With the amount of supernatural stuff that occurred in the book, I like to think it was all actually happening, and not just in people's heads. So, for me, the sister was a ghost, Typhus was actually rebirthing aborted babies into fish, and the possession was real, the voodoo stuff was actualizing in the physical world, and on and on...
I kinda put this down about midway in. That "elegant writing" was starting to feel self-important, and the storyline was annoying me, for some reason. Partly, I tend to dislike how "Christians" are mis-defined and then maligned in so much fiction. So I was doing a bit of an eye roll pretty early on in this one. I'm not even sure if I'll pick it back up.
Kewl. I’ll make it simple, I’m going to agree with Sedai’s choice for August (apologies to Takoma).