As a native Houstonian, I found his depiction of H-Town to be weird. So I looked him up- born in Lubbock, he moved to Canada when he was 3 and stayed there through college. Apparently he did live in Houston for a period as an adult, but not enough to be able to accurately depict the city. He currently lives in Davis, CA.

As a punk rock fan, I found his selection of punk bands to be… sad. Mainstream. Sex Pistols, meh, okay I guess it’s requisite. REM, really? Constant name-dropping of crappy to mediocre bands is sad.

The story was okay, but it seems to me that he should write about things he actually knows when we’re talking character nuance or at the least not try to depict the nuance to such a large degree.

I’ve liked most of what I’ve read by Sean Stewart (Night Watch, Galveston) in fact. But this one especially. I thought this was going to be about ghosts. But instead it was mostly about family and getting on with your life, about not letting your past consume your present. So I guess it kind of was about ghosts after all.