Tango With Ghosts

by Bruce R. Hampson

214 pages, Paperback

Published July 7, 2026

About the author

Bruce Hampson was born in Zambia, Africa into a family of second-generation Litvaks, that escaped the Pogroms in Lithuania in 1855. One day his father saw a postcard of a Royal Canadian Mountie dressed in his red regalia and the snow-capped mountains of British Columbia in the background, he decided to start life afresh. Just as his grandparents did before him, in 1955, he packed up his beautiful wife and young son and moved to Canada looking for a better life, hungry for new experiences. By osmosis, the itchy feet, jumping around countries became one of Bruce's characteristics. He was an underground miner in Saskatchewan, a wine merchant in California, a fireman in Zimbabwe, an ordained minister and charismatic church leader in Alberta, a successful businessman in Hong Kong, a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, a hotel owner in the southern part of France and an author. His never-ending serendipitous journey searching for roots, financial gains, happiness, and God's perfect plan has given him much material and reasons to write his books.

Reviews

[Matt McAvoy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have to be open and share that Bruce initially sent me a copy of this book for a critique and appraisal; my concluding suggestion was that I would change absolutely nothing about the story – quite honestly, it is a wonderful one, almost flawless in its creativity, poignancy and, dare I say it, the sheer beauty of its subject matter. I don’t want to spoil anything about this book, for it is a genuine treat that readers deserve to enjoy to its fullest, but I will say that what could plummet into a pretty unpleasant spiral – and there is some very dark subject matter and backstory forming its basis – actually evolves into a wonderful tale of warmth, love and dancing. The sad, violent history which provides the tension underlying the book’s narrative is the very same as behind the art and beauty underpinning its romantic South American culture.

Bruce is clearly a connoisseur of the content of this book, and envelops the reader to a T in the Latin music, the speakeasies and the political residue of days not too far gone by, which remains present in the streets, hearts and minds of the oppressed people of Argentina. On top of that, he has crafted a story which is compelling, fantastical and utterly heartwarming, rich with threat and hope in equal measure. Think Pan’s Labyrinth and you’re on a similar trail. The supernatural aspect of the book isn’t out of place at all, but fits rather seamlessly, to create a beautiful ghost story with a profound depth to it. There is a little everything: political accuracy, a gripping suspense drama, a heartbreaking, simmering romance and a thought-provoking, multi-layered protagonist. Bruce leaves the reader guessing at every turn.

I did comment that there could be a little more descriptive richness and colour, which I am sure Bruce has addressed – I know he certainly has the ability to make this into one of the best understated, simmering ghost tales out there. I advise readers to find somewhere atmospheric and quiet, sip a Malbec and indulge themselves in everything about Tango With Ghosts, from the sultry, smoking-hot nightlife to the gritty history behind the mystery. Wonderful from Bruce Hampson.

[Literary Titan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bruce R. Hampson’s Tango with Ghosts is a supernatural historical novel about Reginald Emanuel, a seventy-two-year-old Canadian who arrives in Buenos Aires hoping distance will quiet the wreckage of his marriage. Instead, his apartment on Calle Talcahuano greets him with strange music, shifting photographs, hidden messages, and the lingering presence of its former owner, the poet and tango dancer Alejandro Vargas. What begins as one man’s attempt to disappear becomes an absorbing search through a building’s secrets and Argentina’s buried history.

Tango gives the novel its language and its heartbeat. The embrace becomes a way of thinking about love, grief, mortality, and the courage required to remain present when every instinct says to retreat. Hampson clearly understands the dance from within, from the codes of the milonga to the nearly invisible exchange of weight and intention between partners. His Buenos Aires feels equally intimate: humid streets, aging cafés, wooden dance floors, rattling elevators, and an apartment that breathes, remembers, and occasionally loses patience with its tenant.

The mystery reaches beyond the apartment into Argentina’s Dirty War and the lives of those who were disappeared. Through Alejandro, his daughter Elena, the poet Miguel Santoro, and the watchful building manager Jorge, the novel explores the complicated moral inheritance left by terror. These characters carry secrets, guilt, anger, and unanswered questions, yet Hampson keeps returning to the human choices inside that history. Elena is especially compelling, both as a daughter trying to understand her father and as a woman who has made dancing an act of survival.

There’s a warm, insistent generosity at the center of Tango with Ghosts. It believes people can tell the truth after decades of silence, reconnect after years of absence, and step back onto the floor after a fall. The novel’s ghosts aren’t simply there to frighten Reginald. They ask him to witness, to feel, and finally to live. Haunting, tender, and alive with the pulse of tango, this is a novel about holding the past close without letting it stop your feet.