Blog Tour: Becoming Death

09:00

Becoming Death
By Melissa Brown

Summary:

Ever since her father's demise, Madison Clark knew death had her number. After losing her first job, she is ushered into the cryptic family business. Little does she know her family is hiding a dark secret; they are grim reapers, custodians of souls on their journey to the beyond. Madison expects her historic legacy to have benefits beyond immortality. What she doesn't expect is to still be struggling for cash while reaping souls on the side.

As if being Death's minion wasn't strenuous enough, Madison finds herself back at school with her worst enemy studying the ancient rules, methods and paperwork of her vocation. In a cascade of life changes: her best friend admits he’s in love with her and she starts a new job as a professional mourner, but she can’t help thinking her family might have other secrets.

Just when things are finally starting to feel normal again Death throws her a curveball: her next victim is her best friend. Madison must find a way to overcome the strict guidelines of being a grim reaper in order to save his life.

Information about the book

Title: Becoming Death

Author: Melissa Brown

Release Date: June 12th 2015

Genre: Paranormal YA

Publisher: Self-Published

Format: Paperback and E-book

Goodreads Link: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25512745-becoming-death?from_search=true&search_version=service

Amazon UK Link: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Becoming-Death-Melissa-Brown-ebook/dp/B00YHWBGD2

My review:

I enjoyed this book. It had a really cool concept - grim reapers and killing people with their mind, so I knew it had the potential to be a really original story. I was surprised at the direction the book took (it wasn’t as dark as I thought, and it took more of a realism / black humour direction), but I still liked it. It was really well written, and I was instantly hooked.

All of the characters were really likeable. I felt like they were all really well developed, and I actually cared about all of them. Madison (the protagonist) was really interesting to read about because she was realistic and relatable. I also really liked the strong group of women in the book (Madison’s family), which always makes me enjoy the book more.

I wasn’t a massive fan of the romance. Though it did grow on me, and though I did like it much more towards the end, I would have much preferred for Madison and Aaron to have stayed friends (the ending would still have worked anyway). It didn’t add much to the story (the romantic scenes weren’t my favourite), but by the end of the book, I quite liked them together.

There were lots of nice touched which really updated a traditional story. Grim reapers aren’t really modern, but original touches like having mobile apps to find targets made the story darkly funny. At first I feared they would become a little boring and cliche, but once I got into the story and used to them, I found them original and inventive.

The book was very short, so I found somethings to be a bit rushed. This meant it was fast paced, and never slow, but made me think that Madison and Aaron’s relationship was a little rushed. I think it could have made a great duology - this way, we would have got to see more development in their relationship. Also, I would have liked to see more of Madison’s grim reaper duties, which I found really interesting.

Overall, this is a short, light paranormal that many will enjoy. I would recommend to new fans of the genre because it’s not too creepy, and it’s not too heavy. It was well written, and had some perfectly executed (excuse the pun) black humour.

My rating:

About the author:

Melissa Brown an American author that lives in Norwich, England. She is a teacher in ICT skills, English and creative writing. In 2014, she was shortlisted for the IdeasTap Inspires: Writers' Centre Norwich Writing Competition and longlisted for the Nottingham Writers' Club's inaugural National Short Story Competition. She was also a featured poet at the Norwich: City of Stories launch event, where she did a live reading of her poem 'The Library.' She enjoys films, books, comics, fangirling and subscription boxes. She blames her love of the written word on her hometown library and fanfiction. She lives with her partner, Kris, and her awesome cat, Hailey.

Author Links

Website: https://melissarbrown.wordpress.com/

Twitter: http://twitter.com/MRBrown_author

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Melissa-Brown-author/515818468469866/

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/13956318.Melissa_Brown

Follow the tour:

Monday 17th August

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Tuesday 18th August

Elena Square Eyes

Wednesday 19th August

An Awful Lot of Reading