History Literature / ShamanBlues

* AdvertisedExtra: The friedlier of the hospital ghosts is featured fairly prominently on the cover (it's the one on the left), but in the story itself, he makes only three very brief appearances, one of which amounts to little more than a glimpse.
* TheAllegedCar: Everyone Witkacy drives points this out about his jeep. Among others, it lacks the hand brake, the inside lights, ventillation, sits' coverings (Witkacy uses blankets) and two windows. It's considered a good day when the engine starts at the third attempt, and the springs in the sits can cause damage. Witkacy defends it vehemently, though.

* IronicNurseryTune: There's apparently a nursery rhyme about first victims of wraith-as-still-alive, forty years ago, listing nicknames of the victims. We never get to see it in full, but the sheer idea is creepish.

* LeyLine: The entire world is criss-crosed by those. They're filled with magical energy which makes casting spells easier on them and puts ghosts in predictable paths, as it's always easier to use a ley line than waste precious energy on making the few steps beyond it.

* AGlassInTheHand: Witkacy breaks the glass he's holding in his hand when Vulture starts making distasteful comments about possibilities of romancing fifteen-years-old Wiktoria.

* IronicNurseryTune: There's apparently a nursery rhyme about first victims of wraith-as-still-alive, forty years ago, listing nicknames of the victims. We never get to see it in full, but the sheer idea is creepish.

* TheAllegedCar: Everyone Witkacy drives points this out about his jeep. Among others, it lacks the hand brake, the inside lights, ventillation, sits' coverings (Witkacy uses blankets) and two windows. It's considered a good day when the engine starts at the third attempt, and the springs in the sits can cause damage. Witkacy defends it vehemently, though.
* TheCavalry: One-woman cavalry in form of Dora Wilk, who arrives to reinforce Katia and Witkacy with some sheer physical power.
* TheInsomniac: Witkacy rarely sleeps more than three hours a night, if he sleeps at all.
* TheMasquerade: General public doesn't know about magic or ghosts, which is why Konstancja goes to Witkacy with her problem - she doubts regular police would help her. It also presents a problem when Witkacy can't tell her anything about supernatural the case is full of.
* TheMasqueradeWillKillYourDatingLife: You don't even have to know about it. Witkacy's and Konstancja's falling out came from his shaman genes pushing him into drug abuse, while Konstancja has some watered-down magic instincts and saw ''something'' around Witkacy that drove her away.
* TheReveal: Three.
** When the IronicNurseryTune [[spoiler:mentions "Dzwon", it means Tadeusz, not, as the man claims, his sister.]]
** [[spoiler:Tadeusz is behind the murders, having pointed the spirit of his sister at the hospital.]]
** [[spoiler:Witkacy had a daughter with Konstancja. This is why she ran away from him.]]

* ADogNamedDog: Vulture spirit is named Vulture.

* TrespassingHero: Witkacy breaks into Tadeusz's house to search it. Konstancja borrows the keys instead.

* AdultFear:
** You entrust your newborn child to your hospital's neonatal unit, only for it to be ''suffocated'' by a force you can't see, you can't stop and you don't understand. And by the time Konstancja goes to Witkacy, the ghost has already claimed three victims.
** For [[spoiler:Witkacy]], having his daughter inherit his powers and going into the same self-destructive spiral of depression and drug abuse. Preventing this is the very reason he decides to become involved in her life.