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A review by saidtheraina
I Woke Up Dead at the Mall by Judy Sheehan
3.0
I was underwhelmed by some things, but pulled through by things I wasn't expecting.
I picked this up thinking it might be a good readalike for the show "The Good Place," which is trending in my friend-group. I'm not sure how many teens, much less middle schoolers, are into that show, but it fits in the snarky niche of my middle school booktalk lineup.
The title/cover doesn't lie - Sarah wakes up dead in the mall. In a giant bridesmaid's dress.
I was looking forward to enjoying exploring the mall-as-afterlife, but turns out, it's more complicated than that. I won't spoil the details, but the Mall isn't a universal afterlife in this story.
I also wasn't as charmed by the writing/character as I thought I might be after hearing others review it. Sarah is a privileged white girl, and I've been trying to read fewer stories about people who have been the stars of media for all of modern life. There's also a fairly run-of-the-mill instalove hetero romance, and these days it takes a lot for a heteroromance to actually interest me. But I recognize that that's a personal lens issue I have.
All that said, I was feeling underwhelmed, and then the hook totally surprised me. In a really good way. And the book turns into a different kind of story. A mystery, actiony thing that the parts of me that read hundreds of Nancy Drew stories really really liked.
So yeah, there are people who will like the writing here more than I did.
There are people who will like the setting more than I did.
I ended up liking this for the plot.
I'll be taking this out to middle schools in winter 2018.
--
Edit to add: I ended up splicing together many of Bertha's lines from the first chapter or so. It took a bit for things to gel, but it ended up being the runaway hit of the last two schools I performed this set of booktalks at. Great concept!
I picked this up thinking it might be a good readalike for the show "The Good Place," which is trending in my friend-group. I'm not sure how many teens, much less middle schoolers, are into that show, but it fits in the snarky niche of my middle school booktalk lineup.
The title/cover doesn't lie - Sarah wakes up dead in the mall. In a giant bridesmaid's dress.
I was looking forward to enjoying exploring the mall-as-afterlife, but turns out, it's more complicated than that. I won't spoil the details, but the Mall isn't a universal afterlife in this story.
I also wasn't as charmed by the writing/character as I thought I might be after hearing others review it. Sarah is a privileged white girl, and I've been trying to read fewer stories about people who have been the stars of media for all of modern life. There's also a fairly run-of-the-mill instalove hetero romance, and these days it takes a lot for a heteroromance to actually interest me. But I recognize that that's a personal lens issue I have.
All that said, I was feeling underwhelmed, and then the hook totally surprised me. In a really good way.
Spoiler
All of the people in the mall were murdered.So yeah, there are people who will like the writing here more than I did.
There are people who will like the setting more than I did.
I ended up liking this for the plot.
I'll be taking this out to middle schools in winter 2018.
--
Edit to add: I ended up splicing together many of Bertha's lines from the first chapter or so. It took a bit for things to gel, but it ended up being the runaway hit of the last two schools I performed this set of booktalks at. Great concept!