Dusk or Dark or Dawn or Day

By: Seanan McGuire

Narrated by: Emily Bauer

"Emily Bauer's narration of this contemporary ghost story is a poignant, pitch-perfect success...[Her] remarkable ability to shift between various Southern accents and intonations infuses the dialogue with emotional depth and insight." — AudioFile Magazine

When her sister Patty died, Jenna blamed herself. When Jenna died, she blamed herself for that, too. Unfortunately Jenna died too soon. Living or dead, every soul is promised a certain amount of time, and when Jenna passed she found a heavy debt of time in her record. Unwilling to simply steal that time from the living, Jenna earns every day she leeches with volunteer work at a suicide prevention hotline.

But something has come for the ghosts of New York, something beyond reason, beyond death, beyond hope; something that can bind ghosts to mirrors and make them do its bidding. Only Jenna stands in its way.

Dusk or Dark or Dawn or Day is a new standalone urban fantasy novella from New York Times bestselling author Seanan McGuire.

Critic reviews

"A spooky, atmospheric love letter to New York and its shifting moods, skylines and people." — Sophia McDougall, author of the Romanitas trilogy.

A Story of Ghosts & Witches from a New Perspective

Love love love!! A story of ghosts and witches with a new and unique perspective that was both fascinating and compelling. The narration was perfection - I was lost in the story from start to finish. My only complaint is that it was too short - I wanted MORE! I hope she revisits this from one of the other ghost's POV! This will be the first book of 2017 to make it to my "Favorites" list!

Awesome narration!

Emily Bauer was absolutely perfect for this book. In fact, I think that was the best narration I've heard period since starting to listen to audio books. Her character voices were easy to distinguish, and she really set a great tone for the story.
It was my first book by Seanan McGuire but it certainly won't be my last!

Promising start, middling overall

3.5 stars. This book started out promisingly creepy and unique, with poems about death and a southern, rural family in mourning over the suicide of their daughter/sister. Atmospheric and surreal, the surviving sister, unable to face the grief of the family, runs out into a stormy night, and inadvertently falls down a ravine to her death. Fast forward 40 years, and that self-same sister, Jenna, is a ghost working a suicide prevention hotline in New York City. The book (which is too short to be a novel, too long to be a novella) loses much of its atmosphere and becomes somewhat mundane, even though it is discussing the paranormal. Jenna is likable, almost too likable, and McGuire has only broadly sketched the world Jenna inhabits. There are witches, and a host of ghosts, the ability to shift time (years, months, days, minutes) from the living to the dead and vice versa, and a number of old wive's tales come to life (trapping ghosts in mirrors, death shrouds, and the like). There are some convenient solutions to nagging issues (how does a minimum wage coffee shop barista and ghost pay for NYC rent? Her landlord is a ghost), some broad hints about how this paranormal world works (witches have power over ghosts, ghosts must go incorporeal at times, there must be certain numbers of ghosts in places to anchor it properly to reality), and a rushed mystery involving missing ghosts. The book is still entertaining, though the narrator's twang and tendency to repeat herself can lose any charm quickly. The villain has a suitably dark plan, but her plan and her motivation is just barely introduced and insufficiently explored (a lot of interesting work could have been done with the plot, but was just glossed over). The book ties up neatly, and it wasn't a waste of time, but it isn't anything special and does not live up to the opening prologue.

this story sounds like poetry in the best ways

the characters are distinctive, and funny and endearing just the right amount. sadness and happiness are fit together in ways i forgot they could be. i just re-listened to this, and i'm not the most coherent because i'm still crying from it (in a good way).

Clear deviation from her usual prose

I have enjoyed reading all of Seanan McGuire'a stories, and always look forward to any new ones that are released, whether they are part of her October Daye, Incryptid, or Indexing series, or her short stories. This was very much a deviation from her usual writing. There was an awful lot of philosophical offerings that, in many ways, took away from her storytelling. It wasn't that this was a bad story, just unusual, and not in keeping with the rest of her writing. I think I would just rather see her put her time in continuing with stories that have become so enjoyable to read.