The Sport of Ghost Wrestling

The Sport of Ghost Wrestling is a new book of the fantasy/science fiction genre written by Demetrios Anagnostopoulos, the first volume in a series yet to be named.

It centers on the story of Demetrios Anagnostopoulos, a man who has recently become a ghost. The good news is that he gets a lot of cool new powers with it. The bad news is he loses his memories of his mortal life. He decides to use his powers to create a new sport that proves to be quite the hit, and also hopes to find out what happened to his missing wife Lily. However, there are other forces at work, especially when an insidious cult that calls itself "the Island" comes into play. Demetrios is then thrust into protecting the world from this bizarre cult, and discover the truth of his past.

The Sport of Ghost Wrestling can be found (and purchased) here. The sequel (yes, there's a sequel in the works), known as The Return of Mephistopheles: World War III will become available this summer.

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Tropes used in The Sport of Ghost Wrestling include:

• Affably Evil: William and Dorothy try this trick on Demetrios to convince him that "the Island" is good and good for you. It doesn't work.
• Ancestral Weapon: The Dragon Claw sword.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: Despite all the stuff he has seen up to that point, Demetrios is still surprised that Aristotle can talk.
• Badass: Four of them:
  • Demetrios: In addition to his ghost powers, he's also very good with a sword and puts his forms to their best use.
  • Max: Despite the amount of enemies, he still bravely charges into the fight.
  • Mothman: He'll gladly fight any of the mutants that kidnapped him, even Mephistopheles's son Blackstorm.
  • Aristotle: Despite his shortness and appearance to ordinary chimps, he'll bravely take on any opponent.
• The Big Easy: Averted. Most of the story takes place in the Louisiana city that doesn't get as much love: Baton Rouge.
• Big Eater: As another part of Our Ghosts Are Different, a ghost has to eat a lot of food after fighting in epic battles. Though it is necessary to recharge all the energy used after said epic battles.
• Brain Bleach: Demetrios and Kurt want this when William kisses Melissa.
• Cool Horse: Demetrios's winged Mustang Moon Shadow.
• Cult: What "the Island" really is.
• Deal with the Devil: How William becomes Mephistopheles.
• Damsel in Distress: Gloria might show signs of this. To be fair, though, there are hundreds upon hundreds of mutants and only one of her.
• Downer Beginning: How many stories do you know actually start with a funeral? Granted, that's how Demetrios becomes a ghost, but still.
• Everything's Better with Monkeys: Aristotle, the chimpanzee that knows karate (we know, chimpanzees aren't monkeys).
• Fetish Fuel Future: A shade of it; Marissa has a few hot outfits.
• Genre Shift: Not only is Demetrios on his journey to find out what happened to Lily and who he really is (or was, in his mortal life), he also founds Ghost Wrestling, so it looks like it'll be a typical sports story, and also has to save the world from "the Island". It all works out, though.
• It's Quiet... Too Quiet: It turns out just as well as you'd expect.
• Kid Hero: Well, sort of. Even though Demetrios died at the age of 100, his ghostly self looks 18.
• Lampshade Hanging: Quite a few examples. Here's a particularly notable one:

Marissa (after Demetrios escapes from "the Island" for the umpteenth time): Are you sure you're okay? This is starting to feel like a bad horror movie.

• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Some ghosts unfortunately lose the memories of their mortal lives upon becoming ghosts.
• Mutants: The mutants Mephistopheles creates are Mix-and-Match Critters that have the ability to regenerate lost limbs and for the severed parts to turn into copies of their owner. Only by attacking its weak point will the mutant stay dead.
• Ninja: "The Island" employs a few of them.
• Noodle Incident: While swimming home from "the Island" for the first escape, Demetrios gets stuck in the Bermuda Triangle (yes, he went the long way; around South America), but doesn't really describe what happened in there. Of course, given the super-weird reputation of the Bermuda Triangle, it would probably just be a Non Sequitur Scene anyway.
• One-Man Army: More like a four-man army: Demetrios, Max, Mothman, and Aristotle.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: Ghosts in this book have the following powers and abilities: they can fly, turn invisible, walk through walls, shapeshift, need to eat a lot to recharge after intense battles, don't age (they get to look as how they looked during the best moments of their lives) and have a super sense of humor.
• Precision F-Strike: There aren't too many swear words in this story, and when they do show up, you can be sure something bad is about to happen.
• Psychic Powers: Marissa has a few of them.
• Real Life Relative: Well, sort of. The Marine captain John "Max" Stelling is indeed a close friend of the author.
• Self-Insert Fic: Demetrios Anagnostopoulos is both the author and the main character.
• Shout-Out: William changes his name to Mephistopheles because, in his own words, Mephistopheles is the Lord of Hatred (symbolizing his hatred of Demetrios). Now where else was he addressed with that title?...
• Sick and Wrong: Demetrios's friends have this reaction when Shadowbite tries to put the moves on him.
• The Stoic: The National Guard lieutenant seems pretty collected after being threatened by Mephistopheles over the two-way radio.

"That's not what I wanted to hear."

• This Is Your Brain on Evil: Turning into a demonic form causes Demetrios pain. Later, he focuses that pain for important fights.
• Twenty Minutes Into the Future: Well more like an hour and a half into the future. The story takes place in 2085 - 2086.
• Weirdness Censor / Unusually Uninteresting Sight: With the popularity of Ghost Wrestling, normal people don't seem very fazed by ghosts walking around and shapeshifting.