I loved the writing style of this one. The conversation was smart and funny. I loved the southern theme. That being said, at no point in this book did I feel like I fully understood what was happening lol. Zombies? In a small town? Zombies that this family of women all knew about? Partners that suddenly disappear? Was Luna a zombie? I still don’t think I fully understand. Even though I didn’t fully get it, I had a fun time reading this one. I’m surprised it’s coming out in the spring since it definitely has that spooky Halloween vibe. Thanks NetGalley for the advanced read!

3.5 stars

This book takes place in Texas and features four generations of Evans women who run the local funeral home. They have had past encounters with vampires, one of them quite close.

And it looks like the vamps are back. There is also a new young man in town that is suspicious and he has made friends with the youngest of them.

This was kinda horror light and definitely was able to read it at night.

A fun, mystery, family drama all rolled into one.

Many thanks to NetGalley, MacMillan Audio for an ALC and St. Martin's Press for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This was a fun read! It’s like Steel Magnolias meets Twilight! The characters were enjoyable, the storyline was solid. The ending left me wanting for the next book!

If you like a mix of dark humor, horror, mystery this is a book for you!!!

I enjoyed the multi generational aspect to the story and enjoyed the funeral parlor vibes as it reminded me a bit of the dead romantics by Ashley Poston and I absolutely loved that romance!

I also loved the southern vibes and the narration made it that much more immersive in the southern vibes!

This book definitely gave the vibes of that one vampire humor show that was on tv a few years ago and I’m totally failing at recalling its name, but if you like vampires and dark humor I’d highly recommend this one!

Thank you so much to the publisher for my ARC in exchange for my honest review!

Not my usual cuppa, but I loved it! It’s just a fun, slightly horror leaning, not to gross or gory mystery. The characters were hysterical!

This cutesy, hilarious horror was just what I needed this month. The Evan’s family was kooky, amazing and full of strong women. The town might have been confused when vampires started popping up, but not the Evan’s women. They got straight down to business. The audio was amazing and I highly suggest it. You really got the southern town vibes, which added to the overall atmosphere of the book. If your looking for a horror with lots of comedic relief, check this one out

I loved this horror, zombie-ish vampires, who-bit-whom first mystery. Lindy Ryan pushes the plot line along through different perspectives of the four generations of Evans' women who own the small town East Texas mortuary. From the eldest to youngest we have Ducey, Lenore, Grace, and Luna. We also get chapters from the local hair dresser, cop, and sheriff's perspective's. Bouncing around like this helps to get a sense of the town, all the major characters, and back stories or secrets that they bring to the story.

We quickly find out that all the ladies are dealing with some family drama and squabbling often while coming of age, Luna, is in the dark about the true family business of keeping the dead, dead.

Luna is a focal point of the story and her rag tag group of outcasts are a fun addition to this paranormal tale. Overall, a fun and wild read.

Stephanie Nemeth-Parker is a fabulous voice actor and narrator! She has loads of range. Give this audiobook a listen!

This is the first novel in Lindy Ryan’s Bless Your Heart series of supernatural horror. The story of a family of Southern women who run a funeral parlor in a small Texas town has a high body count and lots of gore, but also plenty of humor and heart-warming moments. We get to know four generations of Evans women as they struggle to stop the dead from rising and going on a killing spree. The story held my attention and kept me guessing right up to the end, which sets us up for future stories of the Evans family and friends.

The story is told in multiple points of view, alternating between the perspectives of each of the Evans women and other residents of the town. I found the characters likable and loved some of the Southern expressions they used. I also enjoyed some of the bits of 1990s nostalgia, such as music references and answering machine messages. I appreciated the author’s unique take on the undead.

The audiobook production was excellent, and I loved the narration by Stephanie Németh-Parker. She’s a joy to listen to, with distinctive voices and speech patterns to suit each character, and the ability to convey mood and emotion effectively. The narration really increased my enjoyment of the story, and I highly recommend that any supernatural horror fans give it a listen.

I received a free advanced listener copy of the audiobook through NetGalley. I volunteered to provide an honest review.

3.25 ⭐️

Bless Your Heart is a tale surrounding a small Texas town and the Evans women who own and operate the only funeral parlor. This multi-generational group of women take care of business and their business is the dead. When the dead start to come back to life, the Evans women are the only ones in town that know enough to be able to stop them before more people end up in the grave.

This was an interesting take on a supernatural vampire style monster in this small southern town. The mystery was fun and their cover artist deserves a medal. That cover is what sparked my interest in this book. I see this labeled as horror, but I definitely didn't get those vibes from this while reading it. It felt more like "scooby doo"-esque horror. All comedy, very little stakes.

Crane was my favorite character. What a complete weirdo - I loved him.

I listened to the audiobook for most of this and was impressed by the narrator's ability to distinguish between the characters even when sometimes the story itself felt extremely jumbled, jumping back and forth between characters at will.

My interest waned at about the 60% mark and I was near DNF-ing, however, sticking through it was fun. The ending was predictable, but it wad an entertaining read. It won't be something I revisit in the future.

If I never think about a butterscotch candy again, I'll be happy.

🧛 New take on vampires/zombies
🧛 Family Secrets
🧛 Witty characters and humor
🧛 Unique large cast, unexpected twists
🧛 Spooky suspense
🧛 Buffy vibes
🧛 Small Town drama

CW: columbine mention, violence/blood, homophobia, gore

Thank you to NetGalley, Minotaur Books & Macmillan Audio for the ARC & ALC of Bless Your Heart by Lindy Ryan.

3.5/5 rounded up

Thank you Macmillan Audio for the advanced listening copy! -- out 4/9!

SYNOPSIS -- It's 1999 in Southeast Texas, and the Evans women are up to their eyeballs in dead bodies. While this isn't entirely unusual seeing as they own the local funeral parlor, it is definitely an unexpected twist that some of these dead bodies are, well, undead. Local busybody Mina Jean Murphy rises first, setting into motion a string of chaos that seems familiar to some of the Evans, especially matriarch Ducey, her daughter Lenore, and HER daughter, Grace. Grace's daughter, Luna, is about to find out about a major family secret revolving around the Strigoi, the original vampires. Armed with trocars and deceit, the Evans woman have to protect their town and themselves.

This book was sooo different than anything I normally read, and I'm surprised that I liked it so much! It was definitely creepy and icky at times, but I was hooked from the start. All of the characters had a ton of layers and nuance between them, which added to the story a ton. There were, however, too many POVs in my opinion; I think this made things confusing and diluted more than it needed to be. I think the audio could have been way more clear and effective if there had been a different narrator for all of the characters. The middle got a little bit lost on me, but we made our way back for a powerful and shocking end. The Evans women were fantastic and fun main characters, and I enjoyed their dynamic with each other and the other characters immensely. I'm super intrigued by this series and hope to read more of it soon! That cliffhanger.... I can't wait!

Bless Your Heart was a fun and campy introduction to a new horror-comedy series by Lindy Ryan.

I really enjoyed getting to know the 4 generations of the Evans women, however I did find it a bit overwhelming to jump between so many characters. It definitely felt like it was a first book in a series, setting up the characters for more adventures as they go on, however the pacing was inconsistent throughout - it was medium paced throughout most of the novel, but the events of the last 25% seemed extremely fast and it was really difficult to process one event before another was starting.

There were also some characters that i wonder if were intentionally less developed to create a storyline for further books? Either way, it was harder to connect with those characters (like Crane).

The narration, however, was fantastic! A huge win on that front, as the narrator was so engaging and really good as distinguishing all of the characters.

3.5

Started out great but really devolved in to a disappointment at the end. The Southern platitudes run rampant in this book but are for the most part well written; it’s too bad it falls apart at the end.

This was too much on the horror side for me - very descriptive gory, weird, and I just didn't care for the mystery portion of the story.

I didn't know what to expect from this book. The cover made me think it would be a cozy story but I'll be honest, there was a lot of gore. Is there such a thing as cozy horror? Even though it wasn't what I expected, I really enjoyed this book and the narrator was very good!

A southern gothic masterpiece, Bless Your Heart follows four generations of women through the story of their lives in a small Southern town. A delightfully detailed horror story ensues, keeping the reader on their toes and enthralled in the dark happenings of a town plagued by vampire-like creatures.

Copied from Goodreads:

2.5⭐️ rounded up for its potential

“Bless Your Heart,” the debut novel of Lindy Ryan, is more comedy than thriller. The colorful Evans women—Dulcey, Lenore, Grace, and Luna—serve as multi-generational custodians of their small Southeastern Texas town’s dead. As Luna discovers, however, they also serve as protectors of the townspeople. The reader learns of the Strigoi (vampires) and their history alongside Luna. Ryan’s novel is the first in a series, so significant exposition and character development is understandably necessary. While I don’t think I’ll be reading the next installment, I have no doubt that a “Bless Your Heart” series will have fans.

If you’ve ever wondered what Charlaine Harris’ Southern Vampire series (origin of the HBO series “True Blood”) would look like if melded with “The Golden Girls” and set in 1999 Texas, then this is the book for you!

“Bless Your Heart” will be released in the U.S. on April 8, 2024. Many thanks to Macmillan Audio and Netgalley for this audio ARC given in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Audiobook file didn't work. This seems to be a NetGalley issue and not the author/publisher. Disappointed. Rating is reflection of the experience, not author's ability.

This story takes place in 1999, and revolves around the Evan’s women, who run the towns mortuary. Surprise twist, they’ve been putting down strigoi for generations. What are strigoi, (besides hard to spell), they are the dead come back to life.
Luna is just learning about all this from her great grandmother, grandmother and mother. She’s also learning that she has.a link to the dead and there’s more to her than meets the eye.
The dead are rising and Luna and her family have to get a handle on it quick to save the town:
I was expecting more humor in this book. Maybe because of the title? I think I thought this would be more Sookie less Stoker. It’s an enjoyable listen for the most part. The story and characters are engaging. It’s very gory, but I didn’t mind that.
If I had one critique of this book, it’s all the mentions of what people are doing with their mouths, sucking on their teeth, constantly sucking on candy…..it’s a lot after awhile.
Lyra Parrish does a fantastic job narrating this audiobook and I would definitely listen to one of her narrations again.
Thank you to Macmillan Audio and Minotaur books for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I went into this one completely blind. I almost didn’t finish it but I pushed through. The fantasy/vampire scene is not my go to so I really couldn’t connect with any of the characters. I am giving this one 2 stars just because I really had to convince myself to finish this one.

I think I went into this expecting something completely different than it was. I wanted something funnier, more southern belle banter, more fun. The characters were great, but not sure I would describe this book as fun. This was a darker more horror than comedy. There were twists and turns and it definitely had some unexpected plots. It was well done, but at times dragged on. It was often very repetitive. I wish it had more banter and fun to balance out the mystery aspect.

Thank you NetGalley for my advanced reader copy.