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    Dead Connection
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    Dead Connection
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    Dead Connection
    Ebook237 pages3 hours

    Dead Connection

    By Charlie Price

    3.5/5

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    Currently unavailable

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    About this ebook

    Murray, a loner who communes with the dead in the town cemetery, hears the voice of a murdered cheerleader and tries to convince the adults that he knows what happened to her. But who beleives him? He's a loser. Can he even beleive in himself? Also comes Pearl, the daughter of the cemetery caretaker, who befriends Murray and tries to enter his world. Together they may prove the astonishing possibility that Nikki is closer than anyone thinks.

    "Dead Connection is a smart, funny, very clever page turner; unique and fun to read. As much as I wanted the mystery solved, I didn't want it to end. You're going to like this book." --Chris Crutcher

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Publishers
    Release dateMar 24, 2015
    ISBN9781466892729
    Author

    Charlie Price

    Charlie Price lives in northern California. He is an executive coach for business leaders and has also worked with at-risk teens in schools, hospitals, and communities. He is the author of several novels, including Desert Angel and The Interrogation of Gabriel James, winner of the Edgar Award.

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    Reviews for Dead Connection

    3.5/5

    15 ratings14 reviews

    What did you think?

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    • 4/5
      I did not expect this book to bring tears to my eyes, but I've seen far too much death come far too soon. More than anything, I wish that I could communicate with the dead as Murray does in Dead Connection.I thoroughly enjoyed the story. Murray makes for a great character, I really feel for him. His pain and loneliness seeps through the pages as he finds solace in the cemetery, escaping his home life through comforting those who died far too young.Pearl and Robert, excuse me, Mister Robert Barry Compton also shine with wonderful character development. I found myself rooting for Robert and filled with pride as he started to remember things. Billup and Deputy Gates showed both sides of law-enforcement, the just and the ugly, which was refreshing. Dead Connection was a novel with a little bit of everything in it; a good mystery, the drama of broken homes, and the coveted fantasy of clairvoyance.
    • 3/5
      This book pulled me both ways. I loved hearing the boy's and the detective's stories but the other people were a little boring or repetitive - I felt like just skipping over them strait to the characters' I liked. It is written very well, however, with each completely different character having their own voice and personality.
    • 4/5
      Booktalk: Murray Kiefer is a loner with a weird name and a disaster of a mother. His real friends are at the cemetery. He sits at their graves and listens to the dead tell him their stories, and they listen to him. But now he hears a new voice crying out, asking for help, asking to be found. While Murray tries to find out who is calling to him so desparately, Deputy Sheriff Gates is on his own quest, searching for a missing teenager, searching for a killer.Dead Connection has a supernatural bent, but at it's heart it's a classic who-dun-it. Teenager Nikki Parker has disappeared, and while we know her ghost is crying out to be found, it's going to take some time to find her body, let along track down her killer. Price tells this story through multiple (living) viewpoints, among them, Murray; Gates; Pearl, the daughter of the cemetery caretaker; and Mr. Robert Barry Compton, a psychotic/meth addict who may have valuable information. The constant switches in point-of-view could be confusing, but Price does a good job of giving the characters distinct voices, so it's easy to keep track of who is talking. The story moves forward in short passages - some only a page or so - which keep the pace moving quickly.While the missing teenager take central place in the plot, there are other issues going on here. Murray's mother is a drunk and drug addict whose neglect is what drove him to the cemetery in the first place. And interestingly for a YA novel, several of the main characters are adults. We most closely get to know Deputy Gates, and see his struggle to investigate this crime in the wake of his own son's death. But Price also gives a strong voice to Officer Vern Billup, a drunk, abusive man whose relationship to the case is not immediately clear. This narrative technique adds to the complexity of the story, but teens may have a harder time finding a character to relate to.
    • 3/5
      Murray can talk to the dead, in the cemetery. They are his only friends, until Pearl, the caretaker's daughter, takes an interest in his activities there. Murray hears a girl calling for help and finally realizes that it must be the girl who disappeared in the fall. Murray and Pearl know that she is there, but how do they get the police to investigate?Meanwhile, there are suspects that are heard throughout the story.The ending is a surprise, however.Good, but I don't think it is popular.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed this book. It's part mystery, part supernatural, and very compassionate without being too touchy-feely. Murray is a loner with a mother who's either high or with strange men all the time, so he started spending a lot of time in the local cemetary. Turns out he can talk to the people who are buried there, and he becomes friends with several of them. Then he begins to hear a faint voice who is calling for help, and he gets scared. Meanwhile, an officer is tracking a missing person case. Other compelling characters are also prominent and either add to the case or provide red herrings.
    • 3/5
      Kearsten says: This was okay. The idea is pretty cool, although it's very reminicent of Gaiman's The Graveyard Book, which is MUCH better done. There are a lot of characters (at least six) to keep track of - all of whom get their own point-of-view chapters - and in trying to give them all a voice, the author ends up blending them all together. None of them have a very distinctive voice. In fact, two of the characters are police officers of a sort and I had a VERY hard time keeping them straight. The story gets unecessarily convoluted, and the ending is a bit of a cheat, but Murray (the boy who speaks to ghosts) is an appealing character.
    • 3/5
      This was okay. The idea is pretty cool, although it's very reminicent of Gaiman's The Graveyard Book and Charlaine Harris' *very* adult Harper Connelly series, both of which are MUCH better done. There are a lot of characters (at least six) to keep track of - all of whom get their own point-of-view chapters - and in trying to give them all a voice, the author ends up blending them all together. None of them have a very distinctive voice. In fact, two of the characters are police officers of a sort and I had a VERY hard time keeping them straight.The story gets unecessarily convoluted, and the ending is a bit of a cheat, but Murray (the boy who speaks to ghosts) is an appealing character.
    • 4/5
      I really liked Dead Connection. It took me a couple of chapters to really get into the book. At first, you are presented with what seems like separate stories that don't connect in any way. Soon though come to realize that the individuals we are learning about are connected in more way than one.
    • 4/5
      We all have seen a Murray Kiefer around school. He is the kid who is made fun of, is into weird things, and has very low self esteem. Price turns Murray into the protagonist hero, by giving him a special attribute. This book is sure to keep the reader guessing who is after Murray, and who really hid Nikki Parker.
    • 5/5
      Teenager Murray likes to hang out in the cemetary because he can speak to the dead. After making friends with the caretaker's daughter, they determine to find out who the new voice in the cemetary is and whether it has anything to do with a missing girl. Quick, fast paced read. It will suck you in. Not too scary, but scary enough.
    • 3/5
      This book was in the library under YA, but I don't think I really think it is a YA book. It's rather odd. It revolves around the disapearance of a girl and the lives of many different people who become involved with discovering what happened to her. Odd, but intriguing. I enjoyed it, but it isn't a book I'd want to read again.
    • 4/5
      Would you believe a teenage boy who tells you he can hear a missing girl talking to him? Those who enjoy "Medium" will like this.
    • 2/5
      This book is about a boy who can see/talk to ghosts. One day, he hears a new voice, and it turns out to be the voice of a girl who’s been recently murdered. So to help her find peace with her untimely death, he has to help the police catch who murdered her. The book is told in alternating viewpoints, by like, 5 different people. It got a little confusing in some spots, cause you have to try to keep all the characters in mind, but the mystery was actually rather good, and it wasn’t who I thought it was going to be.
    • 4/5
      Lots of suspense in the "can't put it down" murder mystery.