Thank you to Lerner Publishing Group and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Funeral Girl by Emma K. Ohland is a YA book that combines contemporary YA with the paranormal. The story revolves around Georgia, who works for the parents' funeral home. What people don't know is that she has a magical power. When she touches the dead bodies in her parents' funeral home, she can bring them back to life briefly. But when Milo, one of her classmates, dies, can she stand to bring him back to life? Can she help him fulfill his last wish?

Here is a morbid excerpt from Chapter 1:

"The dead woman’s name was Betty. She was eighty-three when she died from a heart attack alone in the room of her nursing home. There were only seven people at her funeral, if you included me and the pastor. And I wouldn’t exactly say we counted since we were getting paid.
I stood at the back of the chapel in one of my many black dresses and one of my many pairs of black Mary Janes. It was pretty much the uniform. I had a good view of the back of the heads of the five women who attended, and I stood right in line with Pastor Hugh Wilson as he gave his eulogy."

Overall, Funeral Girl is a lovely YA novel that will appeal to fans of Pushing Daisies and A Good Girl's Guide to Muruder. One highlight of this book is how it is a unique blend of paranormal and contemporary YA. The plot was definitely unique. I did take off 1 star, because there was too much "friendship drama" that I wasn't expecting. I wanted more of the ghost and mystery elements. I took off another star, because the ending left me unsatisfied with some important unanswered questions. If you're intrigued by the excerpt above, or if you're a fan of YA books, you can check out this book when it comes out in September.

What worked: Engaging portrayal of a girl dealing with death anxiety that just happens to live in a funeral home. This novel goes a step further than other paranormal ghost stories in which readers are introduced to Georgia, 'G', and are shown the anxieties she daily deals with. I love how the author digs deep into G.'s struggles and not just make this the typical ghost story.

G. lives with her family in a funeral home. While her twin Peter is excited about the prospect of taking over the business, G. struggles. She really wants to believe in an Afterlife, but then again the idea of living forever is equally terrifying. Her first experience with being around ghosts is after her grandmother's death. It's interrupted when G.'s screams in the basement of the funeral home have her parents rush inside. G. never sees the ghost of her grandmother again and fears that she might be caught in eternal limbo.

I really love how G shares her fears, anxiety, and struggles with the topic of death. She also shares what goes on behind the scenes in a funeral home including getting a body ready for burial. The descriptions are very realistic. It brought back memories of when I went to the funeral home after my sister's death and how the funeral director explained the process. All I remember is how my sister looked nothing like she did when she was alive. Ohland nails this and also the many conflicting emotions someone deals with after someone dies.

There's an element of Evan from Dear Evan Hanson where G's experience with Milo, a dead fellow classmate, is taken to the point of his parents and others thinking that she was good friends with him. The truth though is she. like others at their school, didn't know him personally while he was alive. This adds to her stress.

Subdued, bittersweet portrayal of someone dealing with anxiety over death, but also a story that is truthful without just being a ghost tale. Kudos also for showing a teen coming to terms with a paranormal ability while being true to herself.
Good Points
1. Engaging portrayal of a girl dealing with death anxiety with paranormal elements
2. GLBTQA+ representation

eARC provided via NetGalley!

Emma K Ohland hands you your mortality on a silver platter and asks you to converse with yourself about how you grieve in this debut novel. A beautiful novel about the way grief can create breaks and the way grief can fix them.

Grief is a hard thing. Even when you’re feeling it for someone you barely knew.

Even when you can talk to ghosts and try to grant their final request—if she can. That’s what Georgia has done since her grandmother died and she first discovered her “gift.” Georgia and her brother, Peter, are the mortician’s kids. They work at Richter Funeral Home to prep for taking over the family business. When a death racks the school, and Georgia, how will Georgia react? Will she be able to continue talking to the ghosts of those that make their way to Richter Funeral Home? Or will she be too much into grief over a classmate she barely knew to continue using her gifts as she had been?
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Book TWs (taken from the Note to Readers): dying, corpses, grief, depression and anxiety

I don't think I have anything bad to say about this book. The writing is phenomenal the characters and diversity [Asian, non-binary, ace, depression, anxiety] are refreshing, the storyline is intriguing and everything works together to suck you in and keep you reading.

There is so much beautiful language and beautifully human relationships it was hard at times to remember this is a book surrounding death and grief and the fragility of mortality. (btw do not read if you don't like existential spirals because this will more than likely put you in one)

The story was fantastic, Georgia was a beautifully written MC, there is so much about this book to love. I cried the entirety of the last like 3-4 chapters. And even through the authors note, to know someone else was weighed down by the pressure of morality and their impending death at a young age made my thoughts seem a little less out there. I needed Georgia, so than you Emma for sharing her with me and everyone else who will have the pleasure of reading this when it comes out.

(also also, as soon as I hit post on this I'm pre-ordering a copy of this bc I need it on my shelf for easy re-read-ability)

This novel was a very excellent view into grief and loss. The Ghost aspect really helped to grab the interest of the reader. I recommend this book to anyone who has lost a loved one recently as I have. It really helped me with my grief. 4.5 out of 5 stars.

There are supernatural and family relationship themes in this fun book about a teen who grew up in a family of morticians. This book is also LGBTQIA+ friendly!

Georgia is constantly surrounded by death - she is the daughter of a mortician and she and her family live above the funeral home. Unlike the rest of her family though, she cannot stop being perpetually terrified of death. Oh the other thing? She also can see ghosts of the people who have funerals at her family's funeral home. She is barely coping when the body of a classmate comes there. As she works with Milo to try to satisfy his last request, she learns more about herself and how to cope.

I really enjoyed this book! I thought the author did a great job handling those lurking thoughts that many of us have (myself included) about being terrified of death. It was a lot less buddy adventure than I was expecting, but in a good way. The characters also had good growth and development.

I received my copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

What's it like to live in a funeral home when you have a crippling fear of death and the ability to speak to ghosts? That's main character, Georgia's, daily life in Funeral Girl. Her death anxiety is brought to a head when a classmate (Milo) is killed in a hit and run, and Georgia begins to spend time with his ghost and learn about his life. This novel focuses on grief, anxiety, and the importance of friendship. I think this would be a great tool for those working through anxiety about life and death.

Sixteen-year-old Georgia lives with her family in the Richter Funeral Home. Her parents run the place, while she and her twin brother help with the set-up, hosting, and break-down of funerals. At the time of her grandmother’s death, a few years earlier, Georgia discovered that she has the ability to summon ghosts and send them on. She has no idea where she sends them, but with this power, she feels the need to give each dead person who comes through the funeral home a final request. The longest she has ever allowed a spirit to remain awake is 30 minutes, but that changes when Milo’s corpse arrives.

Milo was a fellow student at Georgia’s high school. She wasn’t close to him, but is left devastated by his death. When his body is rolled into the funeral home, Georgia is anxious to awaken his spirit in hopes he can provide answers about his death and maybe what it is like on the other side. When she summons Milo, he is not very helpful and also begs her to let him stay awake. Georgia does, and as their friendship blossoms they both help each other resolve issues in the living world.

This is a unique story of teenage doubts, fears, and insecurities, and the struggle to mature, become self-aware, and manage emotions. The story is beautifully written with strong feelings erupting out of the descriptive words, pulling the reader into this teenager’s world and all the trauma she has experienced and continues to suffer from. Fractured families, drifting friendships, and youthful questioning are all tackled within this story, and what results is a gut-wrenching, yet spectacular novel. This book is highly recommended!

I could not get into this one sadly.
There wasn’t much given about the characters for me to be engaged long enough so this fell so flat for me
I DNF this btw.

Thank you NetGalley and to the publishers for giving me this arc in exchange for my honest review.

From the title to the book cover, I was instantly intrigued. Death fascinates us all because in the end we are all awaiting the inevitable fate.
Imagine living in a funeral home being told you will one day run it. Imagine being able to wake the dead and not understanding why. Imagine waking one person up from their eternal slumber, but they don't want to leave. This is a reality for Georgia Richter.

This novel takes us through a journey of grief, friendship, love and post-traumatic growth. It's not one to miss.

Strong start by giving us basic character descriptions and showing rather than telling us what makes the main character unique. However as the story went on it became clear that the idea of the story was better than the story itself. Found myself getting bored and struggling to pick the book up. I don’t recommend this book for people who easily fall into book slumps because it’ll likely push you into one.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It was such an interesting story and I really liked that they put the trigger warnings at the beginning of the book. It wasn't an easy read because it dealt with death and anxiety but the author knew how to dealt with them. also it had ace and nonbinary rep !!! which is AMAZING and family dynamics and amazing friendships <3

I highly recommend this book!

Thanks, Netgalley for granting me an e-arc of this lovely book

This book is perfect for those who deal with existential dread & death anxiety, I honestly wish I could go back in time and give this to myself when I was a kid.

I wish I could write more about them but my notes from when I read this only have quotes that stuck out to me. but it was a calm and fast read and I loved the characters so much, I look forward to recommending this book to my friends and will be on the lookout at my local bookstores on release day.

16-year-old Georgia struggles with her relationship with grief and death - worsened by living above the family funeral home her parents run. It doesn’t help that Georgia can also raise the dead. With a single touch, she can wake the spirit of the departed and a second releases them. But when her dead classmate arrives at the funeral home, Georgia must help him with his unfinished business while reconciling her connections to death along the way.

Funeral Girl is a heartwrenching debut novel by Emma K. Ohland that chronicles death, grief, anxiety, betrayal and sexuality. This book was a fast paced read that had so much depth to it and covers so many important conversations.

I enjoyed seeing death and grief explored by a young protagonist dealing with so much anxiety about it while also fully immersed in it at home. Conversations about death can still be so taboo, especially to young readers, so this book was so refreshing to read and see that conversation unfold. Georgia was the perfectly set up narrator to tell the story, though I feel like the supernatural element of her ability to speak with ghosts was underdeveloped and almost unnecessary? I wish that had been explored more.

This book was well fleshed out in terms of plot. There is resolution to the storylines, the book felt wholesome and entirely whole. The characters were well written, they grow as characters and they breakdown a lot of important topics. It definitely read as a middle grade though, not a young adult. The writing was plain and underwhelming and almost a disservice to the book as a whole. I wish it had been elevated to a YA or downplayed to a middle grade, for it lingers somewhere awkwardly in the middle currently.

Overall, a quick, heartbreaking, wholesome and warm debut I would definitely recommend to young readers.

There are any number of positives about this young adult novel discussing death, anxiety, family, and coming of age - but while it had its moments it never sang to me. Georgia's learning to cope with her fear of death, and, consequently, life, never felt fully realized or explained - it was just something that happened to her, Just like I could never tell if her supposed gift was real or just mental illness that she worked her way through. On the whole, it was a much easier read than I wanted it to be.

This book caught my attention as a first because it tackles subjects that many readers might shy away from. There is a LOT going on in this novel—death, trauma, mental health, sexuality, gender roles, religion—and I frequently got the impression that some things were rushed, which isn't all that awful given how much Georgia is dealing with throughout the book.

I was delighted with the writing's overall handling of the grief process. Everybody grieves in their own way. Every person will experience grief differently. Some individuals will cry. Some individuals may scream. For other people, the void left by a loved one endures forever. You understand that people really do heal differently as you read about Georgia's loss and how she dealt with it in this book (no matter what they are experiencing, be it the death of someone close or unclose or a fight with a friend). In this book, there are no "hatable" characters. There isn't really a bad guy. No one is truly evil. There is no requirement for it. Just the knowledge that grief exists and that it is quite acceptable to experience it

The book receives a solid 4.5 stars from me.

FUNERAL GIRL is an incredibly heartfelt & bittersweet novel about a girl who is terrified of death. georgia is surrounded by death — she helps run her family's funeral home & has the ability to summon ghosts, which she uses to fulfill their last wishes. but when one of her classmates dies & she revives him, georgia is forced to confront her anxieties about death in a way she never has before. georgia is a brilliantly written protagonist; she’s an imperfect teenager who makes mistakes in her friendships & familial relationships, who finds her days consumed with spirals about the inevitability of death, and who sometimes feels out of place in the world as an asexual girl. and her story is one that will resonate with many, because above all else, it's a story about learning to cope with your fears rather than completely overcome them. about learning to open up to the people around you & let them be there for you when you need it. about learning to allow your thoughts exist in your mind, but not let them consume you. so even though this is a book about death, it's ultimately one about hope.

Funeral Girl is a story about death and grief.

Our main character Georgia is a teenage girl who lives and has been raised in her family's funeral home; the family business which started with her grandfather. She and her brother help at funerals and are expected to take over the family business one day.

Georgia, however, is still feeling the loss of her grandmother. And it doesn't help that whenever she touches a dead body, she can bring back the ghost of that person and have a chat.

And the one day the body of a classmate arrives at the funeral home, Georgia touches him for a chat and things don't go as expected from there.

An interesting concept. Georgia wasn't particularly likeable and I didn't think any of the other characters were either. I could have done without the pages that detailed how to embalm a body. Yes, I know that's part of the funeral home business, but I didn't need the gory details.

Funeral Girl is a story about grief and the fear of the unknown that awaits the human soul after death.

Sixteen-year-old Georgia Richter is anxious about dying, and this isn’t helped by the fact that her family runs a funeral home. And it certainly isn’t remedied by her ability to bring back the ghosts of the departed.

When the body of Milo D’Angelo, a classmate she wishes she knew better, arrives at her family’s funeral home, Georgia seeks out his ghost. In her bid to help him with his final wishes and help him come to terms with his own death, Georgia soon learns that while one cannot escape our end, we can make the time we have remaining worth living for.

By all intents, I should have loved this. It’s got ghosts, grappling with death, mingled and mangled family and friend dynamics, and the supernatural. Instead i was very underwhelmed. The plot moved too quickly, which never allowed a scene or moment to play out in a fulfilling way. Too many times Georgia would be in the middle of a potentially character growing scene, and all of a sudden she would literally run away from it and we were left with unresolved plot.

Unfortunately, I also never really connected with any of the characters, and most of them, besides Milo, felt very one-dimensional. There was never any more than one characteristic given to any character, and they didn't feel like they existed outside the realm of our main character. I did appreciate the non-binary and ace rep, and i felt the author did a good job of incorporating that rep in an authentic way that didn’t feel forced.

Overall, I feel like this was written for the younger spectrum of young adult, maybe tweens even, and i would recommend it to those in that specific audience. Those seeking something a little more mature and nuanced should look elsewhere.

It was so amazing, and heartfelt. I got it last night, and then didn't sleep and finished it this morning. It’s got ghosts and funerals and coffins and inner turmoil and existential dread and ace and nonbinary rep and complicated family dynamics and powerful friendships at the heart of it all. It reminded me of the book The Past and Other Things that Should Stay Buried, and I mean that in the BEST compliment ever. it's one of my favourite books!