Review: Undeadly by Michele Vail

Goodreads Summary:

The day I turned 16, my boyfriend-to-be died. I brought him back to life. Then things got a little weird...

Molly Bartolucci wants to blend in, date hottie Rick and keep her zombie-raising abilities on the down-low. Then the god Anubis chooses her to become a reaper—and she accidentally undoes the work of another reaper, Rath. Within days, she's shipped off to the Nekyia Academy, an elite boarding school that trains the best necromancers in the world. And her personal reaping tutor? Rath. 

Life at Nekyia has its plusses. Molly has her own personal ghoul, for one. Rick follows her there out of the blue, for another...except, there's something a little off about him. When students at the academy start to die and Rath disappears, Molly starts to wonder if anything is as it seems. Only one thing is certain—-Molly's got an undeadly knack for finding trouble....

Publication Date: November 20, 2012

This is one of the tougher books I’ve reviewed lately. I’m pretty sure I liked it, but a few things left me wanting more. It was also one of the first YA books I’ve read in a long time that felt very young to me and lacked the crossover appeal of other novels in the genre.

What I Liked: Molly was a good protagonist. She wasn’t the typical Mary Sue and I liked her spunky side. She was outspoken and toughened up as the story progressed. The early scenes were fun to read with her family and she had some laugh out loud lines.

The world building was probably the best part of the book. I liked how necromancy, reaping and Egyptian god worship was a normal part of modern society. Although the first few chapters had a lot of information dumping, it was still interesting to read about.

The imagery was also well done in the book. Some of the descriptions reminded me of a B-movie about zombies. The scenes with the ghosts and the zombies were over-the-top, but in a fun way.

What I Didn’t Like: The slang was too much. If Molly said “Whatevs” one more time I felt like I was going to do harm to my Kindle. The dialogue wasn’t only full of slang, but the narrative as well. At first it didn’t bother me, but by the end it was overkill.

I didn’t feel like there was enough progression in the book. The ending felt rushed and left too many open ends. The romance was pretty much non-existent and I wanted more character development for Rick and Rath.

I would probably give the second book a try. I didn’t love the book, but a lot of the elements were unique enough that I think there’s potential in the series.

Rating: 3.5/5 Stars

Thanks to the publisher for a copy of Undeadly for review!