Afterlove by Tanya Byrne is a beautiful and bittersweet young adult paranormal romance that highlights love and loss in equal measure.
It won’t be long before Ash Persaud becomes a reaper in the afterlife, but there’s just one problem—she really wants to see her first love, Poppy Morgan again, however, the chasm between the living and the dead is too wide and there are severe repercussions if Ash dares to cross it.
Blinding headlights.
The blood-chilling sound of screeching tires and breaking glass echoes in Ash’s ears as the windscreen hits her and shatters all around her.
But she survived that traumatic experience and she’s still alive. Or is she?
This New Year’s Eve, Ash gets a jaw-dropping offer from the afterlife that she can’t refuse: she will join a team of badass female reapers who are tasked with taking the souls of the city’s dead down to the beach so that they can catch a ride to their fated afterlife.
Even though Ash is busy with learning her new role as a reaper, she’ll never forget Poppy and she will do everything in her power to see her again. Ash will treasure every moment they have together, whether it’s a few hours or days because their love is timeless.
There’s nothing in this world or in the underworld that can tear these strong-willed lovers apart.
Pros And My Favourite Parts
Afterlove has definitely surpassed my greatest expectations and the blurb wasn’t wrong at all because I’ve been dying to read an awesome story like this one! I fell so deeply in love with Tanya Byrne’s candid and heart-tugging writing because she did a fantastic job with portraying devastating losses coupled with a super cute romance between Ash and Poppy. Plus, I love the fact that this story has a cast of diverse characters and I’m thrilled beyond measure that Ash has Guyanese roots because I’m from the Caribbean and I truly enjoy devouring lesfic novels that portray Caribbean meals and close-knit families. Without a doubt, Afterlove is one of the best novels that I’ve ever read and I really wished this book was around when I was a shy and lonely teenager. By the way, have I mentioned how much I adore this gorgeous book cover?
Cons And Heads Up
This story contains graphic descriptions of death, blood, mentions of suicides, overdoses, racism and homophobia.
The Conclusion
Tanya Byrne deserves the highest of fives for creating such a thought-provoking novel that kept me wide awake until the wee hours of the morning. Afterlove is so much more than a love story with paranormal elements—it’s a story about what it truly means to live a full and unapologetic life and it also shows that love can cross borders and transcend space and time, even after death. After reading this literary gem, I can’t wait to see what this author does next!
Excerpt from Afterlove by Tanya Byrne
Like I said, there’s something about that moment. Everything – all those things you did and didn’t do and said and didn’t say – falls away and you see everything with absolute, startling clarity. People go their whole lives waiting for that moment. They climb mountains and swim seas and read books hoping to find it. A lucky few do, but most of us – people like me and Alice Anderson and all the ones who went before us and all the ones that will follow – don’t until it’s too late and, God, it’s cruel, isn’t it? How, when there’s no time left, you suddenly know exactly what you should have done with it.
When Alice lifts her chin to look me in the eye for the first time since she found me standing here, I wait and wonder if this is it. She knows and it will come out in a rush. All the things she should have done. The lies she told and secrets she kept. She can’t take it with her, so she’ll leave it with me. Everything she wished for when she blew out her birthday candles. I’m there and this is it, her last chance to say I’m sorry or I love you or Forgive me.
All the times she should have jumped and didn’t. All the people she should have kissed and didn’t. All that time she wasted being too careful or too polite or too scared when, in the end, nothing is as scary as watching your whole life narrow to a single moment that’s about to pass, whether you’re ready for it to or not.
Maybe I’ll see it then – the regret – burning off her, right through her clothes, and she’ll never look so alive. She’ll laugh and cry and scream, exhaust every emotion until there’s nothing left and it will be like watching a light bulb flare then burn out.
Alice doesn’t do any of that, though. She doesn’t tell me her secrets, doesn’t tell me about her dog, Chester, who sleeps at the bottom of her bed at night. Or about the lipstick she stole from Boots last year, the red one that wouldn’t come off, even when she scrubbed it so hard her mouth felt bruised for days.
I should be OK with that because it means that I don’t need to explain, we can just go. But I want to. I want Alice to ask me who I am. If she did, I’d tell her that I’m Ashana Persaud and that I’m sixteen. I’d tell her that my favourite song is ‘Rock Steady’ because it always gets my parents on the dance floor at weddings and my favourite film is Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, even though I tell everyone it’s The Shining because it’s easier. I’d show her the scar on my chin that I got falling off a slide when I was six and tell her about the tattoo I was going to get on my eighteenth birthday. I’d tell her that I’m scared of open water and clowns and being puked on and that from here, you can see where I had my last kiss, a couple of weeks ago, right there on the beach. And most of all, I’d tell her that it’s not fair.
It’s not fair that she gets to go, when I have to stay here and do this.
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Bits and Bobs
ISBN number: 978-1444955958
Publisher: Hodder Children’s Books
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