Review: How to Save an Undead Life by Hailey Edwards

Posted October 9, 2020 by Holly in Reviews | 1 Comment

Review: How to Save an Undead Life by Hailey EdwardsReviewer: Holly
How to Save an Undead Life by Hailey Edwards
Series: Beginner's Guide to Necromancy #1
Also in this series: How to Claim an Undead Soul , How to Break an Undead Heart , How to Dance an Undead Waltz , How to Live an Undead Lie , How to Wake an Undead City
Publisher: Self-Published
Publication Date: August 19, 2017
Format: eBook
Source: Kindle Unlimited
Point-of-View: First
Cliffhanger: View Spoiler »
Content Warning: View Spoiler »
Genres: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 234
Add It: Goodreads
Reading Challenges: Holly's 2020 Goodreads Challenge, Holly's 2020 Reading Challenge
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Ripped Bodice | Google Play Books
three-half-stars
Series Rating: four-stars

Grier Woolworth spends her nights weaving spooky tales of lost souls and tragedies for tourists on the streets of downtown Savannah. Hoop skirt and parasol aside, it's not a bad gig. The pay is crap, but the tips keep the lights on in her personal haunted mansion and her pantry stocked with ramen.

Life is about as normal as it gets for an ex-necromancer hiding among humans. Until the society that excommunicated Grier offers her a second chance at being more than ordinary. Too bad no one warned her the trouble with being extraordinary is it can get you killed.

Warning: This book contains one ex-con/ex-heiress with a pet zombie parakeet who lives next door to her ex-army/ex-crush. Brace yourselves, we're talking more exes than a pirate treasure map here.

How to Save an Undead Life by Hailey Edwards is book one of the Beginner’s Guide to Necromancy series. I’ve read a few books in the Foundling series and enjoyed them, but not as much as this book.

Grier Woolworth is trying to put herself back together after being imprisoned for five years for a murder she’s pretty sure she didn’t commit. Her unexpected release was such a shock she didn’t look too closely at it, until a strange vampire shows up and offers her an alliance. When more strange things begin happening, Grier starts to wonder what really happened the night her guardian was murdered, and why she’s suddenly a hot commodity.

Grier was such a standup character. I loved how determined she was to put the pieces of herself back together. She’d only been out of prison – where she was in solitary confinement and drugged for the majority of her sentence – a few months, and she was still coming out of the fog and dealing with the shock of her unexpected freedom. I liked that she did what she could to move forward, but still acknowledged she had a long way to go. She’s had a crush on her best friend’s brother, Boaz, since she was a girl, and suddenly he’s back in her life as well. Their dynamic was interesting. Grier isn’t the same girl she was when she went away, and Boaz has a hard time recognizing that. It was also interesting to see her friendship with Amelie, Boaz’s sister, change.

About 3/4 of the way through the book something happens that kind of sets Grier back a bit. I’ll be honest, I didn’t love that part of the book. It went on for longer than it needed to for this reader. View Spoiler »

I’m really looking forward to the rest of the series. There was a lot of humor in this book despite the dark themes, and I found the reading experience to be very balanced and emotional at the same time.

Rating: 3.75 out of 5

Beginner’s Guide to Necromancy

three-half-stars


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One response to “Review: How to Save an Undead Life by Hailey Edwards

  1. Kareni

    I should give this a try (bonus in that I already own the book!). Thanks for your review, Holly.

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