Possessed

Othernaturals #1

by Christina Harlin

When a ghost-hunting episode of the popular paranormal web series Othernaturals goes bad, two cast members quit, and Othernaturals producer, telepath Rosemary Sharpe, finds herself carrying the ghost of an axe murderer on her shoulder. Now she must hire two new members for her team before her show moves on to investigate a haunted dormitory at a state university, all the while keeping her angry companion at bay. Disgraced psychic Andrew Fletcher and renowned healer Kaye Whittington sign on, joining Rosemary’s team which includes an animal empath and his traveling companion Vladimir the cat, a psychic vampire who is more cheerleader than bloodsucker, and a haunted medium who shares head space with his best friend who died twenty years ago. Even the show’s director can see ghosts. Though she is empowered with the telepathy that made her grandfather famous, Rosemary feels that the supernatural need not be real, as long as her viewers are intrigued. But the murderous spirit she carries has other ideas about avenging himself on those who abducted him from his haunting grounds – and on any innocent spirit they may encounter. Passions and paranoia are all part of the package, when filming an un-reality show. Possessed is the exciting first book in the new series by Christina Harlin, author of paranormal thrillers Never Alone and Deck of Cards and the romantic adventures of legal secretary Carol Frank in the “Boss” series. In addition to the book itself, the Othernaturals series also has a website that includes pictures, ghost stories, additional information about the characters, and some fun things for fans.

ebook

First published October 5, 2014

About the author

Christina Harlin is the owner of Underground Book Club, LLC, a service through which she provides ghostwriting and content writing.

She is the author of supernatural thrillers including the "Othernaturals" series featuring the adventures of a team of ghost-hunters, each with his or her own otherworldly talents, passions and secrets. Christina makes it a practice to conduct her own explorations of Missouri and Kansas haunts for inspiration and fun.

Her stand-alone works of supernatural fiction are "Deck of Cards" and "Never Alone". Her other works include the comedic romance series of Carol Frank "Boss" books and the romance/thriller parody, "Dark Web."

Christina enjoys computer games, puzzles, great television and great novels. She is an avid movie fan who writes about films. She lives in the Kansas City area with her family.

Reviews

[Icy_Space_Cobwebs Join the Penguin Resistance! · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review: OTHERNATURALS BOOK ONE POSSESSED by Christina Harlin

Oh, I love this series, and I'm so glad it was recommended to me. Anything paranormal, anything supernatural, and I am so onboard. No need for suspension of disbelief here . Book One, POSSESSED, introduces us to the cast of a supernatural web show, OTHERNATURALS. The 7 members, including producers Rosemary and Greg, all have "talents" ( although occasionally the talents involved lie in emoting rather than in actual contact with the Spirit World). But like air, the Other Side is present and affecting us despite our lack of awareness, so occasionally Rosemary, Greg, Stefan & Brentley, Judge, Sally, Oliver, and Kelly, stumble into actual phenomena. After Season Four and the departure of Oliver and Kelly, two new cast members, Andrew and Kaye, prove to be an electrifying jump start to the new adventures. Sure doesn't hurt that Rosemary, incredibly telepathic, concludes the final episode attached to a multiply-murderous century-old ghost.

[Rainy-Night-Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining read. I already ordered the next book.

#goodstory
#verybadediting

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this fun read.

[RodrinBestWizard · Rating 4 out of 5]

I joined goodreads very recently, I decided that I need to read more books, and this is the first obscure series I decided to pick up. So far, it is a very intriguing start, and definitely worth trying if you are a fan of wonderful dialogue, well-rounded characters and a refreshing spin on the "supernatural" genre. The author has a clear passion for telling character driven stories. The only reason why I didn't give this five stars is because this is an introduction, book one, so a majority of the book is set up in order to get us familiar with these excellent characters. The last page even states literally that there's more to come. My more extensive review below:

That creepy cover already got me in the mood for ghost stories and I wasn't let down. The best way I can describe the story (without spoilers) is that the book focuses on a team of modern day (2014 to be exact) ghost investigators. But there's a nice, refreshing spin on the whole ghost investigation angle, it's all a show that the team puts on to film and edit and post online.

So we've got a main cast of about seven core characters that we follow as they go to haunted locations. Their leader, Rosemary, is this risk-taking paranormal savant with a lot of money to spend. She wants this show to work, so she dresses her team up, sends them to cool locations, and expects lots of drama and thrills. It creates a very interesting book dynamic where the standard "team of investigators" tropes are intentionally set up by Rosemary. Any "cliches" that she can come across, she happily indulges in order to make her show better. If they happen across any actual ghosts, great. If they happen to actually do any good in the world, even better. But Rosemary just wants to entertain her audience with pretty people doing cool things. It's a trope we as the audience can expect from fiction, but it's what the premise of this "Othernaturals" paranormal web series hinges on. It's a very clever use of audience expectations.

It's got scary elements, but it's not meant to be gross-out sappy horror. The tone is always consistently fun. Dramatic, definitely tense and eery, but fun. Looking forward to seeing where this series goes from here!

I'm going to post this exact review on Barnes & Noble because I want to see more books like this out there.

[Ezri K · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story was different than what I would normally read. Set in today's time a group of people with abilities do a ghost-hunting web series. The leader is a young woman who is clearly not hurting for anything as far as needs and comfort, and doesn't appear to have any concern for her own safety when filming the shows. As a matter of fact, she doesn't really come off like a person who cares about much other than getting a good scene for the show.
Thankfully the book doesn't only focus on one character's perspective, but instead rotates through some of the others. In all honest I'm not caring for the main character. There are other characters in the group though that are different and can appeal to others.
This particular edition is focused on the group replacing cast and filming the first episode of their season 5. There is background information provided as well to what had occurred at the last finale. What would be interesting to see is if the main character will develop into a controversial one, or into one that is likable. Though she is supposed to be lovable by all there is an underlining manipulation feel to her character that doesn't take others into consideration.

[Judith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Looking forward to the next book! Recently I read Ms. Christina Harlin's "Boss" books. They were quite hilarious. I was hoping this Othernarural's series would be more of the same. This is not a comedy series though but a scary one - a group of ghost hunters with their own psychic powers too go to haunted locations to film their show- but still there were a lot of funny parts and good dialog as before. The show had a traumatic episode where two of the cast quit so now the show has to bring in two new people, a healer and a psychic who it sounds like might have killed someone. They go to a college to investtgate a ghost in a dorm but things go wrong, no spoilers here. Best part of the book are the characters who are totally interesting - my favorite is Stefan right now, second place is broody Andrew - but they are all pretty interesting. Judge is very funny too. Lots of sexual tension, but nobody is sleeping with anybody yet! I would have given five stars except it feels a little incomplete. That is probably because it is a series so I will see what happens in the next book. Really very scary sometimes!

[Tina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was kindly given a copy of this book via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This book is about a paranormal web based ghost hunting series called Othernaturals. Two members of the show have quit due to an investigation going wrong, Rosemary who is the shows producer as well as a psychic has to find suitable replacements for them in order to record the next show. Rosemary is now being haunted by a murderer.

My expectations of this book was that it was going to be scarier and more focused on the ghost story. The problem was that it was very much about the characters and their stories. The actual paranormal activity just seemed more of a side story to me. I am presuming this book just sets the scene for the other books in the series and they will be more focused on the actual investigations. On the whole this book did not hold my attention.

[Angel Hatfield · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is a supernatural web show called The Othernaturals . There are seven members - two producers Rosemary and Greg, then also Stefan, Bentley, Judge, Sally and Oliver. All have special talents. The series is pretty much about ghost hunting and now rosemary is being haunted by a murderer
I love this story and think this is starting and setting everything up for a series but that definitely doesn’t make it bad I like this story quite a bit. The characters were really good although I felt at times all Rosemary cared about was getting the scene right and wrapping up another episode. But I do Look forward to see if another book will follow I recommend.
I received an ARC of this story for an honest review.

[Jenni Schell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm really not sure what I thought about this book. It wasn't bad. But there were parts that I really liked and parts that I didn't like at all.

[Teresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very unexpected scenario in that you are brought behind the scenes - not unlike a story within a story. The characters are distinct and palpable. A very fun, enlightening read!