Ghosted is a charming twist on Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, plonking it into the modern day world and swapping the genders of the protagonists. The result is fun and should please most teenagers, but I can't rate it higher than a B.

Hattie Tillney is an ex-paranormal investigator who’s given up her passion since her father passed away. He has never appeared to her in ghost form, which has shattered her faith in the afterlife. Her remaining living relatives dwell at Northanger Abbey, the world’s most haunted school, of which her mother is the distracted headmistress. Hattie is preoccupied with caring for her siblings, young Liam and older Freddie, and all of them are lost in their own personal grief. Determined to put the past behind her, she’s stunned when she makes the acquaintance of Kit Morland.

Kit is an eager ghost-lover who absolutely believes that spirits are real. Unfortunately, he’s traveled over on a ghost hunting scholarship, and his studies involve trying to figure out if all of those rumors about Northanger Abbey are true. Hattie and Kit split their search in two directions: Hattie will prove the ghosts aren’t real and Kit will search for proof they are. Along the way they get closer, and all of Kit’s preconceptions about love and death are challenged.

There’s just enough of the original novel left in Ghosted to make this book feel like a proper tribute without it feeling like a poor copy of the original story. It is, of course, not very Austeninan in its telling, but what is, aside from the real deal? Kit and Hattie are two likable teenagers who have actual issues to deal with, familial and with their futures. Their love story is sweet without being sappy.

The paranormal thread is delightful, a good reflection of Catherine’s obsessions in the original novel. But the worldbuilding and tech help make this stand out on its own. The Tilney family is a realistically dysfunctional but still easy to like and relate to. And what’s really enjoyable is the book’s talk of faith – in life, not just death.

This is an entertaining little volume with a sparkly sense of humor, although I reckon adults aren’t likely to enjoy it as much as kids; it’s perhaps a little too pat in its morals. But Ghosted will be a pleasant diversion for younger readers.

I have never read the book Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen which this book is a retelling of so I'm not sure how this compares to that but I did enjoy the story on it's own. As someone who loves a good ghost hunting youtube video, I was instantly interested in this book. I would definitely recommend it to people that are fans of Shane and Ryan's Buzzfeed: unsolved.

Northanger Abbey doesn't have the popularity of some of Jane Austen's novels, but it's always been one of my favorites. The very tongue in cheek humor, the satire Gothic setting, innocent Catherine, and the family dynamics of the Tilneys.

I enjoyed Ghosted for what it was. If you want to straight up compare it to Northanger Abbey, it does not have the tongue-in-cheek humor in the narration, which was understandable but sad. Ghosted has more self-discovery, parent dynamics, and friend drama, as you would expect from a YA novel.

Kit was a delight. Hattie was a little on the more boring side, but at the same time, that was in fact her character: blend in, don't rock the boat, be the perfect friend, daughter, etc. And she does slowly find her way.

Overall, I liked the book, but I would have appreciated more depth and nuance. While I enjoy a good trope, I don't love flat characters who behave in very two-dimensional ways. While there is some excusing for that because everything was seen through Hattie's eyes and she was making assumptions about people that weren't the full truth, it still felt like most of the characters were straight up stereotypes: the rebellious sister, the demanding/distant parent, the popular best friend, the sidekick to the popular best friend who goes along with everything, the kid brother, etc.

Thanks to Wednesday Books and Netgalley for an ARC of this book. All opinions are my own.

Myth: 4/5

This was such a sweet, heartfelt story. Hattie did everything she could to push down the pain of the loss of her father, but somewhere in there, she lost who she was. A coming of age story focused on dealing with grief.

Magic: NA

As with the original, this Northanger Abbey remix plays more with the idea of the paranormal than anything actually paranormal. Interest in the paranormal is a subplot, but we’re not talking about paranormal characters in the novel.

Overall: 4/5

A cute high school romance, a lot of family complexity, and a character finding herself after pushing a lot away in an attempt to deal with her grief.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to review this book.

Hattie Tilney used to be a big believer in teh paranormal until her father's death. Since then she's focused all of her energy on being "normal". All of that changes when new student Kit Morland arrives and starts to challenge everything she thought she'd figured out about herself.

What I liked about this book is that it focused on grief and how clamming up and not dealing with it will affect someone. I also loved the growth and change in Hattie personally and within her family's dynamic.

I really liked the theme of the book. The family dynamic was very interesting. The characters were complex and had depth. The book deals with hard things. The thing that I didn't like was all the language. I understand that the characters are teenagers but I don't really want to read that kind of language.

This book took me completely by surprise! It's truly a book about a family grieving the sudden loss of their larger then life father with each person handling things in a different way.
What I loved:
- Kit!!!
- Liam and Erik
- the creepy school vibes

What could have been better:
- more ghost experiences. We were told the ghost stories and legends but no true ghost experiences were had during the book. Since Kit is a ghost enthusiast, and on a ghost scholarship, I think this should have been explored more

Northanger Abbey gets a YA retelling and it's not quite up to par. If you take away the Austen adaptation, it's okay, but that's now how it's offered up. It takes quite some time for the story to really get off the ground, but the constant self-deprecation of Hattie got ridiculously annoying. There was not nearly enough of the paranormal either.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thanks to Netgalley for allowing me to read this book! It was a cute and easy read. I think it could have gone deeper into most aspects of the story but it did get the over point across. Though I’m not a big fan of everything being wrapped in a bow in the last chapters, it didn’t take away from the story.

📖ARC Review📖
Ghosted by Amanda Quain
Pages: 320
Arc: yes
⭐️: 3.5/5

Synopsis: Hattie Tilney goes to a very haunted high school—or does she? Hattie no longer believes in ghosts since her dad died. Can a newcomer to Northanger Abbey make her believe again? What will happen when her internal ghosts are discovered?

What I liked:
-The love story was cute! Although, it’s a little clean for my taste, but that’s YA for ya. And they are like..17, so that makes sense lol
-the thought of the haunted high school
-the display of grief and how it wreaks havoc on us all in different ways

What I feel could have been better:
-Hattie’s self-deprecating got old after a while
-I feel like we could have leaned into the ghosts more? There was definitely missed opportunities there

Overall..solid 3.5/5. Cute love story 🩷

Thank you to NetGalley for this arc and my opinion is my honest review after having read this book.

Having never read Northanger Abbey, I went into this totally blind, and I was completely charmed.

Hattie, still reeling from the loss of her father, has completely abandoned the love of the paranormal he instilled in her. Too bad she goes to one of the most supposedly haunted schools ever. Her mother is the headmistress, and barely has time for her own three children, more so after losing her husband. When a new student shows up at school on a ghost hunting scholarship, Hattie couldn't be less thrilled when her mother assigns her to be Kit's ambassador at Northanger. He's determined to show her ghosts exist, she's determined to bust the myth. In true YA fiction fashion, chaos ensues and it's adorable.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press & Wednesday Books for an eARC of GHOSTED and for the opportunity to be an early reviewer.

The author's voice was the first thing that stood out to me while reading GHOSTED. Quain is a witty and heartfelt storyteller.

“In case you were wondering, the proper term for a group of paranormal enthusiasts was “an annoyance.”

Critical Thoughts:
This could possibly be one of the most quotable books I’ve read. But sadly, while I enjoyed the writing and dialogue, this story just wasn’t for me. I found it challenging to establish a connection with most of the characters and felt disconnected from the story in general. Maybe this could be attributed to the lack of maturity in Hattie and her friends.

The story starts relatively slow and takes a while to get off the ground. Not a whole lot happens in the first fifty or so pages, aside from meeting Kit. Overall, I liked Kit’s character and the paranormal content he provided. But when his relationship with Hattie quickly veered into insta-love territory, it left a sour taste in my mouth. While their relationship is sweet and makes sense, I didn’t find myself rooting for them, either.

When they’re paired together for a journalism project, Kit attempts to prove the existence of ghosts, while Hattie tries just the opposite. This created a fun, competitive spark. I only wish we could’ve seen this project presented at school when it was finished, especially since we spent so much time working on it. I don’t quite understand why we were left hanging with this, considering the subject tied in with Hattie’s character and backstory. This could’ve helped so much in showing readers why she needed to prove ghosts aren’t real. And, after all, it’s what connected Hattie and Kit in the first place. This just seemed like another missed opportunity.

Speaking of missed opportunities, I loved the paranormal aspects of this story so much, but I wish we could’ve expanded on it a little more. There were so many moments when I felt the author gave the story plenty of opportunities to have fun and explore the subject, only to skip over them instantly and move on to something else.
For example, on Halloween night, Hattie follows the Ghost Brigade into a cemetery for a haunted tour to film footage for their journalism project, but we don’t get a whole lot from this scene. Hattie chats for a while before becoming upset when her mother unexpectedly shows up for the tour. The scene then abruptly ends, and we jump to the next day. This happens many times throughout the book.


PRAISE:
I admired how Quain handled the loss of Hattie’s father. Her depiction of grief is raw and deeply human. We see how Hattie has changed since, how grief stains and seeps into every aspect of your life, leaving nothing untouched.

“My dad had been my everything. I’d arrived at Northanger Abbey missing an essential piece of myself, determined to not let anyone know how irreversibly broken I was, and armed with a final charge—to take care of the family and to make Mom proud.”

We first find Hattie when she’s angry, sad, and lost after having convinced herself that the only way to survive what she’d been through was to reinvent herself.

“Healthy? Never claimed it was. Some choices were just about getting by.”

But as the story goes on, we see her begin to heal and discover whom she wants to be in the wake of all she’s lost. A good portion of the story is Hattie trying to heal her belief system when she thought loss had ravaged it beyond repair. She’s profoundly human and incredibly imperfect. But even when you want to scream at her for making stupid choices and mistakes, you can still understand her on a human level.

All in all, the book wrapped up nicely. Though a bit rushed, it offered a satisfying conclusion. While it may not be an all-time favorite for me, I genuinely believe there is a large audience who will love this book. I’d recommend it to anyone looking for a cozy, slow-paced, heartfelt YA romance with a dash of the paranormal.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I'll start off by saying that Ghosted is not quite the book I expected. The ghosts you'll find in this heartfelt romance aren't the scary apparitions you find in the movies but rather the ghosts of neglect and grief.

Ghosted follows Hattie Tilney, a senior at the world's most (allegedly) haunted high-school, Northanger Abbey. Growing up, Hattie had loved all the ghost stories that surround the school and it provided her an outlet of bonding with her father. However, when her father passed, Hattie put the ghost stories aside in pursuit of the highly successful academic future her mother expects.

All of that changes when Hattie's world gets flipped upside-down by Northanger's new student, Kit Morland. Assigned to be his ambassador and later his partner for a journalism project, Hattie finds herself opening up to Kit and even finding happiness as the pressure of her mother and friends' expectations weighs on her. As her relationship with Kit grows, Hattie finds that maybe it's time to dig up her past and free her own ghosts to find peace in her life.

Ghosted is a spooky atmospheric read that's perfect for the Halloween season. It is a slow burn YA romance that simultaneously touches on topics like family dynamics and processing grief.

Ghosted was absolutely fun! Quain wrote a story that was so well written I found myself flying through the pages, unable to put the book down, pondering what would happen next. My favorite piece of this entire story was how believable the characters were.

The writing is clear and clean, and very immersive. The book hums along at a good clip, but the pacing makes sure we're given time to breathe between plot-intensifying moments. The story was absolutely engaging and the work that went into the settings was noticeable and superb. I felt absolutely transported and I'm so incredibly glad I was able to read an arc of this story.

This was okay. I liked the story and characters, but I felt that some parts were very dragged out and that some foreshadowing didn’t pan out into much of anything. It was good apart from being clunky in parts. I think some of the author’s future books could be much better.

First and foremost I want to thank NetGalley and the publisher for a E-ARC in exchange for an honest review.
I loved Amanda Quain's first novel Accomplished and GOD I loved this one even more! Ghosted is a modern highschooler gender bent retelling of Northanger Abbey (which I believe is Austen's underrated work) and follows lead Hattie Tilney. Hattie has a plan for her senior year and her life and that plan does not involve hunting ghosts!, but suddenly everything starts to change when she meets Kit Morland, new kid and ghost hunter!
The story never gets too complicated and does a good job of keeping to the beats of the original novel, but now in a new era and in a new POV. By the end I felt I knew Northanger as a real school and I wanted to stay there as long as I could.
The highlight of the book though are the characters. Amanda Quain does an amazing job of imaging the character from the original novel but in our times and how changing their genders would change them, but still keeping the character cores the same.
Kit like Catherine is pure sunshine and enthusiasm, but also having an edge of naivety that others can use against them. Kit is so kind and warm to be around even through the page, but he isn't perfect and can get lost in his own ideas and world.
Hattie our lead is both a joy but also heart breaking at times to watch. She like Henry want to put on a good front to the world, but also feel the pressure to be the good child, but what it means to be a good daughter compared to a good son is different and Quain but that in to consideration when she wrote Hattie. At time I could see why a reader could be annoyed with her and the choices she makes, but it is painfully clear why she feels she needs to make these choices.
The rest of the character from Hattie's friends and family are all memorable in their own right and added to the story and its world, side note: Liam is my precious son.
I adored this book and its characters I can't wait to read the next novel this author makes, be it in this serious or otherwise.

The idea of ghosts was used in a way that I've never seen before, but I expected them to be more of a focus - Instead, the main focus was the character relationships (family and friends) and development. My favorite part was the sibling dynamics - I love how the relationships between Hattie and her brother and sister played out. Personally i found Hattie rather annoying, especially at the beginning, but her character improves throughout the story.

Note: I've never read Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen, so I can't say what's similar or different between the two.

*thank you St. Martin’s Press for the eARC of this in exchange for a review*

I feel so bad saying this, but this book fell slightly flat. I enjoyed it while reading it, but that was about it. I feel like it was fairly average, and I was expecting a lot more ghosts. If I had had slightly different expectations, I might have liked it more, but I was hoping for a bit more paranormal and a bit less teen emotions (and I say this as a teenager).

I think a big reason why I can’t say that I loved this book, or even really really liked it, is because of the main character Hattie. I honestly just did not like her. I found her annoying and she just kept repeatedly making the same mistakes and dismissing people without giving them a real chance. I get that at the end she had some character development, but I just really don’t like those kinds of people and it was rough to wait for that change. I did, however, like Kit Morland. I thought he was sweet and cute and he really tried to help Hattie.

Overall, it wasn’t really for me, but it wasn’t a bad book either.

Thank you so much to the publisher and to NetGalley for the ARC of this book. All opinions are my own.

Amanda is back with another stellar book! I thoroughly enjoyed reading this. It was a lot of fun. One of those books that makes you feel happy, inside and out. I love Amanda's voice and how she can keep you captivated with the simplest of things. I definitely encourage you to check this one out when it comes out!

‘Ghosted’ by Amanda Quain was a great Jane Austen retelling, absolutely nailing the Northanger Abbey vibes. And I loved that it was gender bent! It was sweet and so heartfelt. Highly recommend!