Bumpy Oak Books

** I was provided with an electronic ARC from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for honest review.**

Actual rating: 3.5 stars

Ava Morgyn’s debut novel, Resurrection Girls, is a hard-hitting novel of grief and all that comes with it. Our main character, Olivia, has had her world ripped apart by the accidental drowning death of her three-year-old brother Robby. When a new family moves into the house across the street, Olivia meets Kara, who is the first person to have an impact in dragging Olivia out of isolation since the event.

I expected this novel to be more fantastical based on the synopsis, which reveals that there is a generational curse on Kara’s family, and the cover which suggests some kind of spookiness. However, this book swerves hard away from true fantasy and settles into the realm of magical realism. Even the magical realism parts of the novel aren’t nearly as prominent as the coming-of-age and coming out of grieving portions of the book.

While I realized that this book involved the death of a toddler, I did not realize that the entirety of the story would revolve so firmly around Robby’s death and the destruction it wrought on Olivia’s family. Coming from a family impacted by infant death, some of these scenes were particularly hard-hitting for me and I wish that there had been more of a warning about how integral to the story that death would be.

Morgyn’s writing style was one that flowed very naturally with the story, and I felt that it was easy to become invested in Olivia and her friends. I expected the plot to center more around the letters to serial killers, and while they were very important in the end, they weren’t nearly as much of a center point as I had thought.

Overall, I felt this book was a good first showing for Morgyn and I would definitely be willing to read whatever book she produces next.