REVIEW! The Everafter.

The Everafter
Amy Huntley



FROM THE COVER:

Madison Stanton doesn’t know where she is or how she got there. But she does know this – she is dead. And alone, in a vast, dark space. The only company she has in this place are luminescent objects that turn out to be all the things Maddy lost while she was alive. And soon she discovers that with these artifacts, she can reexperience – and sometimes even change – moments from her life.

Her first kiss.

A trip to Disney World.

Her sister’s wedding.

A disastrous sleepover.
In reliving these moments, Maddy learns illuminating and sometimes frightening truths about her life – and death.


My rating: 4 stars.


MY THOUGHTS:

The Everafter is a nice, solid novel; it gives and it takes. It provides a unique outlook on death and what one can do while dead. Usually common objects have meaning for the living, but Huntley transfers that concept to Maddy in her state of limbo, which made for a more interesting read. Because the objects are common, and because Maddy cannot always access the memories they unlock, you can’t help but want to know what special meaning(s) they could possibly hold over her life and death.

Yet, while Maddy is able to connect with her former life, I was unable to fully connect to her – and the other characters – not because she’s unlikeable, but because she’s as transparent as the void she lives in. She and the rest of the characters, including her boyfriend and best friend, seem rather underdeveloped. The story caters more to the plot.

By the end, things fall into place much more quickly than I expected, thereby becoming predictable. But again, it’s a solid story: different, interesting, nice. The good manages to outshine the bad.