‘Do you like what you see?’

Imagine you could change bodies at will, experience life in whatever human form you pleased. Would you?

Claire North’s Touch allows us to explore this idea through Kepler, a ‘ghost’ who can ‘jump’ into any body by mere skin to skin contact. Kepler and kin are possessing entities born into human bodies that experienced violent trauma, triggering a powerful impulse to cling to life. In their death throes these souls reach out – leaving their original bodies and jumping into whomever’s they can lay their pores on. Kepler is a special form of ghost, an ‘estate agent’, who is paid handsomely to find host bodies for other souls that share this unique ability.

We follow Kepler from the first terrifying jump and back and forth through a mesmerising ride through history. We are hurled in at the midst of the action from the outset. Kepler is in love with Josephine, a willing host body that Kepler rents for a considerable sum. The death of Josephine at the hands of a skilled assassin fuels a race against time to unmask Aquarius, the organisation that has made its mission to eradicate Kepler’s kind. We meet others like Kepler; most memorable is the lunatic Galileo who uses ghosting skills to wreak havoc and destruction across the world in an attempt to taunt Kepler. Galileo engages Kelper in a dangerous game of hide and seek, utilising Aquarius to destroy the ghost with Machiavellian precision.

Touch is a fast-paced existential thriller with an original concept. The book deals with issues of love, mortality, identity, and the essence of self. On the ghost’s exit, the hosts are minus the memory of the time they were being ‘worn’, which highlights many ethical issues around survival and consent. Kepler is gender fluid throughout, and the book deals with love and relationships in a very inclusive and thought-provoking way. This is the kind of book that keeps you constantly engaged and questioning the main character as well as yourself.

There’s little doubt that Kepler is a monster who uses people with little regard to their welfare but somehow we are sympathetic.

Claire North’s attention to detail is excellent and the grand finale of the book will keep you gripped until the last page. For me, it doesn’t triumph the marvel that was The First Fifteen lives of Harry August, but it is a book that stands proud in its own right. My only criticism would be that I thought the book could elaborate in many areas such as the origins of these bodiless souls.

Overall it is a gripping, poignant, breathlessly imaginative read that was difficult to put down.