Review of Maggie I Have Your Baby by Kelly Lidji
A.E. Jackson Review Score: 3 / 5 Ravens
How was this review scored?
Maggie I Have Your Baby, the freshman novel of Delaware author Kelly Lidji is a spooky combo of two things I love! Delaware history and a well told creepy story.
Growing up in Sussex County, Delaware I’ve heard a few versions of the Maggie’s Bridge legend. As a child, I also grew up near the infamous bridge. When I was little, I’d swap ghost stories with other kids who grew up near Woodland, Delaware. And there was even a version of the tale I learned while sleeping away at Delaware State 4-H Camp.
But Kelly Lidji’s version of the Maggie Bloxom ghost story has got to be my favorite!
The legend of Maggie's Bridge is well known to Delaware locals. In the late 1800's a young girl, pregnant and frightened, loses her life on a lonely bridge in a terrible storm. But what is the truth behind the story? Who was Maggie Bloxom? What fates brought her to that dark place and stole her future away from her?
Claire Ludlow is as local as they come. She grew up visiting the Maggie's Bridge at midnight and calling for the ghost of Maggie Bloxom. One night when she was 16 she sees more than she thought possible.
When life draws her back to her home town years later and drops her within arms reach of the bridge, can she use newly discovered clues and somehow coax the story of Maggie's life from the spirit of Maggie herself? Maybe even free her from decades of torment where she is trapped in an endless night. Or will the troubles in Claire's own life get in the way and threaten her own safety?
Will she save Maggie or will Maggie save her?
The author’s love of books, reading, and writing is made clear through the lives of the main character, and her Mom’s bookshop. I always like it when an author reveals a little about themselves in the stories they tell. Done well, it is subtle. Stephen King sprinkles autobiography throughout his work, but you wouldn’t know it unless you studied his biography. Kelly Lidji has done a fine job telling us all about her life in this story.
She does a good job balancing two different story lines in different time periods. Then, when it matters most, she masterfully draws them them together into a cohesive whole.
The novel is a good mystery, with suspense built up and intriguing items and incidents placed at just the right beats. The answers are revealed at the right moments, just as more of Maggie’s story is revealed and just as Claire Ludlow faces her own problems head on. This aspect of the story structure was very well done.
Lidji employs an interesting storytelling device by having the tale told through three different points of view - that of Claire the young protagonist, the living Maggie wrestling with love and pregnancy in a time of strict morality, and the lost spirit of Maggie Bloxom trapped in the dark and rainy afterlife.
Overall, the novel is a full, well-rounded, and well developed story. There are complete story arcs that don’t feel forced. All the loose ends are tied up in a satisfying bow to deliver a fine present of great storytelling. I look forward to reading another Kelly Lidji entry in the haunted history of Delaware.
Kelly Lidji lives in Lewes, Delaware with Jason and her two macaws, Rufus and Finn. She grew up in the 80’s trying to raise the ghost of Maggie Bloxom with her friends out at Maggie’s Bridge in Woodland, DE.
‘Maggie I Have Your Baby’ is her first novel. She followed it up with ‘That Devil Knows My Name’, ‘Where The Eidolon Sleep’, and ‘81 Miles’.
Read more from Kelly Lidji at http://kellylidji.com and find her on social media at Facebook(kellylidjiauthor).