Tag Archives: afterlife

Review: 49 Days by Agnes Lee

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49 Days by Agnes Lee

49 Days
Agnes Lee
Levine Quierido
Published March 5, 2024

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About 49 Days

Day 1

Gotta get up. Gotta keep moving. This map – it says I have to cross over here. Wait, what’s that…?

And so begins a graphic novel story unlike any 49 Days. In Buddhist tradition, a person must travel for forty-nine days after they die, before they can fully cross over. Here in this book, readers travel with one Korean American girl, Kit, on her journey, while also spending time with her family and friends left behind.

Agnes Lee has captivated readers across the world for years with her illustrations for the New York Times Metropolitan Diary. Her debut graphic novel is an unforgettable story of death, grief, love, and how we keep moving forward.

My Review

One of the things I love about this book is how immersive it is. Kit wakes up on a beach and swears, so I knew things were not good. It took several pages for me to feel like I found my feet in the story, but I think that was the author’s intent. It emphasizes that Kit is in a new space, figuring things out on her own. As her experience triggers memories from her life, we see those memories play out in short scenes. We see her family light incense and pray as they grieve their loss. When the story shifts from those prayer scenes back to Kit on her journey, it seems the prayers have fortified her and helped move her forward on her journey.

The panels and scenes are often understated in muted grayscale with tan colors. The characters’ emotions also often seem understated. It’s clear Kit’s family misses her, but they seem somber at first. As the story progresses, they experience moments of intense grief that create powerful moments. I think I cried like three times reading this book.

Another wonderful thing about the book is the way that food connects the characters. As a girl raised in a big Italian family, this resonated with me so much. I love that making food together was a connection between Kit and her mom, and that it becomes a vehicle through which her family celebrates their love for her even after she has passed.

The author includes a note after the story concludes explaining her intent and her decision to keep Buddhist practices vague in the text to respect the different ways people practice faith. She names the rituals and practices represented in the book, too.

I actually heard about this book because I read a wild review by someone who I think didn’t get the book at all. It made me curious enough to track down a copy, and I’m really glad I did.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 14 up.

Representation
Kit and her family are Korean American.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
One F-bomb and a small number of other expletives.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
Kit dies before the story begins, and the story follows her 49-day journey between life and rebirth, called bardo, as part of the Buddhist faith. Her family lights incense and prays, following funeral rites called cheondojae.

Violent Content
References to death, though we do not see how Kit died. In her 49-day journey, she has several moments where she resets following what would have been a fatal choice.

Drug Content
None.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Review: The Worst Perfect Moment Shivaun Plozza

Book Review and Content, Fantasy, Romance, Young Adult/Teen 12-18, , , , , , , , , , ,

The Worst Perfect Moment
Shivaun Plozza
Holiday House
Published May 14, 2024

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About The Worst Perfect Moment

Equal parts tender and edgy, this inventive queer romance imagines what it might feel like to come of age in the afterlife.

Tegan Masters is dead.

She’s sixteen and she’s dead and she’s standing in the parking lot of the Marybelle Motor Lodge, the single most depressing motel in all of New Jersey and the place where Tegan spent what she remembers as the worst weekend of her life.

In the front office, she meets Zelda, a cute and sarcastic girl Tegan’s age who is, in fact, an angel (wings and all). According to Zelda, Tegan is officially in heaven, where every person inhabits an exact replica of their happiest memory. For Tegan, Zelda insists, that place is the Marybelle—creepy minigolf course, revolting breakfast buffet, broken TV, and all.

Tegan has a few complaints about this.

As Zelda takes Tegan on a whirlwind tour through Tegan’s past to help her understand what mattered most to her in life, the stakes couldn’t be higher. If Zelda fails to convince Tegan that the Marybelle was the site of Tegan’s perfect moment, both girls face eternal consequences too dire to consider. But if she succeeds…they just might get their happily-ever-afterlife.

Full of humor and heartbreak, The Worst Perfect Moment asks what it means to be truly happy.

My Review

First of all, what a fantastic opening line. I love it. This book starts off with a bang, for sure. I like Tegan, too. She’s sparky, but so wounded and vulnerable underneath, and even when she doesn’t mean to let readers into that, she does. Her character easily kept me reading the book.

Zelda, the angel who designed Tegan’s personal heaven, grew on me a little. She’s very Manic Pixie Dream Girl, which I love seeing in a female-female romance, but isn’t my favorite trope, so I struggled with that. She’s goofy and fun, but determinedly crude, which, again, is not my favorite. Too many “butt-face” comments for me.

The scenes that revisit Tegan’s past and show what actually happened, especially the moments she doesn’t want to remember, hit hard. They showed how complex trauma and grief can be. Each one built up emotionally so that by the time I hit the final flashback, it hit hard. That was so well done.

Readers looking for a new spin on the Manic Pixie trope and who enjoy no-holds-barred humor will probably enjoy this one a lot.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 14 up.

Representation
Tegan and a few other girl characters are romantically interested in girls..

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Lots of crude comments. Lots of swearing. A few f-bombs.

Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing between two girls.

Spiritual Content
Tegan wakes up in the afterlife, in which heaven is supposed to be living at the site of your best memory forever. Purgatory is for people who die with too much unresolved trauma, and means people watch memories of their lives and have the emotions they experienced painfully scrubbed away. Hell, of course, is eternal torture.

Angels are assigned different jobs. There are guardian angels and angels who design a heaven scenario for someone. Tegan visits a counselor, someone who helps her process her death.

Tegan attended Catholic school for a part of her education. There are some references to sins and Catholic doctrines like purgatory, but very little reference to God or faith practices.

Violent Content
References to a girl on a bike being hit by a car, which killed her.

Tegan remembers arguments between her parents, which seem scary and chaotic to her. She sees her dad lose it and kick a door repeatedly. The story deals with abandonment by a parent.

Drug Content
Tegan’s aunt gets drunk and tells her something cruel.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use but help support this blog. I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Review: Always Isn’t Forever by J. C. Cervantes

Book Review and Content, Contemporary, Paranormal, Romance, Young Adult/Teen 12-18, , , , , , , , , , ,

Always Isn’t Forever
J. C. Cervantes
Razorbill
Published June 6, 2023

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About Always Isn’t Forever

Best friends and soul mates since they were kids, Hart Augusto and Ruby Armenta were poised to take on senior year together when Hart tragically drowns in a boating accident. Absolutely shattered, Ruby struggles to move on from the person she knows was her forever love.

Hart can’t let go of Ruby either…. Due to some divine intervention, he’s offered a second chance. Only it won’t be as simple as bringing him back to life–instead, Hart’s soul is transferred to the body of local bad boy.

When Hart returns to town as Jameson, he realizes that winning Ruby back will be more challenging than he’d imagined. For one, he’s forbidden from telling Ruby the truth. And with each day he spends as Jameson, memories of his life as Hart begin to fade away.

Though Ruby still mourns Hart, she can’t deny that something is drawing her to Jameson. As much as she doesn’t understand the sudden pull, it can’t be ignored. And why does he remind her so much of Hart? Desperate to see if the connection she feels is real, Ruby begins to open her heart to Jameson–but will their love be enough to bridge the distance between them?

My Review

I feel like I’ve seen a lot of books by J. C. Cervantes, but this is the first one I’ve ever read. Since it was compared to YOU’VE REACHED SAM, I really wanted to check it out.

It took me a few chapters to get into the story and really fall in love with Hart and Ruby. I’m not sure why, but once I invested, I felt like it was really easy to enjoy the story.

Some of the mechanics of the plot do require a bit of willing suspension of disbelief. As Jameson, Hart has a super limited amount of time in which he’ll retain his memories of his life as Hart. Once that passes, he’ll have Jameson’s memories but still be Hart in spirit or soul. The rules of Hart’s exchange (his soul in Jameson’s body) state that he can’t tell anyone the truth about who he is and what happened.

There’s a bit of dancing around the edges of those rules and bending them here and there. I think it might be harder to enjoy the story if you needed the spiritual/afterlife side of it to make perfect sense and be perfectly self-consistent.

Fortunately, I found it pretty easy to suspend my disbelief because I wanted to know if and how Ruby and Hart could find one another again. I’m always up for a “Can true love conquer all?” type of story, and this one definitely delivered on that trope.

All in all, I can see fans of YOU’VE REACHED SAM or THEY BOTH DIE AT THE END liking this one. It’s a great light summer book with a sweet love story.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 14 up.

Representation
Hart and Ruby are Latine. Ruby’s sister Gabi is in a relationship with another girl.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Extreme profanity used somewhat frequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing between boy and girl. References to sex. Ruby and Hart agreed to wait until college to have sex.

Spiritual Content
Hart meets an angel after his death who gives him a choice to return to life with his soul in the body of someone else.

Ruby’s sister Gabi has a tarot card deck made for her by Ruby’s aunt. When she does a reading with this deck, Gabi senses her ancestors speaking to her. The readings are always insightful and accurate.

Violent Content
Vague descriptions of a drowning death. Vague descriptions of a motorcycle accident. A player is injured during a game of football.

Drug Content
Hart learns Jameson was under the influence of alcohol when he crashed his motorcycle. Jameson drank a lot of alcohol, but Hart doesn’t.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use, but which help support this blog. I received a free copy of ALWAYS ISN’T FOREVER in exchange for my honest review.

Review: The Brink of Darkness by Jeff Giles

Young Adult/Teen 12-18, , , , , , ,

The Brink of Darkness
Jeff Giles
Bloomsbury
Published on July 3, 2018

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads

About The Brink of Darkness
Things have changed for seventeen-year-old Zoe ever since the otherworldly events that brought her together with the mysterious bounty hunter she calls X. In order to save Zoe and her family, X has done the unthinkable – he’s given up his freedom and returned to captivity in the Lowlands.

X is determined to break the lords’ hold on him once and for all, but being stripped of his power pushes him toward a darkness he’s never experienced and a past he’s never known. The secrets that surface could be the key to reuniting X and Zoe… or they could mean the destruction of everything they have been fighting for.

My Review
So many great lines! Pretty much any section told from Zoe’s point-of-view is packed with fantastic side comments and banter between her and her friends. X’s sections aren’t quite as peppery, but I loved the Ukrainian for all his snarky one liners.

So much heart. The Brink of Darkness is, above all else, a story about true love. Both the love between X and Zoe and love of family—birth family, and family you make for yourself.

I struggled with the amount of violence portrayed in this book. Some scenes show graphic torture and reference some pretty horrible events. If I didn’t like the other elements of the story so much, I don’t think I could have finished it. Even though I did, this probably isn’t a good choice for sensitive readers. If I had known how much was in the book, I probably wouldn’t have tried to review it.

Which isn’t to say I’m sorry I read it. I don’t know. I’m really torn. I really didn’t like the amount of violence, but I am a total sucker for a book with great banter and such fun characters. I’m glad it had that quality. See my comments below for additional notes on content.

Recommended for Ages 16 up.

Cultural Elements
Zoe’s best friend Val is a lesbian. Zoe’s family members are vegans.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Infrequent use of strong profanity. One odd thing about the book is the lowercase use of “god” throughout the whole story, even when spoken by a priest.

Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing between man and woman. References to sex, but no description. (Two people lie down in a boat together. They remove shirts and then the scene cuts away from them.)

Spiritual Content
The Lowlands (sort of like Hell) is a place where people who’ve committed heinous acts find themselves in the afterlife. It’s governed by lords who have some supernatural powers, but are themselves dead humans. Several characters reference a Higher Power (capitalized in the story) who is ultimately in charge, but only intervenes in the direst situations.

I found it odd that the story uses a lowercase for God versus uppercase for the Higher Power of the Lowlands.

Violent Content
So. Much.

Several scenes show torture in pretty graphic detail. The methods used to punish inhabitants of the Lowlands are pretty harsh. This is not one for sensitive readers. I had a really hard time with some of the descriptions and skimmed over a couple passages. At one point X is under the governance of a woman who thrives on torturing others. That part was too much for me.

Drug Content
None.

Note: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.