The Visitant, by Megan Chance

Elena Spira believes she’s prepared to help her patient. She’s dealt with drug addicts and alcoholics before. She’s even helped epileptics, which is no mean feat in 1884 when the only “treatments” are cold water baths and bromides. But when she arrives at the dilapidated Casa Basilio at the beginning of The Visitant, by Megan Chance, Elena quickly realizes that her patient will be the toughest one she’s had to care for yet…and that’s before the ghost shows up.

The Casa Basilio in Venice is no one’s first choice as a place to convalesce. The place is falling apart. The servants are clearly skimming. The owner’s aunt shares fictional DNA with Mrs. Danvers; she still pines for her lost daughter, Laura. The patient, Samuel, is recovering from a long debauch, a beating, and his worsening epilepsy. Samuel’s parents dispatch Elena to Venice after offering her family a deal they can’t refuse. All she has to do is treat Samuel, return him to New York, and she gets to travel Europe for months (and not marry her cousin).

Everyone in this book is in an impossible position. They all have deadly secrets. The climate is terrible. Nothing goes right. When Samuel starts to show signs that he’s possessed by Laura’s ghost, Elena gets pulled into an ugly mystery that tests her rational medical mind. Ghosts can’t be real in Elena’s world, but there’s no other way to explain Samuel’s attacks, his inexplicable use of Venetian, and the more-cold-than-usual breezes that fill the rooms of the Casa.

This book completely hooked me. I barely put it down because I just had to know what really happened to Laura and who would win in the battle of wills between Elena and Samuel. (The steamy scenes between Elena and Nero Basilio are icing on the cake.) This fast blend of historical fiction and horror was exactly what I needed after the long, generational story of Britannia Mews.