It has been close to two decades since I read John Connolly’s EVERY DEAD THING. To this day, I can remember and quote passages verbatim from that worthy work that introduced Charlie Parker to the literary world. Connolly has since published 14 more Parker novels, as well as a novella, and BAD MEN, which isn’t listed in the Parker canon but still seems of his world. Through the years, Connolly has built on the foundation of that book, adding and deleting characters and situations while inflicting further physical and psychological damage on his already scratched and dented protagonist.

The overriding storyline --- a battle, perhaps the battle, against evil --- has been gradually layered, book by book, as Parker continues to get close to the truth, or something like it, aided by many (including his young daughters on both sides of the veil) and opposed by many more. Connolly presents this, year in and year out, in volumes that build upon what have gone before yet give new readers unfamiliar with the series (and older ones whose memory for past detail is wanting) enough with a sentence here or a turn of phrase there to pick up and follow along.

"Yes, there are a lot of spinning plates here, but Connolly handles each and all of them quite adroitly without ever losing the attention of his readers or causing confusion. You really won’t be able to read it quickly enough."

That brings us to A GAME OF GHOSTS, a pivotal installment in the series that finishes its latest current arc while building a bridge toward what is to come. In the past, Parker has formed an uneasy and prickly working relationship with a possibly renegade FBI agent named Edgar Ross. As the novel begins, Parker is assigned by Ross to find a private investigator named Jaycob Eklund, who has gone missing. Eklund is another of Ross’ employees, retained for reasons that he keeps close. It develops that Eklund, at the time of his disappearance, was tracking a series of homicides and disappearances that were seemingly linked to reports of hauntings.

The hunt for Eklund puts Parker on dangerous ground, given that Eklund’s investigations were linked in one way or another to a number of entities, including The Brethren, whose founder made a long-ago deal with an angel that has demonstrated across the eons that it cannot be trusted, and whose descendants have engaged in a pattern of destruction to hold off their final judgment; a bizarre criminal organization headed by a pragmatic, cold-hearted mother and her twisted son, who chafes under her rule; a missing person case that is about to be resolved in an unfortunate manner; and The Collector, who has crossed paths with Parker at other times in other places.

Louis and Angel are along to help Parker, of course (and to provide some grim humor), as is Moxie Castin, Parker’s very colorful attorney, who does quite a bit without leaving his desk. While Parker attempts to fulfill his agreement with Ross, his younger daughter, Rachel, is the subject of a restricted visitation action brought by her mother, following what has gone before in A TIME OF TORMENT. Yes, there are a lot of spinning plates here, but Connolly handles each and all of them quite adroitly without ever losing the attention of his readers or causing confusion. You really won’t be able to read it quickly enough.

A GAME OF GHOSTS pulls the pin on a pair of longtime characters but adds a couple more who may (or may not) play out in future books. Connolly leaves some plot lines dangling at the conclusion just so you’ll come back (as if you could possibly help yourself). If all of the above were not enough, he references enough arcane but obtainable source books to keep you interested, busy and, yes, frightened until Charlie Parker’s next appearance. Strongly recommended, though not for the squeamish.