Undead Girl Gang

Sometimes you just have to take a break from the more serious or emotionally heavy reading--or at least I do. And this book about 4 high school students--one of whom is a budding Wiccan and 3 of whom are/ were dead--just fit the bill. Written by Lily Anderson, our protagonist is Mila Flores, a junior who considers herself fat and accepts that this, in conjunction with her non-white skin, dooms her to outsider status at Fairmont Academy. Fortunately, she has an amazing best friend, Riley, who is also an outcast due to the fact that her parent own the local funeral home and live in an apartment upstairs. The problem when the book opens is that there have been 3 recent deaths at Fairmont, all of which the police ruled as suicides. Two of the school's "mean girls" may have hanged themselves in the nearby park, and Riley is found just days later drowned in the scummy local creek. Riley had lured Mila into experimenting with herbs and small spells and that reputation hasn't increased her popularity either. They stored all their crystals and plants at an abandoned house on the edge of town and used it as their mailing address to order stuff by mail. Mila is surprised by the delivery of a large and apparently very old grimoire, addressed to Riley. And then she finds a spell in the back of the book for bringing back the dead. The local dealer in Wiccan magic supplies will have nothing to do with the idea, but Mila is desperate to get her friend back and to prove that she did not commit suicide. Accidentally, she brings back not only Riley, but also their arch enemies, June and Dayton. Unfortunately none of them remember any of the events that led to their deaths, but swear they wouldn't have committed suicide. So it's up to Mila to figure out who the killer is and bring him/ her to justice.  

As the author says, "My books are about snarky girls and emotional intelligence and—sometimes—monsters." And Kirkus is generally positive in their review, saying the book offers "Superlative pacing and writing that flows well make this title stand out. A well-paced undead romp..."