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'A seductive farrago of sex, sin and spiritualism...Girardi writes with wholehearted, infectious enthusiasm about his saints and sinners. Like Ned, he blatantly enjoys slumming in rough, tough bayou bars or swanning around the formal mansions of old New Orleans families, and his evocative style carries him triumphantly through the twists and turns of his preposterous plot' The Sunday Times 'An achievement. The narrative wafts between garish, hallucinatory imagery of New York life in the 1990s and the equally chilling, endlessly intriguing life of New Orleans... The writing is meticulously detailed, distractingly beautiful and incessantly vivid' Time Out 'This totally seductive first novel blossoms from mere chiller into something infinitely sweeter and warmer...a fiercely readable novel' Julie Myerson, Mail on Sunday 'As the pulp thickens, you realise this is sick, slick, wall-to-wall pastiche. Great fun' Observer 'An impressive debut by a writer who at thirty-one is young enough to get even better and old enough to have his own style...the writing is taut, almost terse... There's good descriptive text, good character drawing and good sex in Madeleine's Ghost. I venture that few will shut the book after 360 pages and not feel the better for it. It is that great an achievement' Literary Review 'A spirited debut mingling past, present and the vastly different worldviews of New Orleans and New York... entrancing characters, finely turned comic flourishes and a cryptful of cann plot twists make for a smooth, intoxicating delight' Kirkus Reviews 'In a first novel of astonishing accomplishment Girardi by turns portrays spooks, erotic love, muggers, Romanium mediums and the Catholic church with startlingly few slips and a shimmering style' Publishers Weekly 'A modern ghost story that eschews graphic violence for mood, fascinating characters, and a story that opens strong and keeps building' Library Journal 'Girardi quite wisely adds man elements to keep his narrative flowing. More than a tale of spiritual haunting, it's a story of how love can haunt a lover... And more than a love story, Madeleine's Ghost is a tale of hard contemporary reality, of how people try to destroy themselves if the city they live in doesn't get to them first... This book is a vivid, vibrant gumbo of ghosts and gypsies, lovers and others, making for a fast, can't-put-it-down reading experience' New Orleans Times-Picayune 'Atmospheric, sweet-natured novel about the miraculous power of love... This satisfying novel is filled with a rich cast of supporting characters' San Francisco Chronicle 'Ned [is] a hilarious mix of longing and arrested development... The narrative zings along... It is so freshly observed' The New York Times 'A contemporary story of a haunting, beautifully written, highly intriguing and definitely worth pushing' The Bookseller 'Immensely engaging, lavish in its descriptive details,with a good, engrossinng story to tell... Part love story, part ghost story, always absorbing, it is in many ways a remarkable achievement' Los Angeles Times book Review 'Haunting... An engrossing, fast-paced debut that moves almost effortlessly between New York, New Orleans and the 19th-century South' The Washington Times 'Readers have waited too long for Robert Girardi's peculiar, mesmerising genius. With the publication of Madeleine's Ghost, they may now experience his penchant for the grit and history of cities, for the beguiling passions that bind men and women, and, above all, for the hauntedness in all of us' Colin Harrison, author of Manhattan Nocturne

Robert Girardi lives in Washington D.C. with his wife, poet and novelist Linda Girardi and their three children.