1922, and Dr Alan Twist has come to Cranston Manor, invited by the lord of the manor, to investigate the Rose Room. The room, situated in the attic, has been the focal point of a series of hauntings – mysterious footsteps in the middle of the night, movement and lights inside a room locked from the inside… the usual sort of thing.

Oh, and there’s a banshee on the prowl, who not everyone hears when she screams.

Oh, and people who don’t hear the banshee’s scream have a habit of dying.

Oh, and at least one of the people who died was seen being attacked by a winged creature.

Oh, and there’s a question about whether the lord of the manor is who he says he is.

Oh, and there’s a question about the lady of the manor and her sort-of twin sister.

Yes, it’s a Paul Halter book, no question about that…

So, here we go again, another trip into the world of Paul Halter, the world where no case is ever simple, no case ever involves a simple impossibility, a world where far too many people are happy to believe in a local banshee’s curse…

This is Alan Twist’s first case, where he meets Inspector Hurst for the first time, although it was released as the twelfth title in the series. Twist starts out here as an occult, rather than criminal, investigator, and bumps into Hurst who is there to investigate the recent deaths that have been attributed to the banshee.

It’s hard to say too much about this one without spoiling bits of it, but it’s the usual blend of some clever ideas balanced with some weaker ones. It’s another title when Halter has simply thrown too many threads into the book, so we never get to focus on just the one. One of the bigger issues here for me is the focus for a good chunk of the first half on the identity of the lord of the manor, which, while it has an interesting outcome, it also has a rather extreme event tied to it that just seems… a bit too much.

Then a lot of the banshee stuff gets less of a focus that I would have liked, along with some near psychic deductions from Twist, along with a number of false solutions that, for the most part, just didn’t need to be there. Oh, and one thing central to the case is a bit icky. And the cover’s a bit weird.

With better pacing, this could have come close to his best work. As it is, it’s still a decent entry into his catalogue, and thanks to Locked Room International (i.e. John Pugmire) for translating it for us.