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The Ghost-Wrangler
In a world of wizards and walled cities, Galabras Nachecko is a necromancer in the seaport metropolis of Golathreon, connecting the living with deceased relatives and associates to answer questions left unresolved at the time of death.
Then he is tasked by Duke Simisson’s conniving seneschal to capture the ghost of a notorious land pirate scheduled for execution. He snags the spirit but finds that the assignment has made him a man who knows too much.
Nachecko is propelled into a new career—secret agent segueing into diplomat—that leads him far from home, plunges him into perilous adventures, and brings him both true love and tragedy.
Then he is tasked by Duke Simisson’s conniving seneschal to capture the ghost of a notorious land pirate scheduled for execution. He snags the spirit but finds that the assignment has made him a man who knows too much.
Nachecko is propelled into a new career—secret agent segueing into diplomat—that leads him far from home, plunges him into perilous adventures, and brings him both true love and tragedy.
- GenresFantasy
334 pages, Kindle Edition
Published June 14, 2023
About the author
Matthew Hughes
200 books286 followersBorn in Liverpool, his family moved to Canada when he was five years old. Married since late 1960s, he has three grown sons. He is currently relocated to Britain. He is a former director of the Federation of British Columbia Writers.
A university drop-out from a working poor background, he worked in a factory that made school desks, drove a grocery delivery truck, was night janitor in a GM dealership, and did a short stint as an orderly in a private mental hospital. As a teenager, he served a year as a volunteer with the Company of Young Canadians.
He has made his living as a writer all of his adult life, first as a journalist in newspapers, then as a staff speechwriter to the Canadian Ministers of Justice and Environment, and, since 1979, as a freelance corporate and political speechwriter in British Columbia.
His short fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s, Asimov’s, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Postscripts, Interzone, and a number of "Year’s Best" anthologies. Night Shade Books published his short story collection, The Gist Hunter and Other Stories, in 2005.
He has won the Arthur Ellis Award from the Crime Writers of Canada, The Endeavour Award for his historical novel What the Wind Brings, and the Global Book Award in the dark fantasy category for The Ghost-Wrangler.
A university drop-out from a working poor background, he worked in a factory that made school desks, drove a grocery delivery truck, was night janitor in a GM dealership, and did a short stint as an orderly in a private mental hospital. As a teenager, he served a year as a volunteer with the Company of Young Canadians.
He has made his living as a writer all of his adult life, first as a journalist in newspapers, then as a staff speechwriter to the Canadian Ministers of Justice and Environment, and, since 1979, as a freelance corporate and political speechwriter in British Columbia.
His short fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s, Asimov’s, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Postscripts, Interzone, and a number of "Year’s Best" anthologies. Night Shade Books published his short story collection, The Gist Hunter and Other Stories, in 2005.
He has won the Arthur Ellis Award from the Crime Writers of Canada, The Endeavour Award for his historical novel What the Wind Brings, and the Global Book Award in the dark fantasy category for The Ghost-Wrangler.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
May 15, 2024
Galabras Nachecko is a necromancer in Golathreon, who is asked by Tyber Walthus, the Duke’s seneschal, to obtain the kra of a notorious land-pirate at the moment of death; it turns out that the pirate might have knowledge of a certain jewel that had been in Walthus’s family for generations and that he had lost when giving it to his fiancee, who apparently died in a cave-in some years earlier. Unfortunately for Nachecko, the kra is not very helpful in this quest; in addition, one of the Duke’s special police or “sniffers” wants to know what Walthus is up to considering that he had never told the Duke about this jewel. Even worse, the jewel turns out to be an artifact left by the Demiurge after its use in the creation of the universe, and that artifact doesn’t want to be found, just wants to be left alone…. Matthew Hughes has taken on the role of heir to Jack Vance with respect to the universe that Vance created many eons ago; while I have never taken to Vance’s writing, I love Hughes’s, and this stand-alone novel is a good example of his inventiveness, humour and world-building that could serve as an in to his other works or as a great new addition to those of us who already know his oeuvre; highly recommended!
August 18, 2023
Hughes' amazing imagination and wit are on full display in this picaresque set in the Dying Earth milieu. Great fun, but for me at least, his short stories are even more so: more tightly plotted and tongue-in-cheek. Of course, one may look at this novel as really a collection of several shorter pieces about Nachecko the necromancer, loosely tied into a single volume.
July 2, 2023
very inventive but a bit over the top here and there, and the picaresque content sometimes doesn't quite match the matter-of-fact style - a bit more irony would really help; still an entertaining read that I read in one sitting more or less
July 10, 2023
An engaging book
April 23, 2026
It's pretty hard to forgive how this book ends. It's hard to explain what a let-down it is without spoilers.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews