- Published on
- Shalini
- in Book Posts, Book Reviews, Digital Reads Media, Digital Reads PR, Digital Reads Reviews, Fiction
Publication Date: June 2022
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Blurb
Florence Day is the ghostwriter for one of the most prolific romance authors in the industry, and she has a problem—after a terrible breakup, she no longer believes in love. It’s as good as dead.
When her new editor, a too-handsome mountain of a man, won’t give her an extension on her book deadline, Florence prepares to kiss her career goodbye. But then she gets a phone call she never wanted to receive, and she must return home for the first time in a decade to help her family bury her beloved father.
For ten years, she’s run from the town that never understood her, and even though she misses the sound of a warm Southern night and her eccentric, loving family and their funeral parlor, she can’t bring herself to stay. Even with her father gone, it feels like nothing in this town has changed. And she hates it.
Until she finds a ghost standing at the funeral parlor’s front door, just as broad and infuriatingly handsome as ever, and he’s just as confused about why he’s there as she is.
Romance is most certainly dead . . . but so is her new editor, and his unfinished business will have her second-guessing everything she’s ever known about love stories.
My Review
What was it all about
The Dead Romantics was a love story, but not a typical romance, but the love that bound the hearts of the family and friends and soulmate.
Florence Day was the ghostwriter of bestselling romantic books, but she couldn’t write in the past one year since her breakup. Because she simply didn’t believe in love.
She returned home after ten years when her father died for his funeral. The Days had the best funeral home in town.
A protagonist who could see dead people, she got a shock of her life when she saw her new editor at the door. As a ghost.
The book was all about dealing with her losses, getting to know a new ‘dead’ love, and finding her path in life.
How it made me feel - The Good
I was quite excited at the idea of a protagonist who could see specters. But in the first few chapters she refused to acknowledge her gift.
I was more invested in the book from the second half when Florence opened up and showed me her emotions and bonded with her family.
The emotions of grief, pain, past memories, death of a loved one, family bond, and an unattainable love was all dealt in a poignant manner, laced with dollops of laughter.
The book was a good debut as some of the scenes made me cry. I liked how death was celebrated by this town, yet they were mean enough to drive the one with a special gift after she solved a child’s murder by talking with the ghost.
The Bad
I didn’t like the first half as I couldn’t connect with Florence. She was too fixated on herself. She didn’t even use her gift to help anyone. Until Benji appeared as a ghost.
I didn’t understand her reasons for staying away from her family for ten years, and then coming home on losing her dad. What a waste! What were those words of love when there was no action to show that love. She was selfish, who took her family for granted.
Benji was an okay character, not someone I would fall in love with. His plot-arc had been done up and easily guessable. I could feel their chemistry only later in the book. But it needed a shot of heat.
With a lot of quirky characters, if you let go of your sensibilities, there was a dog as a Mayor and innkeeper who served coke and rum and read books, sometimes it felt too much.
The Conclusion
Overall, it was still an enjoyable book, just not something I would hold on to and sigh and long for.
I downloaded the digital version of the book from an online retail, and this is my journey down its pages, straight from the heart. STRICTLY HONEST and UNBIASED.
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