Review: When Life Gives You Demons by Jennifer Honeybourn
10:00
Series: None
Author: Jennifer Honeybourn
Published July 17th 2018 by Swoon Reads
Goodreads Synopsis
Sixteen-year-old Shelby Black has spent the past year training to be an exorcist. Her great-uncle Roy—a Catholic priest and Shelby’s guardian—believes she has a gift for expelling demons, and he’s put her through exorcist boot camp hell, but he still doesn’t trust her to do an exorcism on her own.
High school is hard enough without having to explain that you fight demons for a living, so Shelby keeps her extracurricular activity quiet, especially from Spencer, her cute math tutor. Secrets run in Shelby’s family, though: her mother has been missing ever since an exorcism went horribly wrong, and Uncle Roy is tight-lipped about it. But Shelby’s hell-bent on finding her mom, no matter what—even if what it ends up costing her her soul AND a date with Spencer.
Goodreads
Review
Wesley James Ruined My Life was a fantastic debut, and when I heard about this book, I was definitely intrigued, but had to wait a while until I could grab myself a copy. I found the whole premise of this book fantastic, especially without it being too religious. Shelby is in training to be an exorcist with her priest uncle Roy. Her mother has been missing for over a year, and no one knows where she is, and Shelby is trying to focus on finding her, and acing all her tests to become a full on exorcist. However, as any other sixteen year old would, she still has school to deal with, and her struggles with maths have led her to have a tutor, Spencer, who she finds cute, and seriously wants to keep away from her exorcism work. Well, there's more than meets the eye to Spencer, and he might just be the key to help Shelby to find and help her mother come home.
I loved Shelby's character. She was sassy and had a persona that suggested she didn't care about things, but once we saw more of her, we saw that she really did care, and that her loss of her mam and the struggles with her abilities did get to her, and that she did have a vulnerable side. The book wasn't heavy either, even though it was dealing with demons and the like. There was a proper humour to it that I wasn't really expecting, but loved none the less. The banter between all of the characters, but especially between Shelby and Spencer was real and witty, and I loved the chemistry between them, even before the truth about each other had been revealed. Jennifer's books are definitely ones for me, and I'll be adding her third book to my wishlist ASAP!
Dates Read:
February 23-26, 2019Rating
4 Stars
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