Multiple Wilmington places get spooked in this Ghostbusters-like tale
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Long Island native E. Thomas Cain spent years working on the nursing staff at New Hanover Regional Medical Center.
In his other life, he was a fantasy artist whose work appeared in Heavy Metal. More recently, he's become a prolific writer whose fantasy tales often uses Wilmington -- or Wilmington in an alternative universe -- as their setting.
"A Place of Shadows," one of the most recent, encompasses 12 stories starring Jupiter Liu, an Asian-American psychic. Picture Dr. Strange crossed with James Bond.
After years working with the U.S. Psychic Intelligence Agency, a shadowy spy service headquartered on the Lower Cape Fear, Jupiter has set himself up as a private investigator.
He has a secretary, Velma -- think Miss Moneypenny crossed with Reba McEntire -- and an office at Fifth Avenue and Market Street, not far from the Bellamy Mansion. Like Moneypenny, Velma often cautions Jupiter about his womanizing ways, which rival James Bond's.
Jupiter's clients include members of the Imperial House of Habsburg. His cases? Think Sam Spade mashed up with the Ghostbusters.
Along the way, Jupiter encounters goblins, wood nymphs, daemons (not just demons: daemons), possessed Ming vases, unspeakable things with tentacles, the occasional dragon and slime, rather a bit of slime.
There may be a gun in a pocket of his frock coat, but more often he uses the Eye of Dagn, a mystic gem "pried from the onyx face of the pig-god Ziditu."
Who knows what evil lurks behind the curtained golf villas of the gated community "Gladefall?" Jupiter Liu does.
Cain uses an arcane, rather antique diction, in the manner of H.P. Lovecraft, and fans of Lovecraft's stories will probably glom onto Cain and "A Place of Shadows" as well.
A prequel, "Hob-Goblin," tells how Cain acquired the Eye of Cagn.
Most of Cain's books are available only in e-book editions.
Book review
A Place of Shadows: The Jupiter Liu Stories
By Elvis Thomas Cain
Amazon Kindle, $9.99
This article originally appeared on Wilmington StarNews: In "A Place of Shadows," Wilmington turns to ghosts
