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A Hundred Billion Ghosts Gone
The "hilarious and compelling" breakout surprise of 2017 has an even-more-addictive sequel! It’s been seven years since all the ghosts came back. Now, in four days, they’ll all be invisible again. The clock is ticking. Meanwhile the ghost of Abraham Lincoln has been prominently annihilated in mid-speech. And he’s not the only one; other ghosts are also being obliterated from the face of the Earth. All the evidence points to the Post-Mortal Services Clinic, where Ryan Matney happens to be a lowly, bored lab assistant. So Ryan and the brilliant scientist Margie join forces with their incompetent and semi-corporeal detective Lowell and a sketchy psychic medium whose powers truly are medium at best. Together they race to stop the Clinic from falling into the wrong hands before the lights go out on the haunted world. And maybe, just maybe, Ryan won’t die this time. Yes he will. More than once. The second book in the series that has been called “crazy-fun and cleverly written”, “hugely imaginative”, and “the most fun I've had in fiction in a long time”.
ebook
Published June 26, 2020
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About the author
D.M. Sinclair
5 books149 followersIf you've ever switched on a television and are not picky, you've probably seen something written by DM Sinclair. He's done more than a hundred hours of that stuff, and will happily take the blame even for the shows he didn't write.
Later he switched to writing books because he thought it might be nice. It isn’t, though.
Nevertheless, he plans to keep writing as long as he is alive. After that, he intends to visit Australia.
Like many Canadians, he lives in Canada.
Later he switched to writing books because he thought it might be nice. It isn’t, though.
Nevertheless, he plans to keep writing as long as he is alive. After that, he intends to visit Australia.
Like many Canadians, he lives in Canada.
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
April 11, 2024
There was an unmistakable rising sense that things had not gone completely back to normal. Something remained very, very wrong.
D.M. Sinclair's "A Hundred Billion Ghosts Gone" - or AHBG2 as I'll be calling it from henceforth - is the follow-up to the hilarious, um, "AHBG" (without the "gone" bit). According to the author in fact, we only have 99,999,999,998 books to go. And because of my obsessively compulsivitivity, I have gone ahead and pre-ordered all of them. And I say that even though I have to begrudgingly admit (also known as a confession covered in mud) that I wasn't AS big of a fan of this second book as I was the first nor even "Psychic Simon" which I've droned on about now in 2 other reviews. Hey, it was good. They're all good but this last one was a bit - I'm not sure how to phrase this - too dire? We'll get to all that in the coming paragraphs because I'm certainly going to get my money's worth here.
I just want to be sure that your ghost is intact. It’s more prone to instability than most people’s.
We return in this follow-up tale to the Post-Mortal Services Clinic, which remains not only busy but in the capable hands of Margie who now acts as its Manager and Chief Specialist. Naturally, Ryan has returned as well in his role as… did we decide on "Lab Assistant" or what exactly? In his own words, it's the kind of job that was tedious, rarely fun, and almost never enriched with six essential vitamins. Anyway, he's there, gets zapped a lot throughout the story as he tends to do and even obsessed way too hard about a rare brand of butter-flavored cereal (hence the vitamins reference). So yeah, you can tell we're in for a totally philosophical look at the here, the There, and all points in between. And totally not speaking of anyone else, Lowell is also back doing his best detective work by trying his utmost not to do any detective work at all. Which he excels at since the number of client cases he's solved since joining the team at the clinic has hovered at just under 1.
Cases just made his job harder, requiring him to do unpleasant things like show up, and think.
And things get especially tense for the world's worst detective when his chief rival Gwen - a psychic medium (see aforementioned Simon book!) works her way into things, all the while seemingly resembling Emma Thompson in my mind as she appeared in her role as whoever she was in "Harry Potter". Needless to say, there are more players, um, in play as well this time, ranging from an OFFICIAL Director of the Federal Bureau of Ghost Affairs (East Division), who in typical fashion for a government official can't even see nor hear ghosts through most of the book to even a former (waves in a way to indicate extreme formeritude) Official Famous Person that I'm not going to tell you about here because that would be a major spoiler. I mean, even if you were to hand me a 5 dollar note and even some pennies to go with it, I won't give anything away! I'm honest like that. But it makes for some pretty cool "hm, what's happening with all that" along the way! Even better than a day at the theatre. Ooops, too soon?
The lantern reveals the unseen spectral pathways of the ether … And it attracts and kills mosquitoes.
This time, however, like I said, there's much less hilarity - still lots of weirdness sure - to be had as the situation involving our spectral friends has grown quite dire (there's that word again!). Before of course we had the capital-B Blackout which revealed the ghosts of the world to the rest of the world that weren't ghosts (keep up, okay?). But this time we're also getting zappinations from the Sun that are causing a rash of capital-B Blinks, that despite the cuter name, are causing part of the population of ghosts to up and completely disappear. Which naturally also scares the bejeebus out of Ryan - and to an undefined level for Margie, too - since as we know he's had his ghost removed (voluntarily), then attached (involuntarily) to a knick-knack, then ripped (voluntarily) off of that, then assaulted (involuntarily) with enough voltage to power a Las Vegas city block. Again, it's no wonder that many scenes in this particular story involve his hair (pick a spot) bursting into flames.
He was officially excellent at being a ghost.
All-in-all then I found the pacing for AHBG2 not quite at the same level of reckless abandon as the first chapter. And I say this acknowledging Lowell's frequent driving shenanigans. I also was less… enamored? with some of the newer players, including the dude on the money and even Gwen herself. The constant descriptions of her voice actually echoed in my brain like fingernails on a chalkboard. I should probably dial back my own reading BOX (oh ha ha) a bit so that level of intensity isn't quite so overwhelming. But still, despite what I'd again call a slight lowering of pacing and laughability, this is a very, very readable book. Which you should read in a readably reading kind of way! One more for good measure: read it!
Never you mind that little Virginia speech. It is long over, a temporal concern of mortal men. The Toaster is eternal.
In terms of my next steps, well, I'm still looking very much forward to Sinclair's "Hole House" offers, though I think this time I'll build in a bit of a pause between now and same. This only because I don't want to imagine that reading his books without a break now for the better part of a week has put any kind of crinkle in my brain matter or otherwise influenced my opinion about his work. Just to be safe though, I've attached a few fondue forks to a hairdryer and am conducting tests as we speak. If I'm not back in a few hours, please call a psychic large to find me (why do they always go with mediums?). I'll be here all week folks. Ciao.
D.M. Sinclair's "A Hundred Billion Ghosts Gone" - or AHBG2 as I'll be calling it from henceforth - is the follow-up to the hilarious, um, "AHBG" (without the "gone" bit). According to the author in fact, we only have 99,999,999,998 books to go. And because of my obsessively compulsivitivity, I have gone ahead and pre-ordered all of them. And I say that even though I have to begrudgingly admit (also known as a confession covered in mud) that I wasn't AS big of a fan of this second book as I was the first nor even "Psychic Simon" which I've droned on about now in 2 other reviews. Hey, it was good. They're all good but this last one was a bit - I'm not sure how to phrase this - too dire? We'll get to all that in the coming paragraphs because I'm certainly going to get my money's worth here.
I just want to be sure that your ghost is intact. It’s more prone to instability than most people’s.
We return in this follow-up tale to the Post-Mortal Services Clinic, which remains not only busy but in the capable hands of Margie who now acts as its Manager and Chief Specialist. Naturally, Ryan has returned as well in his role as… did we decide on "Lab Assistant" or what exactly? In his own words, it's the kind of job that was tedious, rarely fun, and almost never enriched with six essential vitamins. Anyway, he's there, gets zapped a lot throughout the story as he tends to do and even obsessed way too hard about a rare brand of butter-flavored cereal (hence the vitamins reference). So yeah, you can tell we're in for a totally philosophical look at the here, the There, and all points in between. And totally not speaking of anyone else, Lowell is also back doing his best detective work by trying his utmost not to do any detective work at all. Which he excels at since the number of client cases he's solved since joining the team at the clinic has hovered at just under 1.
Cases just made his job harder, requiring him to do unpleasant things like show up, and think.
And things get especially tense for the world's worst detective when his chief rival Gwen - a psychic medium (see aforementioned Simon book!) works her way into things, all the while seemingly resembling Emma Thompson in my mind as she appeared in her role as whoever she was in "Harry Potter". Needless to say, there are more players, um, in play as well this time, ranging from an OFFICIAL Director of the Federal Bureau of Ghost Affairs (East Division), who in typical fashion for a government official can't even see nor hear ghosts through most of the book to even a former (waves in a way to indicate extreme formeritude) Official Famous Person that I'm not going to tell you about here because that would be a major spoiler. I mean, even if you were to hand me a 5 dollar note and even some pennies to go with it, I won't give anything away! I'm honest like that. But it makes for some pretty cool "hm, what's happening with all that" along the way! Even better than a day at the theatre. Ooops, too soon?
The lantern reveals the unseen spectral pathways of the ether … And it attracts and kills mosquitoes.
This time, however, like I said, there's much less hilarity - still lots of weirdness sure - to be had as the situation involving our spectral friends has grown quite dire (there's that word again!). Before of course we had the capital-B Blackout which revealed the ghosts of the world to the rest of the world that weren't ghosts (keep up, okay?). But this time we're also getting zappinations from the Sun that are causing a rash of capital-B Blinks, that despite the cuter name, are causing part of the population of ghosts to up and completely disappear. Which naturally also scares the bejeebus out of Ryan - and to an undefined level for Margie, too - since as we know he's had his ghost removed (voluntarily), then attached (involuntarily) to a knick-knack, then ripped (voluntarily) off of that, then assaulted (involuntarily) with enough voltage to power a Las Vegas city block. Again, it's no wonder that many scenes in this particular story involve his hair (pick a spot) bursting into flames.
He was officially excellent at being a ghost.
All-in-all then I found the pacing for AHBG2 not quite at the same level of reckless abandon as the first chapter. And I say this acknowledging Lowell's frequent driving shenanigans. I also was less… enamored? with some of the newer players, including the dude on the money and even Gwen herself. The constant descriptions of her voice actually echoed in my brain like fingernails on a chalkboard. I should probably dial back my own reading BOX (oh ha ha) a bit so that level of intensity isn't quite so overwhelming. But still, despite what I'd again call a slight lowering of pacing and laughability, this is a very, very readable book. Which you should read in a readably reading kind of way! One more for good measure: read it!
Never you mind that little Virginia speech. It is long over, a temporal concern of mortal men. The Toaster is eternal.
In terms of my next steps, well, I'm still looking very much forward to Sinclair's "Hole House" offers, though I think this time I'll build in a bit of a pause between now and same. This only because I don't want to imagine that reading his books without a break now for the better part of a week has put any kind of crinkle in my brain matter or otherwise influenced my opinion about his work. Just to be safe though, I've attached a few fondue forks to a hairdryer and am conducting tests as we speak. If I'm not back in a few hours, please call a psychic large to find me (why do they always go with mediums?). I'll be here all week folks. Ciao.
July 17, 2020
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. This series is underrated so much! I loved the first one and couldn’t wait to see what happened next! This def still left me wanting more! The universe Sinclair created is great and I wish just for a while I could visit! Loved it and can’t wait for more!!!
August 26, 2022
Thank GOODNESS I finally finished that book. It moved even slower than the prequel and I didn’t think that was possible. Plot had potential but moved so insanely slowly it was practically like nothing was happening at all. Sorry but this one was not for me.
September 1, 2023
I read this because I read the first one and it made me laugh. This one was okay but not as funny or as good overall as the first one. Also, if the author described why the blackouts making ghosts disappear were happening then I missed it. He never really described (beyond a blackout/electricity surge) how they came to be seen in the first book so it wasn't a huge issue but the characters kept predicting that another blackout was coming and all of the ghosts would disappear and I wasn't sure how they came to this conclusion.
February 12, 2022
I wish I could tell you why I liked this book and it’s predecessor. They are clearly silly and I think there are some discrepancies between the first book and the second but the twists and turns held my interest. I enjoyed seeing some of the characters change and some not. The story was fantastic but I don’t consider the books to be in the category of fantasy. They are certainly a break from our currently reality.
November 3, 2022
I really liked this sequel - it was as fun as the first one but also deeper with more character development, new characters to develop (living and ghost), a really weird cereal, and a number of twists I didn't see coming!
When the book ended, I wasn't ready to let these characters go yet. I hope the author writes more with them. I think there's more to explore in this world and more cereal to eat!
When the book ended, I wasn't ready to let these characters go yet. I hope the author writes more with them. I think there's more to explore in this world and more cereal to eat!
February 14, 2023
The amusing sequel to "A Hundred Billion Ghosts"; in this one, the ghosts who were suddenly visible in book one are set to become invisible again, when a "blink" occurs that does the opposite of the previous blackout. Ghosts will need the help of hapless Ryan, sensible Dr. Margie, and nutso detective Lowell--as well as Abraham Lincoln. Lots of fun ways of writing, and a definite through-line of a love of breakfast cereal. Reminiscent of Douglas Adams.
February 24, 2023
The novelty of the first in the series had me hooked and wanting more. While this second book was fun, funny, and fast paced, the repetitive nature of the tone wore on me a bit. Being British I appreciate the sarcastic internal narrative of our protagonist, Ryan, and the banter between the characters had me LOL several times. This is a great fast read, and good if you want a break from more heavy material.
June 27, 2023
Loved this sequel? Ok, it feels like there could be another book..but there isn’t! Big sigh! What became of Margie and Ryan? Are they together still? Is Lowell up to his usual shenanigans? I have more questions too! I like Ryan. This was the main reason for continuing to read this second book. The dark part with The Toaster was slightly ridiculous but I get it. Why wasn’t Roger Foster given his comeuppance? That should have happened! That guy! Still a good book to read.
February 24, 2022
Still a really entertaining and light-hearted book. Who would have thought hating toast could lead to anything good. I also personally disagree with the assessment of toast, but that’s just me. A humorous book with a lot of heart. It’s an easy read and was a nice escape during one of my busiest times at work. Definitely read this and it’s predecessor, it’s worth the laughs.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 30, 2020
Quirky imaginative plots always get 5*s from me because I think everyone should read them. BUT, there was a point where I got lost and thought the book had gone off course. Happily it recovered nicely and avoided me dropping it to 4.
August 2, 2020
5 Stars
This sequel was just as fun as the first. Blackouts are affecting the ghosts and Margie and Ryan have been accused of the second assassination of Abe Lincoln. Such a creative story and I just love these characters.
This sequel was just as fun as the first. Blackouts are affecting the ghosts and Margie and Ryan have been accused of the second assassination of Abe Lincoln. Such a creative story and I just love these characters.
December 7, 2020
Toast cereal
Do you want to learn about a lantern that finds trails of love between ghosts? How about a possibly made up FBI type officer that can't see his ghost partner? Well then read this! I laughed, I was frustrated and I really want to see Lincolns ghost.
Do you want to learn about a lantern that finds trails of love between ghosts? How about a possibly made up FBI type officer that can't see his ghost partner? Well then read this! I laughed, I was frustrated and I really want to see Lincolns ghost.
July 3, 2023
funny and a good story
The best thing about this book is that I laughed and giggled all the way through. If you want a book with a smidge of mystery and lots of laughs this is for you!
The best thing about this book is that I laughed and giggled all the way through. If you want a book with a smidge of mystery and lots of laughs this is for you!
July 6, 2021
Satisfying!
This sequel ties up all the loose ends and resets the world to "normal." I will miss these people - they are complete characters with fulls sets of pros & cons.
This sequel ties up all the loose ends and resets the world to "normal." I will miss these people - they are complete characters with fulls sets of pros & cons.
September 12, 2021
Sequel well worth it
A very funny page turner!!! Just like the original! I loved the new characters with their odd
flaws they fit nicely into this world.
Boo toast!
A very funny page turner!!! Just like the original! I loved the new characters with their odd
flaws they fit nicely into this world.
Boo toast!
September 27, 2021
Just as ridiculous and entertaining as the first
December 28, 2021
3.9 stars. Moved pretty fast, ended abruptly for me, but was a good read.
June 1, 2022
3.5 stars rounded up!
July 7, 2022
Sequel, another fun light read. Some giggles.
October 30, 2022
cute, big fan of sinclair’s writing and character development. this sequel felt slightly unnecessary, but still a good victory lap for the story.
November 10, 2022
Enjoyable read but I really like the first book more.
A lighthearted, twisty story that was fun and unique like the first one but, this book dragged a bit here and there and ended abruptly.
A lighthearted, twisty story that was fun and unique like the first one but, this book dragged a bit here and there and ended abruptly.
March 4, 2023
Supernatural Delight
Sinclair is witty, spinning a fast-paced adventure filled with humor and loaded with action. Great read! Looking forward to more from him.
Sinclair is witty, spinning a fast-paced adventure filled with humor and loaded with action. Great read! Looking forward to more from him.
May 26, 2023
Very good although not as good as the first one. You should be patient to inconsistencies, typos and some plot holes, and read this. Not many books are worth being patient for these - this one does.
September 18, 2023
Fantastic sequel! I really hope the author has plans for another because I’d love to know what happens to Ryan and Margie after this.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 25, 2025
great sequel but did not fully finish. Hopefully there will be a third one to finish the series
July 15, 2025
I enjoyed the quirky humour, but the book was not quite as good as the first
October 23, 2023
This is so much fun to read. And, when you are at a dinner party and the subject is "What do you want to be wearing when you die" you know you are not alone.
November 24, 2024
Strange concept but a fairly good read.
Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews