If Dumas pere were alive today, he would still be Prince of the Potboilers. Here is a tale, never before translated into English, of ghosts and godliness, of rosy-cheeked virgins and dark-visaged villains, every bit as florid and swashbuckling as The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo. The House of von Eppstein is cursed with a dire secret: the women of the family who die on Christmas Eve actually remain half-alive, returning when it suits their purpose on the anniversary of their death.