Where the Shadows Hide

Reviews / Votes

PSI are back and they're making a brave splash in the third installment! Clarkin's ghost hunters are as charming as ever, and the spooky stakes have never been so high - both professionally and interpersonally. The cruise isn't the only ship in danger of sinking... -- Courtney Smyth, author of The Undetectables highly original and deliciously chilling -- Independent.ie Clarkin has a knack of both terrifying her readers and creating a beautiful sense of belonging, weaving together themes of friendship and found family, with continued important representation of queer and disabled characters, alongside spine-chilling moments. Readers will be gripped. -- CBI's The Best Irish Books of 2025 Amy Clarkin's paranormal investigators return for their third ghostly adventure, Where the Shadows Hide which sees the team aboard a luxury cruise ship ... Without resorting to caricature, Clarkin deftly notes power imbalances and points to the ways, minor and major, in which workers are often exploited or dehumanised. Also striking is the depiction of chronic illness, with Eabha still recovering from the physically wearying events of the previous book ... Writing about ongoing health difficulties - and Clarkin explicitly links these symptoms to ME, which she has explored in her non-fiction work - can present a challenge plot-wise. As readers, we are used to resolution at the end of a text a tragic death, a successful recovery. In a supernatural setting, there's the temptation of a magic cure of some kind, but that can feel disheartening or frustrating if one is concerned with representing particular experiences in an authentic fashion. Here, then, the conflict is not quite Eabha versus chronic illness, but Eabha versus other people's responses to the condition. Boyfriend Archer means well with his overprotective stance and seemingly helpful suggestions (vitamins and yoga inevitably pop up), but ultimately makes "her feel like he thought she wasn't trying hard enough to get better". Her journey is not to overcome or positive-think her way out of illness, but to "learn how to exist within the parameters she had now", which involves hope and grief. This thoughtful representation is moving and empowering. -- Irish Times Amy Clarkin has created something quite special with her PSI (Paranormal Surveyance Ireland) series, mixing ghost-hunting plots with strong, believable characters. In this latest instalment, the five paranormal investigators are invited on board a luxury cruise ship that is experiencing ghostly happenings. They try to blend in with the rich passengers and work out who or what is haunting the ship, while also dealing with their own friendship and relationship problems. The perfect Halloween read! -- Irish Independent As a creepy setting this is unusual but as chilling and cinematic as they come ... If the paranormal elements of Dublin author Amy Clarkin's third PSI novel are multilayered, they have nothing on the complex, ever-fluctuating relationships between its diverse cast of characters. A ghost story with plenty of bite, its paranormal plotline is sufficiently strong to prevent it being submerged under the weight of emotions, including trust and betrayal, examined via its young adult protagonists. Eabha's fatigue may be due to a previous encounter with a homicidal ghost, but it allows for a deep dive into attitudes to chronic illness, while the characters' diverse range of sexuality and asexuality explored here will allow many young readers to feel truly "seen" -- Irish Examiner