She's Got Books on Her Mind

Aiden Grant is dead. But, he still walks the earth. He's able to walk the earth still because when he died he held on to his regret which made him a grim reaper. He brags that he's a pretty good one too. Then he gets his next assignment from his "mentor" Abraham Lincoln, and it's Bee. Bee, the girl he once looked at with eyes full of love. Now he has to take her soul. He's resolved to do his job but when he tries to take her soul away she flat out surprises him by fighting him off. She actually speaks to him because for some reason she can see him. It's a race to discover how she's able to see grim reapers and what her other powers have to do with her history. This needs to be done by the seven day time limit when Aiden has to take her soul away. If not Aiden gets in some trouble ... well some big trouble. He would get sent to hell if he messes this up.

The story gets a little more complicated than just the regret and wanting he has for the life he had and the life he could have had with Bee. Ancient grim reapers start to get involved and wreak havoc but before that it's just Aiden and Bee. The thing is that Bee doesn't know Aiden is her grim reaper because he keeps himself covered up. So there's this whole drama with that. Aiden has to act like someone who doesn't care about what he has to do. He puts on a false voice so Bee won't know who he is. Everything gets complicated when things get too personal. Of course nothing can get more personal than taking the soul away from the one you love.

With Aiden you can tell he's a nice guy who really cares about Bee and her family. His regret has to do with her and her family. The way he died has to do with a lot about her family particularly Bee's cousin who was his best friend. You do feel some of his emotions about his death. Sometimes I felt the story could be a little dramatic at points but other times I did feel truly sorry for what Aiden had to go through. I got a little bit emotional for him because when you really think about it Aiden died so young. He was robbed of his life. The book is even partly inspired by the "If I Die Young" song so no wonder this book got me a little emotional.

Bee was just awesome. She was really strong. I particularly liked her entrance to the story which started with a bang. I didn't expect her to be so different. I didn't expect her to be able to heal him the way she did. I guess it makes sense she would be unique. I kind of really wished she was normal. There are some times I didn't want this complicated part of her to be in the story. I just wanted to feel like I could connect with their situation a little more. Only in that it didn't really need that extra bit of paranormal for me to like this story. Saying that I did really enjoy the story. The characters were great. I loved that it was about grim reapers too. I think a lot of people will like that this book deals with death and grim reapers because it's such a big thing in YA. The addition of the ancients I thought was unnecessary though. Other than those couple of things I pointed out this was a nice, fun read. ( )

After reading the premise for this, I was hooked. Aiden who is a reaper with a deadly kiss, um yes please! I had to know why and how Bee played into all of this.

Aiden has held onto some heart-wrenching guilt, causing him to not move on after his death, thus becoming a reaper. Aiden is a sweey guy, did I really just say that. He’s a reaper, and a good one at that, but he does really have a sweet side. Bee is his new assignment, how can he reap the girl he loved before his death. Don’t envy him for that at all. Aiden’s world is turned all which ways when he learns her secret. I really enjoyed Bee, she was stubborn and one feisty girl and I like that she gave him a run for his money, never making it easy for him. They had a small romance that built along the way, and it a sweet one.

The world set before us was interesting, with a river of souls and the reapers mode of transportation being gondolas. And the Abe Lincoln being the head reaper was a fantastic twist to this. And Bee’s brother Jaleb was awesome, he cares for his sister so much and is so protective, I just adored him. Action wasn’t missing that’s for sure, with people after Bee and her new found ability and ancestry, there was never a dull moment. The ending was one that I thought I had figured out, but nope, I didn’t so I can’t wait for the next book.

It has what I would call star crossed lovers, that have a genuine and endearing romance, it has sacrifice and little bit of a twist to the whole how a reaper becomes a reaper and what happen in their lives after. This kinda surprised me in a good way, it was different, and I like that. I think fans of reapers will love this, I know I did. ( )

Small press and self-published books are not usually books I work with. There has been a lot of drama in the blogging community with small press/self-pubbed authors, and I try to avoid it. But I couldn't pass up on Deadly Kisses after reading the synopsis. Poor President Lincoln has been used and abused a LOT in recent titles, but in this instance it was a lot of fun without being disrespectful. I was also a big fan of the overall quirkiness of the plot and world Cuevas built, so as soon as the book arrived in the mail, I started reading.

There were a lot of things I liked about Deadly Kisses, and I want to get to those before I get to the negative portion of this review. First and foremost, I loved the world that Cuevas created. I loved the Grim Reaper lifestyle - the gondolas and the river of souls, the Grim Reaper night clubs (I mean, they even have drugs that stop the decomposition process), the fact that they use CELL PHONES to communicate. I loved the idea of bargaining with demons and possibly losing your soul because of it. And even with that part - the part about Hell, and trying to outsmart the Devil himself - this book never got too dark or lost its upbeat voice.

And I did love Ad's voice. He was sarcastic and smart-assed and had a self-deprecating sense of humor. He was so typically a teenaged boy, even if he was a Grim Reaper. I loved that even though he was obviously attractive, he never let it get to his head and he never acted like he was better than anyone else. And when it came to Bee, he never thought she was stupid and naive (even when she was being stupid and naive.)

The parts where the book fell flat for me were in the writing. Oftentimes, the author would use the wrong words (for instance, "sock draw" instead of "sock drawer.") There was a lot of confusion, especially in the beginning, where I felt like I was missing sentences, and I never knew who was talking until halfway through the conversation. And speaking of dialog - a lot of it was choppy, and just weird.

"Just like my song that Mad Dogs played 'The Truth Will Set You Free'."

Or

"Just because you're smart as a whip and home schooled doesn't mean you can't do the work."

A lot of the dialog between Bee and her family members just came off as really cheesy and even a bit on the 7th Heaven side.

I really liked the ending, though. I love that you can tell there could be a sequel coming, but it doesn't feel cut off. There is character growth in all the characters (even Ad's and Abe's relationship grows stronger). There is a definite resolution, which is refreshing because so many times it seems like the author and editor just picked an arbitrary spot in the manuscript and decided they were done for the day.

In all, this was a quick fun read. There were some problems with the writing, which did kind of jar me out of the story a lot. But I did enjoy the mythology and world-building, and the plot was fast-paced and engaging. Definitely a recommended read for lovers of clean urban fantasy. ( )

Small press and self-published books are not usually books I work with. There has been a lot of drama in the blogging community with small press/self-pubbed authors, and I try to avoid it. But I couldn't pass up on Deadly Kisses after reading the synopsis. Poor President Lincoln has been used and abused a LOT in recent titles, but in this instance it was a lot of fun without being disrespectful. I was also a big fan of the overall quirkiness of the plot and world Cuevas built, so as soon as the book arrived in the mail, I started reading.

There were a lot of things I liked about Deadly Kisses, and I want to get to those before I get to the negative portion of this review. First and foremost, I loved the world that Cuevas created. I loved the Grim Reaper lifestyle - the gondolas and the river of souls, the Grim Reaper night clubs (I mean, they even have drugs that stop the decomposition process), the fact that they use CELL PHONES to communicate. I loved the idea of bargaining with demons and possibly losing your soul because of it. And even with that part - the part about Hell, and trying to outsmart the Devil himself - this book never got too dark or lost its upbeat voice.

And I did love Ad's voice. He was sarcastic and smart-assed and had a self-deprecating sense of humor. He was so typically a teenaged boy, even if he was a Grim Reaper. I loved that even though he was obviously attractive, he never let it get to his head and he never acted like he was better than anyone else. And when it came to Bee, he never thought she was stupid and naive (even when she was being stupid and naive.)

The parts where the book fell flat for me were in the writing. Oftentimes, the author would use the wrong words (for instance, "sock draw" instead of "sock drawer.") There was a lot of confusion, especially in the beginning, where I felt like I was missing sentences, and I never knew who was talking until halfway through the conversation. And speaking of dialog - a lot of it was choppy, and just weird.

"Just like my song that Mad Dogs played 'The Truth Will Set You Free'."

Or

"Just because you're smart as a whip and home schooled doesn't mean you can't do the work."

A lot of the dialog between Bee and her family members just came off as really cheesy and even a bit on the 7th Heaven side.

I really liked the ending, though. I love that you can tell there could be a sequel coming, but it doesn't feel cut off. There is character growth in all the characters (even Ad's and Abe's relationship grows stronger). There is a definite resolution, which is refreshing because so many times it seems like the author and editor just picked an arbitrary spot in the manuscript and decided they were done for the day.

In all, this was a quick fun read. There were some problems with the writing, which did kind of jar me out of the story a lot. But I did enjoy the mythology and world-building, and the plot was fast-paced and engaging. Definitely a recommended read for lovers of clean urban fantasy. ( )

Dying with regrets and not being able to let go of them is how someone becomes a grim reaper. At seventeen, Aiden became a grim reaper because he was full of regret and guilt for the accident that caused his death and that of his best friend, Sabrina, who is also Bee’s cousin. He was content enough to go on with his afterlife as a grim reaper (or rather a Reaperling in training) until he was “tested” with an assignment to reap the girl he loved in life, albeit an unrequited love. The reaping doesn’t go quite as planned and creates a dilemma that Aiden has to fix while also dealing with some ancient grim reapers who are after Bee. Aiden is willing to sacrifice anything to save Bee. I liked Aiden from the start. He had a vulnerable side that makes you want to pick him up and just hug him like a sad puppy, but at six-feet tall that might be a bit awkward ;)

Aiden--or Ad as he is known in his afterlife--works for Abe (as in Abe Lincoln). Abe doesn’t play as big a role in this story as I expected. I thought he would be a more quirky character who constantly was giving Aiden history lessons as alluded to in the blurb. This was only given limited attention. He pops in occasionally but I don’t think he added much to the overall story. A slightly deeper meaning to his role becomes evident later in the book, but I felt he could have been a much more interesting character and more involved in the plot. I also wasn’t crazy about his dialogue. It felt very stilted and part of that may be an intentional reflection on the era he lived in but it felt forced. I just didn’t really like Abe very much.

As for Aiden’s love interest, I was a little meh about Bee at first but she kind of grew on me. She definitely has some spunk and knows what she wants. I thought it was odd at first that she was never really too perturbed about all the grim reaper stuff until her own secrets are revealed, then it makes a little more sense. As the story progresses, more and more secrets about Bee's family and the town's history are revealed as well.

Bee and Aiden have a sweet romance. Aiden gets a second chance at love in his afterlife, but when you can't kiss someone without reaping them, it does create a dilemma. You could say that there was an HEA as boy does get girl in the end but this story is not neatly wrapped up and there is an overarching story being set up in this book. Story threads that I had expected to be resolved by the end are clearly left open to be picked up in the next book, Kiss From the Grave.

There were a few things I had an issue with in this book. Dialogue didn’t always suit me and didn’t seem to flow well at times. There were a couple of instances where there seemed to be some editing blips and there were also quite a few instances where things weren’t clear or didn’t make sense to me, leading me to ask myself why did that happen? Why would he say that? What does that mean? How did she know that? Wait, is he “nekkid” under that cloak? (heh, heh…just checking if you were paying attention. But seriously, I think he was).

I like grim reaper themes and so this story sounded interesting to me and I liked the cover art. It had some elements that reminded me a little bit of the short-lived TV series, Dead Like Me. The story started off good then went to just okay but then turned around again and suddenly got more interesting. At first I wasn’t that compelled to get back to it when I put it down but the more I read it the more it engaged me as the layers started peeling away and the plot became more interesting. When I think back on the story I remember the things I liked more than the things I didn’t like. Would I read the next book? Yeah, actually I would. I am interested in knowing where the story goes and what happens to Aiden, Bee, and even her brother Jaleb, who comes into the latter part of the story.

This story is told in first person from Aiden’s POV. It has characteristics of both Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance so I feel it falls a little on both sides of the fence.

Quick Quotes:

“She had my heart long before I knew I had to reap her. But having her close to me and not being able to kiss her was my personal hell.”

~~~

"And I want you. We want what we want. The heart has its own agenda.”

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