It's not often that a book so successfully combines a subtle, eerie ghost story with compelling historical fiction, but The Uninvited really pulls it off. Set during the 1918 flu epidemic in a small Illinois town dominated by anti-German, anti-foreigner agitation, the book captures the fear caused by the deaths of so many, on the battlefields overseas and at home from illness. The plot builds, adding tension and complications, until a really stunning final third that ties it all together just marvelously. Highly recommended.