I'd call this horror lite. It was creepy-ish but overall, I was underwhelmed. This is a case where I definitely should have stopped reading before the end in fairness to the author but I wanted to see if I was right about the "twist."

I tried my best to finish this, I really did. Unfortunately the problem here for me is the narrator, and the simple wattpad style of explaining every little tiny detail unnecessarily. If you told me the author was in high school I'd believe it. A fairly interesting premise, though, just poorly executed.

here lies olive — kate anderson
pub: 24 oct

sixteen-year-old olive, two years after a near-death experience involving shellfish, fears there might be Nothing after death. with this fear, she keeps people at a distance, believing that relationships inevitably only end in sorrow.

in her quest to learn about the afterlife, she summons jay, a hitchhiker ghost trapped in the woods for over a century, and agrees to help find his unmarked grave and let him rest. but when mysterious attacks in the woods start targeting olive's classmates, she teams up with her maybe-nemesis, possibly-crush maren, her ex-best friend davis, and the suspicious new girl vanessa, to save jay from becoming a "shade."

while i did like the atmospheric writing, most of my issues are with the characters and their development, especially olive. i thought her a bit shallow at times, and then she would very suddenly arrive to the right conclusions, even about her romantic interest in maren. the plot wasn't entirely predictable but I'd have expected a little more mystery~ with how it was set up. i think the presentation of a mature (taboo, even) subject of death and the grief and depression it comes with was handled well to appeal to a younger audience.

if you like YA horror or mystery, this is a good spooky fall read 👍

as always thank you to netgalley, the author, and publisher north star editions and flux!

In short, takes readers on an emotional rollercoaster through death, friendship, and the mysteries of the afterlife.

Olive Morana, our angst-ridden protagonist, is irresistibly relatable. After a near-death experience, she's haunted by the fear of a bleak afterlife, but her journey to uncover the truth is both heartwarming and spooky. The story unfolds in a quirky New Mexican town with a fascination for the supernatural, providing an ideal backdrop for Halloween enthusiasts.

Anderson crafts a captivating narrative that blends elements of ghost stories, mystery, and soul-searching. As Olive confronts her fears and unravels the secrets of her town, she rekindles lost friendships and discovers the unexpected beauty in life's imperfections.

While the romance may evolve at a slower pace than some would prefer, Olive's journey toward understanding death and embracing love is both tender and genuine.

This book is a delightful YA horror novel that embraces themes of friendship, found family, and the enigmatic realm beyond life. Perfect for Halloween reading, it will tug at your heartstrings and leave you pondering the mysteries of existence.

1/5 Stars

TL;DR - Long, overdrawn, and ultimately underwhelming. A one-dimensional protagonist who acts both too young and too old for her age, a nearly non-existent plot, and a laughably cliche and underwhelming conclusion. I should have stopped at like 30%, but it became a hate-read, and now I, too, want to find out if there’s an afterlife.

Big thanks to North Star Editions, Flux, and NetGalley for providing the ARC for this book in exchange for an honest review!

***Trigger warnings for: death, PTSD, death of a loved one, divorce, mentions of living in a sanitarium/asylum, mentions of murder, mentions of child sex trafficking, attempted murder, serious harm inflicted by a knife/blade, blood, and disability after violence.***

‘Here Lies Olive’ by Kate Anderson is a YA “horror” book that follows the story of Olive, a 16 year old who has a near-death experience and becomes obsessed with the possibility that there might not be an afterlife. She decides to summon a ghost to find out the truth, and everything goes awry from there. She has to navigate this haunting, as well as her own trauma, drama between friends, and her growing attraction to her lifelong rival, a girl named Meren.

Sounds cool, right? It’s not. It is, most assuredly, not.

(Spoiler, the only good thing about this book is that it features sapphic characters and a prominent guy-girl platonic friendship. That’s it, end of list.)

I straight up did not enjoy this book. As I said in the TL;DR, I should have stopped at ~30% when I realized that this book had all the emotional depth of spilled milk and all the subtlety of a stampeding elephant, but it morphed into a hate-read that I couldn’t put down because it was just so bad. I’m legitimately angry at this book for being so bad, and at myself for not sparing myself the migraine and the lost hours of my life.

I don’t even know where to begin, kind of like how this book doesn’t know where to stop. Everything is so laboriously over-explained, and so much is told instead of shown. Endless details about things that don’t matter and never-ending trivia about death-related things, none of which added anything but pages to the narrative. 100+ pages could have been shaved off of this if Olive and the author had just shut up. Purple prose to no end - there are a lot of lines where I asked myself, out loud, “What does that even mean?”, and nope, I still don’t know. So much melodrama and yet no discernible emotional depth.

And the repetition, y’all. The same basic ideas repeated over and over and over with just slightly varied wording. I get it, Olive is sad and afraid of death. Bad things are bad, everything’s her fault. Just beating us over the head with long-winded purple prose, telling us exactly how we should feel and exactly what’s going on with no room to breathe. All these “big emotional moments” are just the same stuff over and over in excruciatingly heavy-handed detail, that in no way seems either realistic or relatable. Just the author holding your hand and over-explaining like you’ve never felt a single emotion in your life and you desperately need three whole pages to deal with a single shallow outline of a feeling. This book actively gave me anxiety because of how much the author feels I need to know every single thought that goes through Olive’s head.

(From my notes: If I have to read the phrase “Maren effing Seymour” one more effing time, I will find out quickly if there’s an afterlife. And if I have to read one more description of bare, “spooky” trees, I will return from said afterlife and actively haunt the author for making me read it approximately seven billion times.)

Speaking of Olive. She is a one-dimensional cartoon caricature of a teenager, and yet, I do not believe for one second this girl is sixteen. She is entirely too self-aware to be realistic, and is, inexplicably, also dumb as a bag of rocks, and that’s being generous. She spends so much time psychoanalyzing everyone and knowing exactly why everyone does everything they do, knows all of their deep dark personal failings, can spot trauma and maladaptive coping mechanisms from a mile away, and yet…never once thinks maybe she’s the one who needs therapy for ACTUALLY DYING. She admits (laments, really, and repeatedly) that she’s “so broken” but never actually does anything to remedy that? No attempt at personal growth, no processing of the trauma she endured except in ham-fisted “revelations” that are apropos of nothing. No, no, don’t go to therapy, just get a girlfriend and all your trauma is gone! Her grandiose introspection sounds like a 30+ year old who’s had years of therapy to understand the trauma she went through, not a 16 year old with no mentioned psych help. I don’t think the words “therapy” or “mental health” are ever mentioned in this book, but I sure need to talk to my counselor after the psychological torture that was the experience of reading this.

(Olive’s also not like other girls, you see, because she’s a GOTH who wears DARK LIPSTICK and DOC MARTENS and is OBSESSED WITH DEATH…in the self-proclaimed “dark tourism capital of the United States” where literally everyone in town is obsessed with death. Yeah, okay, sure.)

Which brings me to her parents. They just willfully ignore that their daughter made a complete 180 in terms of personality and engagement in life after she was literally dead for five minutes, and they just go, “Oh, teenagers are so quirky!”. Like, the fuck? Girl is depressed and clearly has PTSD. Doesn’t do her homework, skips school, ghosts her lifelong best friend, yeah cool, all normal and not at all indicative of mental health issues. Not even after she witnesses the death of her adoptive grandmother do they try to get her some counseling. Olive literally breaks down and tells them about what happened when she died and how it affected her, and they’re just…completely and utterly shocked. They “didn’t think about what it meant for [her] emotionally”…excuse me? And then, yep, no therapy! A+ parenting, no notes.

(I can see why Olive is so stupid, her parents are clearly not possessed of any brains or common sense whatsoever.)

Plot, next to non-existent. Horror, none; supernatural elements, the bare minimum. Brains in these kids, definitely not a one. 35% of the book spent angsting about what’s going to happen to the ghost boy, and yet doing nothing at all to find the MacGuffin to avoid said fate. Obvious foreshadowing and plot twists, a clear progression of cause to effect, and Olive and her friends are just, completely bewildered and make the dumbest decisions possible. As other reviewers have said, this absolutely reads more like middle-grade than YA in terms of complexity (or lack thereof) and the simplicity of the writing. Except weirdly interspersed with the aforementioned late 20s therapy talk.

(Except I wouldn’t recommend this at all to actual teenagers because the mental health rep is just so bad. Not at all a good example for young people to draw from.)

The villain is obvious, and trite, and they even get an entire cliche villain monologue. Neat! And the entire climax is maybe five pages and, I shit you not, is resolved with the power of love. Pure garbage.

And then. AND THEN. The author has the gall to acknowledge the Navajo Nation in her author’s note when one of the only three BIPOC characters in this book (all three of whom are Navajo), ends up mind-controlled and violently assaulted by a white woman, which culminates in him almost dying and being permanently disabled by the attack. Not to mention Olive calling the land on which the haunted house is built a white character’s “ancestral land”, when earlier in the book, she acknowledges that the land was stolen from the Navajo and they were “pushed out”. Yeah, okay, sure. Everyone cares an awful lot about the dead white boy on the property, but no one bats an eye about the Native lives likely lost there. Writing such poor Native rep (and I struggle to call it even that) and then tossing a last-minute mention to the people she spent the book brutalizing and erasing the history of just does not sit well with me at all. I don't understand how this all got past her Navajo sensitivity reader, but hey, here we are.

Final Thoughts:

This could have been a really powerful story about trauma and depression and mortality and death, but instead it’s just a bloated, mediocre “love story” with a dash of nonsensical paranormal flavor. Deleting it off my Kindle and going to find that promised afterlife.

My thanks for the ARC goes to NetGalley and North Star Editions, Flux. I'm voluntarily leaving a review.

Genre: Paranormal, Horror
Age Group: Young adults
Representation: LGBTQ, different races (including indigenous people!), and the dead
Spice Level: Medium (sex mentioned but scenes are not on the page and kissing)
Language: High—there's about every work in the book here (nothing that they won't hear in high school)
Substance Use: Drinking

I loved how the themes of horror are immediately seen. We also know exactly what has caused Olive to feel worried about death and her goal to figure out what is on the other side.

This is a fast-paced novel that stays true to its beginning. There are paranormal elements throughout—and an intriguing mystery that must get solved.

This is not my preferred genre, so I don't know how the horror aspect lives up to YA horror, but I thought it was good. I also liked how it leaned into urban myths, and I liked the resolution—it was satisfying.

The only reason I'm marking it down one star is because of the language—yes, it's might be realistic, but I just don't enjoy reading it. I'd like to see more fiction that relies on the great writing than on language for the impact, and I feel like HERE LIES OLIVE is well-written and stands on its own.

I hope you enjoy this book too.

Happy (haunted) reading!

Absolutely loved how spooky and atmospheric 'Here Lies Olive' is. Had a great time reading this book, and I am definitely looking forward to more from this author!

Where do I even begin?! I mean, this kicked October off with a bang.

We’ve got our MC Olive, who has experienced a great deal of death in her young life. After a terrible allergic reaction, her heart stopped for a full 5 minutes before she was brought back to life. She also experienced an elderly woman she befriended pass away as she held her hand in her final moments.

These events only leave Olive feeling more alone and wanting to learn more about what happens when someone passes. So she decides to hold a seance in the most haunted house in town. In an attempt to reach her friend and finally have her questions answered, she awakens someone else in the process and starts a terrifying and gruesome chain of events.

This book is visceral, it’s haunting, and best of all, it’s got an ending no one saw coming. Could not recommend this book enough and will definitely be picking it up when it releases on 10/24/23.

Thank you to NetGalley for the arc in exchange for an honest review. I will be posting this same review to Goodreads as well.

Thank you to NetGalley and Flux for giving me an eARC of this title in exchange for an honest review!

Truthfully, I don’t have a lot of feedback to give on this title. There was nothing wrong with it, it was a perfectly fine book. But, despite being initially drawn in by the premise, I was let down by the plot. It was really just… fine. I wasn’t “wowed” and I wasn’t appalled, it was just perfectly okay.

It took me quite a bit to get through this book, for a number of reasons, but not the least of which was that I just wasn’t drawn in. I didn’t find the characters all that compelling, and therefore wasn’t all that interested in their journeys. Olive’s whole thing is that she’s trying to search for meaning in life after her brush with the Nothing waiting for us after death, but it honestly didn’t really feel that urgent or dramatic to me? Maybe it was because we were already two years out from her NDE, or that the book cements us so early on in a town where death is a common theme, but death and dying just really didn’t seem like a big deal— especially when there are so obviously ghosts.

I don’t know, this was a tough one for me. I definitely didn’t dislike it, but reading it kind of felt like trying to put together a puzzle made out of only middle pieces— it’s just not going to work.

An engaging YA tale perfect for spooky season! There are some serious topics discussed (death, trauma etc) but I believe in an age-appropriate way for the genre.

Fun book with lovely cover. I appreciate the sapphic romance and the themes of friendship, death, found family and more. I would like a little more character development. Looking forward to more from this author.

"Here Lies Olive" by Kate Anderson is a captivating and thought-provoking YA horror novel that masterfully explores themes of death, grief, and the afterlife.

The story revolves around Olive, a sixteen-year-old girl who has a deep fear of death, stemming from a near-death experience due to an allergic reaction. Living in a town known for its dark tourism, Olive feels disconnected from her peers and is afraid of forming deep connections because she believes that death will ultimately separate her from the people she loves.

However, Olive's life takes a supernatural turn when she summons a spirit named Jay, a hitchhiking ghost trapped in the woods behind her town's poorhouse. Olive agrees to help Jay find his unmarked grave in exchange for answers about death and the afterlife. As Olive gets more involved with Jay's quest, she discovers that her classmates are being targeted by someone or something sinister, and the attacks are becoming increasingly dangerous.

Kate Anderson's writing is both atmospheric and emotionally resonant. She skillfully explores Olive's complex emotions and fears, allowing readers to empathize with her struggle to confront death and the unknown. Olive's character is well-developed, and her personal growth throughout the story is believable and relatable.

The plot is filled with suspense, eerie supernatural elements, and a sense of foreboding that keeps readers engaged from beginning to end. The mystery surrounding Jay's death and the supernatural occurrences in Olive's town add layers of intrigue and tension to the narrative.

One of the strengths of the novel is its diverse and well-rounded cast of characters. Olive's relationships with her friends, including her complicated feelings for Maren, provide depth and authenticity to the story. The book also explores platonic and romantic love, mental health struggles, and the importance of facing one's fears.

"Here Lies Olive" is not just a horror novel; it's a story about confronting fears, embracing life, and the power of human connection. It beautifully balances the eerie and macabre with moments of warmth and humor.

In conclusion, "Here Lies Olive" is a haunting and emotionally charged YA horror novel that delves into deep existential questions while delivering a spine-tingling and suspenseful narrative. Kate Anderson's debut is a must-read for fans of atmospheric horror and coming-of-age stories with a supernatural twist.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an arc in exchange for an honest review. The following opinions are my own.

I love a good ghost story. It was quite cute and I enjoyed the flowery prose. Reminded me a bit of mediator in some small aspects.

Check out TheLesbianLife.com for more spoiler-free reviews :)

Olive should be totally cool with death. I mean her mom is a mortuary cosmetologist and her dad is a monumental mason. But after an allergic reaction caused her to see the other side, she’s been petrified of returning to the Nothing. She has cut off all ties with anyone she cares about to protect herself from total emotional devastation. Even her parents and now ex-best friend Davis. So when the closest thing she’s ever had to a grandma passes right in front of her, she must find out what’s waiting after death.

However, after summoning the mysterious ghost Jay who proves to be less help than she expected, her classmates start getting attacked. Olive must find his grave and help him pass to the other side with the aid of Davis, new girl Vanessa, and her enemy/potential love interest Maren before more people get hurt. While also confronting her own fears of death, life, and love. Unless Jay isn’t the one causing these attacks…

This book surprised the crap out of me! A cozy horror steeped with spooky thrills and ghostly chills. I was not expecting such a twisted and enthralling mystery. Usually, there is a trade-off between plot and character development in the YA genre. And I normally have a bone to pick with the overly simplistic and needly descriptive writing style. However, Here Lies Olive may have caused me to change my opinion on the genre as a whole.

The mystery of this plot, although somewhat predictable, kept me turning pages faster than I have in a long time. And even I didn’t see the plot twists at the very end coming. Yes, there were ghosts, witches, and a general sense of the macabre. But there were also themes of self-discovery, friendship, forgiveness, grief, and trauma. Done in a tasteful and not at all pandering way. Which is so rare for both YA and horror. I truly felt Olive’s trauma and fear over the Nothing.

Olive was such a fun and unexpected main character. I loved her retro goth vibes and dedication to protecting the people she cared about. Plus her journey of queer self-discovery was perfectly woven into the overall story. It never felt forced or heteronormative. And her pure as-heck friendship with Davis had me rooting for them the whole time.

Speaking of Davis, I was pleasantly surprised to see the amount of Navajo representation throughout the book. I appreciated that it was informative without being tokenistic. Davis and his family's Navajo roots and storyline were, again, tastefully woven in with the overall plot. Although I’m not indigenous myself, my girlfriend is Chippewa and gave her stamp of approval on Davis and his family.

All in all, if you’re in the mood for a ghost story with plenty of depth and twists I highly recommend this read. And don’t let the YA stamp sway you. I promise you’ll fly through this spooky mystery faster than you can say Halloween. Happy reading!

Thank you to NetGalley, Flux, and North Star Editions for sending this eARC for review consideration. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

4.75/5 stars

CW: Blood, bones, bullying, child death, death, depression, gore, hallucinations, murder, occult, PTSD, torture, violence.

This was a really cool concept. I enjoyed all the elements of supernatural stuff that were employed in the story. I wanted there to be a better flow to the actual plot though. The twist was maybe a little too obvious. Someone can only repeat a motion so many times before we KNOW it’s going to become a huge plot point.

Overall I was entertained, just not wowed.

Here Lies Olive
By: Kate Anderson

5 Stars

As an adult reader I'll admit that every now and then, I love to pick up a good YA book and just get lost in the story. This story not only met that mark, but bypassed it. A classic ghost needs saving storyline is matched with an awesome unique town and a great set of characters to make an amazing ghost story.

When Olive has a near death experience, it leaves her with a few questions. The main one being, "where do we go after we die?". With a group of unlikely friends, she finds herself on a journey to answer this question. Even if she has to summon a ghost to do it.

This story is full of action. It was so well written that it is easy to get lost in the story. The storyline itself was well done. It had elements of spook and romance (which I LOVED), while also being packed with danger and drama. The descriptions were also done amazingly well. I love to read a book and be able to feel the scene from descriptions. Those are always the best.

The one thing that surprised me about this book is how easy it was to relate. Olive is a young girl who had a bad experience. Now she focuses on death. I can relate. As I have gotten older, its easy to make that leap to your soon-to-be mortality and want to know what comes next. I know I do. Who doesn't?

Overall, this was a great story. Whether this book is read by an adult or a teen, I believe anyone who picks it up will love it. I know I did.

*I want to thank Netgalley and the Author for this book in return for my honest review*

Stormi Ellis
Boundless Book Reviews

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to review this book.

After Olive nearly died from an allergic reaction, she began pushing people away. Now, two years later, she's left feeling unmoored and is looking for answers. When a new girl decides to check out one of the town's legends, Olive goes along too, hoping to find a spirit that can answer her questions about what happens next. What she doesn't count on are all the ugly things that come after.

While I will say I found this book predictable (I called the ending from a mile away) it did have some good twists. It was engaging and a good spooky season book.

Here Lies Olive is a queer YA light horror novel that focuses a lot on grief and death, and also touches on things like the evils of 20th and early to mid-21st century “mental health care” and colonisation.

Olive died for five minutes, and all she saw when she was gone was what she calls the Nothing. There was nobody in the darkness, and all she felt was a sea of shadows and loneliness. Afterwards, she was determined to cut off everyone she loved, and wall herself off. But despite this, she ended up becoming friends with a woman from the local nursing home. And after she passes, Olive is determined to find out if the Nothing is what awaits everyone after they pass away.

So Olive ends up summoning a ghost so that she can ask them what exactly comes after death. But nothing goes right, and the ghost ends up being one who hasn’t passed on so has no idea what comes next after all. To help the ghost cross over, and therefore find out, Olive promises to help Jay find his unmarked grave in hopes he can give her a message once he passes on.

I really would have loved some more page time and development of Jay. He was a character with a lot of potential but I never felt like he was present enough to become a central character to the story. If the core group had spent more time with him I feel like readers would have really invested in Jay’s journey to crossing over, and the search for his unmarked grave. Instead, I felt like he was sidelined a lot, even though I had thought his story would be a large part of the book. And instead of caring about him and befriending him, Olive just got angry with Jay when bad stuff started happening and she assumed it was because of him.

Jay wasn’t the only thing lacking some development. I would have liked to see some more build up of the relationship between Olive and Maren because I think it could have been a really cute ship, but in the end I felt like it was a bit rushed, especially because Olive hadn’t even figured out she was gay until about two-thirds of the way through the book. It was still cute, don’t get me wrong, but I just would have liked it to be more fleshed out because the goth girl and the preppy girl is a cute ship!

On the other hand, I thought the conversational writing style was really engaging and reminded me of paranormal books from circa 2010, which have all but disappeared. This style makes it really easy to connect to the MC because it feels like they are having a chat with you personally. So I liked that a lot!

Another great thing was how fleshed out Davis, Olive’s best friend, was. He was very central to the story, and also had things going on in his life outside of what he was doing with Olive. His Navajo heritage was also central to his character, and I loved this. He was definitely not a cardboard cutout character who only served the main character.

Overall, I did enjoy Here Lies Olive. There were somethings that could have been improved and then I have a feeling I would have loved it. But as it was, I still liked it and it’s a perfect book for the spooky season – especially if you’re looking to dip your toes into the horror genre but don’t want to be keeping the lights on after you stop reading.

Olive was very much a teen, predictable, and kind of one dimensional. I feel like many things were used more for shixk value, or to try and incite a woke reaction, but those subjects were not used too much, just on surfaxe imo, which made this whole book not as enjoyable.

Thank you NetGalley and North Star Editions for the arc in exchange for an honest review.

Exploring grief, trauma, friendship and young relationships, this atmospheric coming of age novel is a great way to start the spooky season.

Please do check trigger warnings before reading!

Olive has faced death before. After an allergic reaction almost k!lled her, Olive has become obsessed, and terrified, with what comes next.

Summoning a spirit to find out from someone on the other side, Olive meets Jay. A hitchhiking ghost who is stuck in the woods near where he died, it's up to Olive to help him. Strange attacks have been happening in town on Scary Road, targeting students at Olive's school, and they're getting worse. Olive teams up with her ex-best friend, nemesis, and the new girl to help Jay's spirit before he becomes too dangerous.

This was a great debut, full of interesting characters and some good exploration of grief, death and what comes next, friendship and young relationships.

Olive's character development was great. She is grieving the loss of someone close to her, and this is compounded by her fear of what comes next, or lack-thereof. She is navigating her friendship with Davis, who she distanced herself from following her near-death experience, and some rather complex feelings for her nemesis, Maren. The narrative was full of great dialogue and teen angst.

Some of the plot/characters were a bit predictable, but this didn't take away from the enjoyment of the novel too much. This will be a great read for autumn/spooky season.

This book releases Tuesday October 24th 2023.
Thank you again to NetGalley and North Star Editions for the arc.