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The House on Tradd Street Karen White Books

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The House on Tradd Street Karen White Books

It's hard to like a book when you utterly hate the main character, but I guess it's a testimony to the author's story-telling skills that I liked The House on Tradd Street despite Melanie Middleton. For a supposedly uber-successful realtor and respected businesswoman of thirty-nine years old, Melanie is incredibly rude, tactless, and immature. Her specialty is selling historical old houses to her clients, but she describes people who buy old houses to restore as "stupid." Nice, huh? In addition, she thinks all old buildings, even those in residential neighborhoods, should be razed to make way for parking lots and convenience stores. I hated this character from page one. Add in her intolerance (the way she criticizes her best friend's clothes and the fact that Jack has female friends), and the way she treated the dog whose owner died (trying to give the dog to anyone, even threatening to dump him at a shelter just so she wouldn't be inconvenienced by him) and by the end of the book I was rooting for the malevolent spirit to take her out. I won't even go into her teenage-girl-drama temper tantrums, complete with "I never want to see you again!" pronouncements. The fact that she had a crappy childhood didn't even soften my dislike for this horrible woman.

If you can get past Melanie the Bitch, the story is a good one. I'll admit that I had parts of it figured out long before the author "revealed" certain parts, but there were still some surprises. The secondary characters are great: Sophie and Chad, Jack and Amelia, Mrs. Houlihan, Melanie's father, even Rich the plumber. Marc wasn't so great, but he was a two-dimensional character, and it's clear he was only thrown in the story to create some conflict. The story could have been told without him and would have been better. I wish we would have seen more of Susannah. It would have been great if she had turned out to be Melanie's grandmother. I thought that was where the author was going when she mentioned the color of Susannah's eyes. I think the author missed a really cool plot twist there.

Although I'd like to read the rest of this series, I'm put off knowing Melanie is the main character. I read the first chapter of the next book, and she's still the same whiny temper-throwing twit. I may see if my local library has the books, but if not I won't read them. Melanie Middleton isn't worth the money to buy them.


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The House on Tradd Street Karen White Books Reviews

The first in series concerning rundown mansions in Charleston historical area. I have always enjoyed Karen White's books. I found a skillfully written paranormal tale. The characters and the descriptions of houses, area and the ghosts are first class. The protagonist, Melanie Middleton appears to have a negative character but as her story begins to unravel I understood her reactions.
Melanie is startled to learn she has inherited a house in Tradd Street.She wants nothing to do with it at first. The inheritance has strings attach but her friends convinced her to accept the gift. She is uneasy as she a woman and child in the garden and highly influence in the attic. Melanie meets two male friends, one a writer of historical books and the other real estate CEO. BOTH with will influence her life. I recommend this book.
When Melanie Middleton inherits a historic Tradd Street home from a man she met only once, she has to solve the mystery of the man's mother's disappearance which eerily parallels her own abandonment by her mother. Melanie vehemently denies that she sees ghosts but that doesn't stop her from seeing them.

As she begins to restore the home, with the assistance of Jack Trenholm who is a writer in need of a book idea, her best friend Sophie who is a quirky college professor whose specialty is old Charleston homes, and Chad who is one of her clients looking for a house.

Trying to solve the mystery of the disappearance of Louisa Vanderhorst leads to another mystery. A Vanderhorst ancestor might have hidden some Confederate diamonds somewhere in the house. Melanie could use the diamonds to help restore the house but a descendant of the man Louisa was supposed to have run off with - Marc Longo - is also on the hunt for the diamonds.

Besides ghosts, this book has tangled family relationships. Melanie's father, who turned to alcohol when Melanie's mother left, has been named the trustee of the money left to Melanie to restore the home. Melanie has long since learned that he could not be depended on. Also Melanie's mother has been trying to contact her but Melanie has written her out of her life.

This was an excellent and spooky mystery with a great setting and intriguing characters.
I love Charleston, have family there, and my sister-in-law's name is the same as one of the streets referenced in this book. Unfortunately, Ms. White needs to go back to writing school, as this book is sloppily written, with poor construction and trite cliches throughout. To cap it all off, neither she, nor her editors bothered to learn that Mayo Clinic is in Rochester, MN! May she never write "due to the fact that" again! I'd hoped it would be an amusing summer read. Don't waste your money or your time.
As others have noted, it's hard to categorize this book. Set in the present time, it's a mystery dealing with lost diamonds from Civil War days and also with the disappearance of a young mother in the 1930's. It's a romance involving Melanie Middleton, who inherited the house on Tradd Street in Charleston, and her two suitors, Jack and Marc, who have different reasons for wanting to find the missing diamonds. It's a ghost story with spirits, mostly friendly, who inhabit Melanie's new house and garden and want to communicate with her. It's also a story of family relationships--of different generations and different times, of people living and people dead--and of the restoration of a historic home in a location rich with reminders of past eras and people who once lived there. Add to that the fact that the story is told in a compelling narrative, and you've got a good book. Yes, some of the romantic developments are a bit exasperating, and one aspect of the mystery is rather obvious, but I still had a lot of fun reading this book and I intend to look into the sequels. I would definitely recommend it.
It's hard to like a book when you utterly hate the main character, but I guess it's a testimony to the author's story-telling skills that I liked The House on Tradd Street despite Melanie Middleton. For a supposedly uber-successful realtor and respected businesswoman of thirty-nine years old, Melanie is incredibly rude, tactless, and immature. Her specialty is selling historical old houses to her clients, but she describes people who buy old houses to restore as "stupid." Nice, huh? In addition, she thinks all old buildings, even those in residential neighborhoods, should be razed to make way for parking lots and convenience stores. I hated this character from page one. Add in her intolerance (the way she criticizes her best friend's clothes and the fact that Jack has female friends), and the way she treated the dog whose owner died (trying to give the dog to anyone, even threatening to dump him at a shelter just so she wouldn't be inconvenienced by him) and by the end of the book I was rooting for the malevolent spirit to take her out. I won't even go into her teenage-girl-drama temper tantrums, complete with "I never want to see you again!" pronouncements. The fact that she had a crappy childhood didn't even soften my dislike for this horrible woman.

If you can get past Melanie the Bitch, the story is a good one. I'll admit that I had parts of it figured out long before the author "revealed" certain parts, but there were still some surprises. The secondary characters are great Sophie and Chad, Jack and Amelia, Mrs. Houlihan, Melanie's father, even Rich the plumber. Marc wasn't so great, but he was a two-dimensional character, and it's clear he was only thrown in the story to create some conflict. The story could have been told without him and would have been better. I wish we would have seen more of Susannah. It would have been great if she had turned out to be Melanie's grandmother. I thought that was where the author was going when she mentioned the color of Susannah's eyes. I think the author missed a really cool plot twist there.

Although I'd like to read the rest of this series, I'm put off knowing Melanie is the main character. I read the first chapter of the next book, and she's still the same whiny temper-throwing twit. I may see if my local library has the books, but if not I won't read them. Melanie Middleton isn't worth the money to buy them.