"Velveteen" is a darkly comedic journey into the afterlife, where protagonist Velveteen Monroe navigates Purgatory with a wicked sense of humor and a sharp tongue. Daniel Marks crafts a macabre yet compelling world filled with intriguing characters and unexpected twists. Velveteen's relentless pursuit of justice, coupled with her unconventional methods and raunchy humor, makes for a refreshingly unconventional YA read. Despite occasional pacing issues, the story's dark atmosphere and witty dialogue keep readers engaged. With its blend of fantasy, horror, and humor, "Velveteen" offers a unique and entertaining twist on the afterlife narrative.

At the outset, "Velveteen" seems incredible: the promise of a dark and morbid revenge tale from the perspective of a murdered girl's ghost, who has the ability to travel between purgatory and earth. Though the concept of "Velveteen" is great, the world-building of purgatory as a city is interesting, and the love interest is extremely charming, this story unfortunately falls flat due to choppy writing, too much exposition, and not enough of a revenge plot. I was ready to love this and ultimately was let down.

I won't be able to leave a review for this book; I requested it in a past lifetime of my NetGalley use (about ten years ago!) and it no longer fits with my reading interests. If I ever do end up reading it I'll come back and update this!

I loved the world building in this book.
Daniel Marks brings new life to a story about revenge and purgatory. This was a great book, and I was super happy I got a chance to read it.

This book had a lot of hype, but I just couldn't get into it. It felt fairly dark, but maybe my mood played a part. I know a lot of readers loved this one.

Daniel Marks' unique worldbuilding is visceral and immediately draws the reader into this mashup of horror and thriller. Part revenge story, part ghost story, this one is a win from Marks.

Good cover, decent idea, somewhat mundane plotlines. Serial killers and ghosts and vengeful girls should make for a bloody (pun!) good time but this is just condescending. The characters have such little brains, the plot moves be convenience and the bad guy is so obvious I don't know how this story lasted more than 150 pages. An entire book of boring nonsense.

DNF. Got a couple of chapters in and couldn't deal with the level of bitterness and anger coming off of Velvet, so I decided to stop reading.

I mean, I get why she's that way, but I don't remember why I requested to read this book. Did I read the summary beforehand? Maybe it was during my 'demons' phase.

Requested and read this book back in 2012 but never got around to posting review on blog and now don't recall it enough to leave an accurate review.

While I was excited for a murder-mystery with a paranormal twist, I did not enjoy the worldbuilding or direction that the plot took.

This book just wasn't for me. DNF so no review is currently posted.

Thank you for providing me the review copy.

DNF. What in the world? The reality of this book and the blurb are very different from one another. I don't like the MC, and it all feels very forced and stereotypical. Add in an uninteresting love interest, insta-love, and lots of irrelevant passages to skim and this was a mess.

THis book was incredible from the very first chapter! It was so much more than I thought it would be going in, and it suprised me in the best way. It wasn't your typical teenage murder mystery. It was dark, and creepy, in all the right ways! Highly recommend this one and look forward to more from this author!

Sorry, requested but did not get around to reading.

I wanted to love this book and the beginning was fantasticly creepy but then didn't really hold up to the promise of the premise. It was less horror and more romance, with horror elements.