Prompt 41 – A sticker on the front

This is one of the prompts that I had left blank thinking that I would inevitably find something I wanted to read with a sticker on the front. And, no surprises, I snagged a copy of The Dead Romantics at a book swap which still had its original Waterstones sticker on. I’ve taken it off as I hate stickers in books!

What it’s about?

Florence Day is the ghostwriter for one of the most prolific romance authors in the industry, and she has a problem—after a terrible breakup, she no longer believes in love. It’s as good as dead.

When her new editor, a too-handsome mountain of a man, won’t give her an extension on her book deadline, Florence prepares to kiss her career goodbye. But then she gets a phone call she never wanted to receive, and she must return home for the first time in a decade to help her family bury her beloved father.

For ten years, she’s run from the town that never understood her, and even though she misses the sound of a warm Southern night and her eccentric, loving family and their funeral parlor, she can’t bring herself to stay. Even with her father gone, it feels like nothing in this town has changed. And she hates it.

Until she finds a ghost standing at the funeral parlor’s front door, just as broad and infuriatingly handsome as ever, and he’s just as confused about why he’s there as she is.

Romance is most certainly dead… but so is her new editor, and his unfinished business will have her second-guessing everything she’s ever known about love stories.

A disillusioned millennial ghostwriter who, quite literally, has some ghosts of her own, has to find her way back home in this sparkling adult debut from national bestselling author Ashley Poston.

What I think:

I loved this book!

It’s warm and witty and full of love.

Florence is such an endearing character. After a terrible break up with a dastardly ex, she is broken hearted and has lost her romance writing mojo. With a deadline looming and a new editor the pressure is on.

The death of her father means she has to return to her home town, where her family runs the local funeral parlour. Florence has to revisit the metaphorical ghosts of the past and the literal ghosts of the present.

She learns about life and love, faces her doubts and fears and begins to mend her broken heart. There’s lots of chemistry between her and Benji which is only increased by the fact that they can’t touch each other and can never be together

I love the stories about Florence’s parents and the way that her relationship with her father emerges. They share the gift of being able to see the dead, but while  Florence has run from it, her father embraces it and uses it as a way to help people.

This was thoroughly enjoyable and perfect romantic escapism. I really liked the characters and did not see how it was going to end happily for Florence. This is one of my favourite reads of the year so far.