. Plus, since the characters weren’t really developed as stated above, it seemed forced and kind of creepy. Because of this, when it came to the sex scenes, they were uncomfortable to read and I ended up just skipping over those.

I did end up finishing the book, but just barely. Some paranormal romance readers might enjoy this quick read, but I cannot say I am one of them.

If you read this book, I'd love to hear your opinion on it! What did you think? Love it? Hated it? Let me know.

Available on Amazon at the link below:
Haunted on Bourbon Street