Reviews - I See You've Called in Dead

634 reviews for:

I See You've Called in Dead

John Kenney

4.13 AVERAGE

texmom22's review against another edition

5.0

dark emotional funny hopeful lighthearted reflective sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

book_leigh's review against another edition

4.25

I mistook this for a comedy. It starts out humorous, man writes and submits his own obituary. Then he’s suspended from work (as an obit writer). With his free time, he discovers the difference between life and living. Quality and quantity. And it’s not as obvious as it seems. It’s not all fun and games, this is quite a serious book, but well done.

the_bookerie's review against another edition

4.25

emotional hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I went into this read expecting a bit of a humorous romp, but I was taking her back by how meaningful, complex, and hopeful this book was. I really enjoyed all of the characters we met along the way, including those whose funerals were attended along the way. This book is a reminder of the joy and pain that lives at the same time in so many people, and so many moments. It’s an ode to friendship and those who see us when we can’t see ourselves. At times the book and the circumstances was a bit overly twee, but for me it wasn’t distracting and added to the charm of the book. There were some very sad parts of the story, made more so by how close I felt to the characters. Despite that, this book is heartwarming and hopeful.

chord7795's review against another edition

4.0

Unique and novel idea. I enjoyed the ride

hotskeletonwinter's review against another edition

5.0

dark emotional inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This book reminded me a lot of Mikki Brammer’s ‘The Collected Regrets of Clover’. Bud writes about death every day—obituaries are his career. And yet, he has no idea how to live. After a mistaken publishing of a self-obituary, his life changes…one funeral at a time. After attending a series of funerals for people he doesn’t know, he starts to think more about life. But only after the death of a special friend does he finally begin to live. Excellent book for a Death Cafe!

bookwormjimmy's review against another edition

3.5

dark emotional funny reflective sad slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

It's a classic tale of an obituary writer who gets drunk one night, writes his own obituary, and accidentally publishes it online to his newspaper. Whoops. Now he's going to get fired, but because the system clocks him in as dead, they can't do that. Yet.

Okay, so maybe not a classic tale per se, but it still follows a similar path of understanding life after death, of grief, of appreciation for the things we do have in life, and all that. So here's the thing, the book is genuinely funny and pokes fun as some of the absurdities in life. Our narrator has some people close to him, they have really deep and meaningful conversations, and some people may or may not make it to the end. But the pacing is a bit slow. While the characters are enjoyable, they were a little bit boring to me and I had a hard time really connecting to everyone.

This is one of those books that I can agree that it's a good book, it just wasn't for me.