In this cosy crime story, Keli Milanni is a very modern lady working as an attorney in a town practice. She's also a Wiccan or white witch, who trusts in nature and energy. Therefore she's not pleased to be made to don a spooky costume and staff a "haunted barn" for a Halloween festival. To Keli, this season is Samhain, an ancient Celtic festival. And she's one hundred percent positive that ghosts don't exist.

Edindale, Illinois seems like an ordinary town, but Keli now has a client on the phone who claims that she's seen a ghost. Maybe the SAMHAIN SECRETS really do include a thin veil between this world and the spirit world. Why would Keli be responsible? Well, her law firm dealt with the sale of the house which Mrs Hammerlin has just bought, and the nervous lady is stating that the previous owners should have disclosed the presence of a ghost. Keli thinks maybe she shouldn't have bought a home with a view of the cemetery.

An interesting character now enters; Josephine O'Malley, Keli's aunt. She left their Nebraska hometown as a teen and became an environmental activist, always on the move, and now she promotes organic farming, sending packets of natural pollinated seeds to farmers. A contact, Fredeline Paul from Port au Prince, tells Keli that her aunt was helping women farmers in Haiti but is missing, but as far as Keli knows, Josephine has always been missing.

This is the fourth Wiccan Wheel Mystery and I previously read Yuletide Homicide as we work our way through the seasons. In this book we see the process of identifying a dead person from a morgue photo and proceed to investigate how good, altruistic people can still make enemies. There is a glimpse of Voudou but mainly we see two different ways to look at Halloween and witches -- white candles, doves and sprigs of herbs, or the Gothic black and warty image of the lazy stereotype. Pumpkins, fake skulls and cauldrons decorate the shops and porches, as vegetarian Keli soaks up the atmosphere of misty October and demonstrates a house cleansing for Mrs Hammerlin. I enjoyed the topical mystery with more than one kind of crime and a wide variety of characters. There is also a black cat to entertain readers.

Jennifer David Hesse was born in Illinois and now lives in Chicago, and she spins a good yarn. SAMHAIN SECRETS will keep you reading and guessing.