UNDER THE APPLE TREE

Easley’s novel offers romance, a ghost story, a mystery, a lost treasure map, and even some home renovations.

Recently divorced 35-year-old Kate Ecklund is finally pursuing her longtime dream of opening a bed-and-breakfast in the shadows of the Cascades. She left a financially comfortable but emotionally stifling existence as a member of Seattle high society to remodel a Victorian mansion in picturesque Salmon Falls, Washington, where she and her 8-year-old daughter can start a new life. Kate’s musician brother is living with her to help with the renovations and set up his own studio space. Before long, though, they’re unsettled by another musical roommate: the piano-playing ghost of Blossom Thatcher, the mansion’s recently deceased owner. As Kate learns more about Blossom’s tragic past and the puzzling history of her new abode, she gets to know her new neighbors, many of whom harbor secrets of their own. Easley plays two storylines against each other with occasional chapters that focus on the events of Blossom’s life, featuring characters and themes that echo stories set in the present. This ambitious blend of genres results in a tapas-style sampler of delightful morsels that will leave readers hungry for more, especially its wonderful treatment of issues related to ecology, social class, and gender in both time periods. Easley keeps an impressive number of plates spinning throughout and ultimately ends with all of them intact. The characters are well drawn and the pacing is brisk, but it’s the setting that’s the star of the show: Like Louise Penny’s Three Pines, Salmon Falls has a small-town charm, surrounded by natural beauty, that makes it easy to pass the time there.

A fast-paced, romantic supernatural puzzler, nestled in the mountains of the Pacific Northwest.