Reviews with content warning for Gore - If I Have to Be Haunted

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If I Have to Be Haunted by Miranda Sun

2 reviews

not_asha01's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective fast-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

4.5

Content Warnings

bookishmillennial's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny lighthearted mysterious reflective 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? It's complicated

Disclaimer if you’ve read other reviews by me and are noticing a pattern: You’re correct that I don’t really give starred reviews because I don’t like leaving them. Most often, I will only leave them if I vehemently despised a book.I enjoy most books for what they are, & I extract lessons from them all.

Everyone’s reading experiences are subjective, so I hope my reviews provide enough information to let you know if a book is for you or not, regardless if I add stars or not. Find me on Instagram: @bookish.millennial or tiktok: @bookishmillennial

premise:

contemporary supernatural fiction / fantasy and coming-of-age story with romance
third-person POV of teenager Cara, who was raised by her single mom, and the ghost of her Laolao (maternal grandmother) who arrived when Cara was younger
She is a ghost speaker, which means she helps ghosts cross over to the other side, and her Laolao had this same gift - she still speaks to her Laolao every day
Cara has been bantering back-and-forth with rich kid, Zach, ever since elementary school, and they are partnered up for a project at school
Cara finds Zach's dead body after school, but once she notices she can touch him, she realizes that he is not fully dead yet; her Laolao helps them figure out how to reconnect him to his body, and find the antidote to the snake that bit him
Cara and Zach's ghost begin a quest to find the antidote, and confront their issues along the way!
cw: estranged mother/daughter relationship, generational struggles, cannibalism,

thoughts:
Cara was a super relatable character for me in her struggle between her mom and her grandma's approval, all while trying to figure out what *she* really wants too. The slow-burn, antagonists-to-lovers romance between her and Zach was fun and full of delightful banter!

This is so specific to me but every Brittany I have ever read in a book has been absolute *garbage* so I was beyond thrilled that the side character, ghost hunter Brittany, is a bad ass and adds a fun dynamic to the group's quest! Charlotte and Felicity were not highlighted as much in the book, but I liked that they were foils to Brittany and Zach. I appreciated that it showed Cara that you could add even more people in your corner! <3

Cemetery Boys meets Legendborn feels like an accurate way to describe it so I think fans who enjoyed those, will absolutely enjoy this! The Chinese American representation and the red string theory was woven in so beautifully to the story. I don't know if this is meant to be a standalone or if it's the first in a series, but either way, I'd absolutely read from Miranda Sun in the future.

quotations that stood out to me:

There was that. Being born on Halloween and cursed with the unwanted ability to see ghosts—she couldn’t find it more ironic.

So many threads of blood in your body, and one of them became a string that connected your heart to the heart yours was meant to be with, the person whose side you’d eventually end up at. The thread could snarl itself in knots, stretch out over chasms and continents, but it wouldn’t break, and one day it would lead you to love, to another hand whose little finger was tied with your string.

Death this loud drew ghosts. The broken glass shattering the air, the keening of sirens, the resounding silence of a stopped heart. The world folding and creating something so terrible nobody could look away, not even the dead.

Xiaogui. A term of endearment used for children, quite literally meaning little ghost.

A bad mother but a good grandmother. A flawed human being but a better ghost.

There were so many things stacked against Cara in this world. Child of an immigrant, daughter of a single mom. People looked at her face and expected someone passive, someone who didn’t know how to speak English or fight back. Her mother was probably right: she didn’t need to add the problems of the dead to her own. Going to a good college wouldn’t merely be an accomplishment anyone would be proud of—it would be a way out. A lit path in the dark woods, leading to a better life than the one her mother had. All her mother wanted was to give it to her. So Cara stayed quiet.

After fighting their entire lives, they knew exactly where each other’s weaknesses were. They pressed their fingers into each other’s wounds to win.

Which would her mother find worse: running off with a ghost or with a boy?

But if love meant controlling every single aspect of the other person, she wanted no part of it.

“Liminality concerns thresholds. Boundaries. It’s where things transition from one state to another. Where things change. You’ve been in liminal spaces before. Haven’t you ever been at school after everyone’s gone home and the halls are quiet and the lights are dim and flickering?”

Cara had been raised to respect her elders, no matter what, but she’d found that sometimes, certain adults simply didn’t deserve her respect. Especially when they tried to eat her.

Her eyes had never been her own. They had belonged to the dead, to those that refused to move on, to the countless times she’d stared at the ground so that ghosts would not find out she could see them. And they belonged to Laolao, to her legacy. You have your grandmother’s eyes.

Something passed between them, a trembling thread of memory they both held the ends to, wrapped around their fingers. Tying them together.

Perhaps the way to begin breaking the chain was to embrace herself for who she was and what she could do. And to stick with the people who helped her do that.

Crown shyness. She’d read about this once upon a time. To only grow so far and no farther. To sense without seeing how close you were to another, close enough to touch, and yet stop.

“You know how people won’t believe something, even if they see it, until they feel it? Like, even though the sign says Wet Paint, at least one person is going to sit down? How people pinch their cheeks in case they’re dreaming? It’s all about what we perceive. What we get back when we check our perceptions against those of other humans.

“America likes to pretend its ghosts don’t exist. That its sins are safely buried in the ground. But pretending something isn’t there doesn’t make it go away. It just makes you less prepared for when the time finally comes to reckon with your own haunting.”

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