#BookReview ‘Queen Of The Dead’ by Sarah Broadway

Speaking with the dead is nothing new for Lou. It’s a curse she’s learned to hide from everyone – sometimes even herself.

After running away from a past that took advantage of those abilities, Lou finally carves out a normal life for herself.

That is, until she receives a mysterious message from a ghost – the Veil is thinning – and a cult of necromancers infiltrates her small town.

In a race to discover and defeat her foe, Lou learns she’s not alone in the fight. She grudgingly leans on her allies but wonders who to trust. What’s more impossible is suddenly finding herself the romantic interest of a man who somehow isn’t afraid of all the dark, creepy things about her… but even he has secrets for her to discover.

Time is running out, and reality seems to be slipping away. To save her new life and the people she loves, Lou must learn to accept who she is and embrace her true abilities, no matter where they might take her.

Huge thanks to the team at Angry Robot Books for my gifted arc review copy of the forthcoming, ‘Queen Of The Dead’ by Sarah Broadway, which is due to grace bookshelves from November 25th.

It is a fantastic read, with echoes of the early Anita Blake novels, and I mean that sincerely as a compliment.

Lou appears to have things worked out-she doesn’t use anything technological, because the ghost energy interrupts them and causes them not to work, walks certain places -and not others-due to overwhelming ghost energy, and has established relationships with some of them.

There is a little boy with a sinister, Damien from the Omen presence, called Tom-Tom,Mrs Hammond, constantly disapproving of ‘modern young women’, and fond of abruptly yanking Lou out of her sleep and into her graveyard who immediately stole my heart.

Lou works in a shop, at night, in order to avoid lots of tech and potentially dangerous situations with the undead, who sense Lou like a ship to a lighthouse, and seems to have it all together. She has a home, a best friend named Mortie who is aware of her gift for seeing, and speaking with the dead, and uses it to help him piece together the stories of those in the graveyard , where he undertakes a lot of grace rubbing.

He looks after herm, and vice versa, their small social circle existing quite peacefully until a malevolent spirit crosses the Veil to bring her into a realm of darkness.

As Lou and Mortie try to establish just what is happening, she finds the ghosts she is accustomed to seeing are behaving in increasingly strange ways, warning her that something dark and terrible is coming.

The control she had over when and where she can go is increasingly wary, she is being pulled from pillar to post with no idea why, or where this will end up being other than the spirits are in danger.

Hooded, cloaked men are chasing her, the places she thought were safe , no longer are, and her small group of allies-Mortie, Zelda the cat, Cliff, her manager at the Piggly Wiggly, Vick, Scott the policeman who rescues her bike after it is stolen -are in dire need of her to stand her ground and fight back.

What she took for an annoying quirk of character that means she has to ride a bike rather than drive a care, means she has to avoid the lake in the local park as the ghost there wants to drown her, all of the little things are actually a pretty big deal. And the fate of the world kind of depends on her not running any longer.

I genuinely loved the attention which was paid to the supporting characters, the arc that Lou has to go through to become herself, and the fierceness with which she fights for her friends.

Lou is a character who hits the ground running, and this first volume sets the stage for a hopefully long lasting series which will only grow in the ability to transport you to a completely different world.

It is dark, genuinely scary in parts and so full of heart and hope , and I loved it!

Sarah Broadway works as a news producer at a TV station in Alabama. Sarah’s passion for storytelling has her delving into the fictional world during her free time. She writes in several different genres, though it’s always contemporary fantasy and the paranormal that feels the most like home. When she’s not writing, Sarah can be found knitting, crocheting, or spending time outdoors surrounded by nature.

Links-https://sarahbroadway.com/