A breezy, funny, and profound tale about death and new beginnings.
In this debut novel, a man in the hereafter must decide how he will live his next life.
Thirty-something American Scott Stillman finds himself in the afterlife, though details of his death are initially hazy. The realm is not unlike a giant airport terminal, as people decide if they’ll stay or live another life on Earth. But Scott is a “direct return”—his unnatural death means he must go back to the planet. He can purchase a new body and such traits as artistic talent and IQ points using the “monetary award” he’s earned during his latest lifetime. This doesn’t give Scott much of a budget, so he’ll have to choose wisely. Amazingly, he spots people he knows in the hereafter—his recently deceased and overbearing father, Mort, and Scott’s ex-girlfriend Allison Newhart, who’s also a direct return. Scott’s on-again, off-again relationship with Allison is back on, and the two plan to reunite in their ensuing lives. But Scott has a devastating secret that he’s afraid to tell Allison. He may have to make amends, even with Mort, before his departure. Alexander’s amusing afterlife tale comes with numerous guidelines. There are, for example, different levels in the hereafter, and a worthy soul will “graduate” to the next. Scott befriends, Buddy Shanken, a Level 8 who is the novel’s most endearing character. The vibrant story’s short chapters include snippets of a popular hereafter guidebook that entertainingly elucidates the “rules” and provides tips. Along with dry humor and a charmingly sardonic Mort, the tale offers intriguing insights into these characters, who examine their lives, past and future. Scott, who blames his misfortune on everyone except himself, soon has regrets over things he’s done. Eventually, the cast members choose which traits will afford them happiness, from physical beauty to something that can make others joyful. The ending, while predictable, delivers a memorable wrap-up.
A breezy, funny, and profound tale about death and new beginnings.Pub Date: April 28, 2022
ISBN: 979-8-44965-389-5
Page Count: 186
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.
Using mystery and romance elements in a nonlinear narrative, SenLinYu’s debut is a doorstopper of a fantasy that follows a woman with missing memories as she navigates through a war-torn realm in search of herself.
Helena Marino is a talented young healer living in Paladia—the “Shining City”—who has been thrust into a brutal war against an all-powerful necromancer and his army of Undying, loyal henchmen with immortal bodies, and necrothralls, reanimated automatons. When Helena is awakened from stasis, a prisoner of the necromancer’s forces, she has no idea how long she has been incarcerated—or the status of the war. She soon finds herself a personal prisoner of Kaine Ferron, the High Necromancer’s “monster” psychopath who has sadistically killed hundreds for his master. Ordered to recover Helena’s buried memories by any means necessary, the two polar opposites—Helena and Kaine, healer and killer—end up discovering much more as they begin to understand each other through shared trauma. While necromancy is an oft-trod subject in fantasy novels, the author gives it a fresh feel—in large part because of their superb worldbuilding coupled with unforgettable imagery throughout: “[The necromancer] lay reclined upon a throne of bodies. Necrothralls, contorted and twisted together, their limbs transmuted and fused into a chair, moving in synchrony, rising and falling as they breathed in tandem, squeezing and releasing around him…[He] extended his decrepit right hand, overlarge with fingers jointed like spider legs.” Another noteworthy element is the complex dynamic between Helena and Kaine. To say that these two characters shared the gamut of intense emotions would be a vast understatement. Readers will come for the fantasy and stay for the romance.
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2025
ISBN: 9780593972700
Page Count: 1040
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.
A year in the life of the No. 2 boarding school in America—up from No. 19 last year!
Rumors of Hilderbrand’s retirement were greatly exaggerated, it turns out, since not only has she not gone out to pasture, she’s started over in high school, with her daughter Shelby Cunningham as co-author. As their delicious new book opens, it’s Move-In Day at Tiffin Academy, and Head of School Audre Robinson is warmly welcoming the returning and new students to the New England campus, the latter group including a rare midstream addition to the junior class. Brainiac Charley Hicks is transferring from public school in Maryland to a spot that opened up when one of the school’s most beloved students died by suicide the preceding year. She will be joining a large, diverse cast of adult and teenage characters—queen bees, jealous second-stringers, boozehounds young and old, secret lesbians, people chasing the wrong people chasing other wrong people—all of them royally screwed when an app called Zip Zap appears and starts blasting everyone’s secrets all over campus. How the heck…? Meanwhile, it seems so unlikely that Tiffin has jumped up to the No. 2 spot in the boarding-school rankings that a high-profile magazine launches an investigation, and even the head is worried that there may have been payola involved. The school has a reputation for being more social than academic, and this quality gets an exciting new exclamation point when the resident millionaire bad boy opens a high-style secret speakeasy for select juniors in a forgotten basement. It’s called Priorities. Exactly. One problem: Cinnamon Peters’ mysterious suicide hangs over the book in an odd way, especially since the note she left for her closest male friend is not to be opened for another year—and isn’t. This is surely a setup for a sequel, but it’s a bit frustrating here, and bobs sort of shallowly along amid the general high spirits.
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9780316567855
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
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