Cold Kiss by Amy Garvey

The women of Wren's family have a kind of magic.  Wren's mother won't even acknowledge that they have it, so neither Wren nor her little sister understand their power.  When Wren's boyfriend Danny died in a car accident, all Wren can think about is getting him back, and she uses her power to raise him from the dead.  But it isn't quite the same Danny.  He's no longer dead, but he isn't really alive either, and he's confused and doesn't understand what's happened to him.  Wren is in way over her head now, and doesn't know where to turn for help.

I didn't even think about Danny being a zombie until I read the author's note at the end were she talked about how her zombie wasn't the brain eating variety by rather the kind one might create with Haitian voodoo magic.  And I was like, "Oh yeah, he was undead.  I guess he was sort of a zombie."  But since Danny wasn't stumbling around trying to eat people, I hadn't even thought of it like that.


The book was really mostly about dealing with pain and loss.  Wren brings Danny back because she can't deal with her pain, and she doesn't want to be alone.  After she does this, she realizes bringing him back was selfish.  She pulled him out of where ever he was before, and now he's lost and confused and helpless, plus Wren has to figure out what to do with her undead boyfriend who doesn't like being alone and who she's hiding above a neighbor's garage.  Not a great situation.  Because of her focus on keeping Danny hidden, she begins to lose her two good friends.  Wren also is frustrated with her mother not explaining her magical abilities.  She can't go to her mother for help.

Wren meets a new boy at school (of course there's a new boy at school) Gabriel, who has magical women in his family as well and has the ability to read minds.  Kind of.  Yes, read minds, like Edward Cullen.  Gabriel's mind reading doesn't seem to be quite as clear as Edward Cullen's, and I never totally understood how exactly he understood things, but he did, so he figures out that Wren has raised her boyfriend.  And he wants to help her fix things.  Wren gets confused as she's attracted to Gabriel, but still loves Danny very much.  I actually felt really bad for Wren when she realized how she felt about Gabriel.  If she could have only held off with the boyfriend raising! 

Wren finally figures out how to take control of her life, which was pretty satisfying.  She had some help along the way, but ultimately what it took is her being willing to let go of Danny, and when she was ready to take that step she figured out what she had to do to set things right.

I'm guessing this is going to be a series, because toward the end there were some revelations about Wren's father (who is absent) and why he left and why Wren's mother doesn't want to talk about magic anymore, but most of it was left up in the air.

Cold Kiss will come out on September 20.