Piper Willow dies the summer after her high school graduation but she doesn’t make it to Heaven or Hell…instead she finds herself in a spiritual terminal called the Station. She’s given only two choices: Return to Earth as the subconscious for a person in need of some outside assistance, or move on and spend an eternity lost in her own sorrow and pain.
Does Piper have what it takes to save a life - to be the nagging voice inside someone else's head - or will she fail and end up lost and tormented in limbo...forever?
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MY THOUGHTS
I was pleasantly surprised by this book. I didn't love it, but the book takes a unique spin on the afterlife and it felt like a wonderful combination of the supernatural and contemporary.
After Piper is raped at a party and her best friend dies in a car accident (when Piper was behind the wheel), Piper feels like she has nothing left to live for. She commits suicide, but instead of it being the end, she ends up in an afterlife for those who committed suicide. These people are given a choice: They can be taken to a hellish limbo or they can go back to Earth as a Volunteer. A Volunteer enters the mind of a person who is thinking about suicide and tries to act as a conscious to help them find their love for living again. Piper isn't sure if she can do this, worried that she will fail, but it's an option she will take.
I haven't really seen very many paranormal books like this one. It encounters very tough subjects, such as sexual assault, suicide, grief, and guilt. I see topics like this all the time in contemporary, but such difficult subject matter does not always make its way into paranormal books. I especially have never seen this in independently published books. I really liked the fact that the book did not hesitate in discussing these topics. The afterlife (or The Station) did seem to take a back seat to the assignments (when Piper Volunteers to help those on Earth) through a lot of the text. Part of that could have just been the pacing of the book as the book is fairly short so some elements were sped up. I actually really liked the assignments, because they had a strong contemporary feel and I read more contemporary nowadays than paranormal. The assignments did feel a lot different from the rest of the book and were almost like short stories, but I really enjoyed seeing different lives and seeing how they tried to overcome their struggles.
One of the really great things about this book was that there was no romance! Sure, Piper watches come of her assignments strike up a relationship, but she doesn't. I loved that about this book because it allowed Piper to grow without a romantic relationship! Since as I am writing this review I have since read Book 2, I can say that, unfortunately, this changes in the next book.
IN CONCLUSION
Overall, I did like this book and it felt like a great start to a series. It tackled the afterlife in a new way and I loved the contemporary twist. It ends in a bit of a cliffhanger. Even though I saw the ending coming pretty early on in the book, it did make me want to immediately read the next book.
I hereby give this book
3.5 Stars
Meaning: I liked it, but it wasn't quite amazing.
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