⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I’m honestly surprised I enjoyed this one so much. It carries the same spastic, complex, fun, shocking vibes of films like Knives Out and Ready or Not. It’s a mixture of genres including paranormal, queer, and romcom.

A well-blended, slightly chaotic, completely FUN read where a pre-surgery trans man, Ezra, navigates his mother admittance to an affair with the rabbi’s wife, his family’s funeral home on the brink of bankruptcy, and a new volunteer who catches his attention.

Oh, and he can also see dead people and his latest ghost is the dead husband of his love interest who keeps telling him to “fix it,” even though Ezra doesn’t know what “it” is.

So yea, this one is all over the place, and at 400 pages long, it can get a bit overwhelming. But kudos must be gifted to the author because all the plot points had a satisfying conclusion and I thoroughly enjoyed this entire wild ride.

𝙄 𝙧𝙚𝙘𝙚𝙞𝙫𝙚𝙙 𝙖 𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙥𝙡𝙞𝙢𝙚𝙣𝙩𝙖𝙧𝙮 𝙘𝙤𝙥𝙮 𝙤𝙛 𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙨 𝙗𝙤𝙤𝙠. 𝘼𝙡𝙡 𝙧𝙚𝙫𝙞𝙚𝙬𝙨 𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙢𝙮 𝙤𝙬𝙣.

This was such an emotional but well-written romance novel. As a not so regular reader of romance, this was a very welcome change. The queerness of this book was done just right and it didn't feel as if it was just there for the representation, or that it was forced. The chemistry between the main characters were just amazing. A very heartwarming read. (Original rating at 4.5 stars).

My soul feels so full after reading this delightful book! As queer and Jewish this book resonated with me deeply and brought me so much joy. The Jewish traditions that were represented were done accurately and with respect. The MCs queer identity was also done well with lots of honest moments and experiences that other queer people will relate with. I liked the paranormal aspect I wasn’t sure if it was going to be completely goofy or what but I thought it was the perfect balance of funny and emotional. I had a great time with this book and will be looking out for what the author will be writing next!

This book had A LOT Of different plotlines going on at once. While I did enjoy the queer representation and humor in this book, some of it was lost on me due to the sheer about of drama and other factors all playing into the story. I went in thinking that it would be romance novel and to me, that almost felt like a side plot to the family feuding and drama that took place throughout the book. I honestly thinking it could have been a lit fic just with the family spectacle that was on display.

I did enjoy the writing but it just felt like "too many cooks in the kitchen" as my mom would say. Thank you so much to Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for this eARC!

I picked this book up because I wanted a queer romance about ghosts. That’s not exactly what I got. The ghost element was pretty much an undertone in the entire book, an afterthought when it was sold as a main plot line. Heck it’s even in the title so you would think it would be given some page time, but sadly that was not the case. The queer element was there, Ezra is trans and is working on fully transitioning. I found this element fully developed and interesting. The romance element was also understated unfortunately. So, what was this book if it really wasn’t anything like it was labeled you ask? Well, it was a family drama. I did enjoy learning some Jewish customs. Ezra and his family are Jewish and own a funeral home and this was the focus of the story. Now had I picked this book up when I was interested in a family drama I may have different thoughts, but you can’t label this a queer love story and then hardly develop the love story, that just doesn’t work for me. The pacing was also incredibly slow, so much so that I would put this book down, and practically forget that I had read anything because I had little desire to pick it back up. I really wanted to know how this book played out, and that sheer stubbornness is what propelled me to finish, but in the end, I was left wanting for the story I was sold in the burb.

Rules for Ghosting follows Ezra as he reluctantly returns to work at his family's funeral home. It reminded me a lot of Dead Romantics, which is a personal favorite, so I was really excited to read this one.

This story had great characters, including an adorable dog that we actually get to see! I loved the found family aspect, all the roommates were so fun, I wanted more of their stories too. The family, particularly the siblings, had a heartwarming bond that was so lovely to read. Overall, I really enjoyed this book!

That being said, I did find the writing style a bit confusing at times, including a section in the beginning where Ollie is referred to as "her" then later in the same chapter called "him." It got clearer as it went on, but it did throw me off and made it a little harder to get into for a bit. (This was an arc read so hopefully it'll be fixed!) I also found the repetitive use of the phrase "he let him get away with a subject change" a bit frustrating. We don't need an announcement every time the characters change the subject during dialogue. These aren't things that should dissuade anyone from giving Rules for Ghosting a chance, it's a great read! 3.5 rounded up!

📖Book Review 📖
⭐️⭐️⭐️
#RulesforGhosting

Rule #1: They can't speak.
Rule #2: They can't move.
Rule #3: They can't hurt you.

This was a good book, with hard hitting themes (trans individuals, diverse LGBTQ characters, grief); however I struggled to get into it due to the 3rd person POV.

Overall it was a unique book, just was expecting more of a witchy/paranormal vibes.

Read this if you
- Like 3rd person POV
- Enjoy Family drama in books
- Are looking for books with a diverse LGBTQ cast of characters

Publication Date: Aug 20th

Thank you to Random House Publishing for the ARC

#booksofinstagram #bookreview #arcreader #arcreview

Prepare to break all of the rules and dive into the family business!

Rules for Ghosting is one of the most surprising books that I have read in a while. Not only was this a super tender and very sweet book, but it also tackled some very hard themes of grief, identity, and happiness. This book follows Ezra, a doula who has run to the other end of the life cycle to escape from his family's business, running a funeral home. Ezra when attending his family's dinner receives a massive bomb drop and his family implodes a bit. However, along with this, Ezra picks up some shifts are the family business and in so doing has the opportunity to get closer to Jonathan, a grieving widower. As Ezra starts to get closer to Jonathan he starts to see Jonathan's husband around every corner, breaking all the rules that Ezra has known about ghosts.

As I mentioned before, this is such a tender. story. I went into this expecting something a bit more on the comedy side of things but then came out with a feeling of the characters' catharsis. Ezra was truly written so well and I found myself falling in love with his character. I don't know when or how it happened, but I know readers are going to feel the same way. (#TeamSappho). Jonathan's character also is well-written and I just wanted nothing but the best for these two as they both dealt with their grief. And although this does tackle some heavy topics there is still plenty of levity and lightness in this. Some of the text message exchanges had me laughing out loud and I loved how Shelly Jay Shore had those formatted. They just were witty and cute and it felt like reading messages within my friend group.

Check this story out! You won't be disappointed! This is a perfect story for fans of The Pairing by Casey McQuiston, You Should Be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian, and Withered by AGA Wilmot.

Rules for Ghosting is an interesting and fun read. The story follows Ezra, a Jewish young man, as he navigates the fallout from a surprise announcement during the family Passover Seder and must return to the family business of working at a Jewish Funeral Home. To make matters more complicated Ezra can see ghosts which causes some issues with his relationship and job. This work is wonderfully written with moments that caused me to laugh, juxtaposed against beautifully written sad scenes where I had to take a moment to stop crying. This book has a lot of heart, and I thoroughly enjoyed the characters and the family relationships. I do wish the actual rules when it comes to the ghosts were a little more developed as it felt a little arbitrary, which I wouldn’t have given a second thought to if the book wasn’t titled Rule for Ghosting. This is a great debut novel, and I am excited to see what Shelly Jay Shore writes in the future.
Thank you to Net Galley, Random house Publishing Group, and Shelly Jay Shore for an early copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Don't go into this book thinking it will be creepy or scary because you will be disappointed. It is mostly about a Trans Individual and his family going through a lot of messy situations. Overall this book would be really good for a specific audience and some of the humor made me smile.

Rules for Ghosting exists at the center of a complex Venn diagram of genres: paranormal, queer, family drama, romance, comedy. It's the story of Ezra and his family and the family of friends he's building alongside. Ezra's a pre-surgery trans man who's spent his life being the problem solver for everyone in his family. He also happens to see ghosts—which partly explains why he fled his family's funeral home business early on. He's trying to give up his habit of fixing everything—and apologizing for everything—and is at the start of a potential romance with a dreamy man. A dreamy man whose husband died a year ago, and that husband's ghost has been appearing to Ezra, asking Ezra to "fix it," but what "fix it" means is unclear. Add to that an early scene played out on the first night of Passover: Ezra's mom reveals that she and the Rabbi's wife have been lovers for years and want to leave their husbands to live together. There are yet more complications, but this gives you a taste of the ground Rules for Ghosting covers.

I love a book with an interesting premise and Rules for Ghosting is definitely that. Shelly Jay Shore writes the way some jugglers juggle, keeping a mix of chainsaws, hearts, family memories, bottles of wine, risks taken and risks fled, and a very large dog up in the air simultaneously. At times, this becomes a bit exhausting for the reader, but the exhaustion is well-balanced with the unfolding of the book's characters and the challenges they face. One I started, I knew I wouldn't be putting it down.

If you're looking for a good beach read that offers a sort of 21st Century queer comedy of manners, Rules for Ghosting is your book. Maybe you haven't been looking for such a book, but take a moment to ask yourself "should I start looking?" If the answer is yes, then, again, Rules for Ghosting is your book.

I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via NetGalley; the opinions are my own.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. I enjoyed this book and think you will to.

The biggest thank you ever to Random House for this eARC! Never in my life has a book so accurately reached into my heart and my soul and hurt me so personally. "Being raised the Eldest Daughter Transcends Gender" Hey!! Quiet Down!! Ezra feeling the need to fix everyone's problems despite and at the expense of their own well being. The middle child/eldest daughter (gender neutral) of it all was just so knife to the chest accurate. And the pain of the supernatural element, the self contained secret, the quiet grief, the need to keep people at an arms length so they can't get close enough to get to you know you and be let down by you. WOAH. It was so excellent and poetically written it almost made me angry with how much I loved it. How dare a book be this beautiful and this well balanced how very dare.

When I first began this book I couldn’t believe that it was a debut novel. That being said, I wasn’t really sure what to expect but, it was simply perfect. The dynamic between Jonathan and Ezra is top tier. I’m not one that is usually into books with a paranormal aspect, but this one may be the one that swings me.

This book had a lot of different representation in it: Trans, LGBTQ+, as well as different cultural aspects of Jewish customs surrounding death. This book was highly inclusive and that was one of the things that I really loved about it.

10/10 no notes!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for gifting me this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks to NetGalley for the eARC of this book! Rules for Ghosting, at first glance, sounds like a paranormal romance. The main character, after all, does see ghosts. Instead, it read like a sweet Gen Z contemporary romance.

The main character, a trans guy named Ezra, has to work at his family’s funeral home when his mom takes off. He is usually in the business of birth and life as a doula and yoga teacher, and now must help with the family funeral home he has been steadfastly avoiding. It’s hard when every hallway of the funeral home is haunted — sometimes by people he knows. Ezra meets a ghost at the funeral home who doesn’t seem to follow any of the usual rules. Then he meets the ghost’s widower, a handsome volunteer at the funeral home named Jonathan.

One of my favorite aspects of the book was the exploration of traditional Jewish funeral rites. It opened my eyes to a different way of dealing with death that I found fascinating.

The romance was sweet, but surprisingly straightforward, considering all of the family and personal drama that Ezra and Jonathan both faced. I love to see trans characters out there in the world, and the found family aspects were beautiful as well.

I give it 7/10 stars, and recommend it to all lovers of contemporary romance!

As someone who grew up with family in the funeral industry, I could not have requested this ARC fast enough and WHEW did it deliver.

Ezra is our hero - a trans Jewish guy who is white-knuckling it through keeping his family together through a crazy tumultuous time. Further complicating matters, he's having to return to work at his family's funeral home, and has been able to see ghosts since he was a little kid. The slow-burn feelings for the handsome widower who keeps popping up in his life are just the cherry on top of Ezra's chaos.

While there is a LOT going on in this story, it's a beautifully interwoven story about grief, family dynamics, and growing into your own identity. The romance is incredibly sweet and swoony, but I was truly kept on my toes by all the other building storylines as well. I loved it, and would wholeheartedly recommend to anyone looking for a fun, queer romance that dabbles in chaotic subplots.

Me being me I saw the cover and immediately requested this, thinking it was a YA! (No I did not read the blurb, I never do 😂)
But honestly, for me the cover is not giving adult romance? Well, it is and I still really loved it.

Ezra is a Jewish trans guy who can see ghosts ever since he was a young kid. Not the best superpower to have when your family owns a funeral home since generations. But when he starts seeing a ghost who can do things no other ghost ever did before, his job at the queer community center gets put on hold for weeks and his family implodes at Seder things get a little…much.

This book really wasn’t mainly focussed on the romance part, it was more a contemporary book about family, especially the experience of growing up as the oldest daughter of the family in a family that doesn’t talk about anything serious. I could relate to SO many things that happened in this book it was ridiculous! Reading this book was kinda bringing up trauma and healing at the same time.

For a book with death as a main theme it was also surprisingly funny and heart warming.
I loved the queer friend group (they were all roommates), the sweet slow burn romance and the amount of jewish culture in this. Especially the experience of second generation immigrants was described so well. The guilt you feel whenever you give up something your grandparents did, but just doesn’t feel right for you. This was all done so well and in such a wonderful prose.
I highly recommend reading this if you love books about messy family’s who still love each other, mature communication in a complicated relationship and ghost stuff.

Title: Rules for Ghosting
Author: Shelly Jay Shore
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Publication Date: August 20, 2024

My rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

“To save his family's failing funeral home—and his own chance at a queer love story—a reluctant clairvoyant must embrace the gift he long ignored in this poignant and tender debut.”

This was a phenomenal debut novel. The pacing and development of the story was fantastic. This is a story about family, love, identity, death, grief, and embracing your queerness. I enjoyed reading about Ezra and his complex family and friend dynamics. All of these characters felt extremely fleshed out and real. I really appreciated the amount of detail and attention that was given when it came to their cultural and interpersonal dynamics, which only helped to create these real, complex characters that were a joy to read. I’m not entirely sure what I was expecting when I started this book, but I was pleasantly surprised and would recommend this book. I will for sure be rereading this in the fall!!

Thank you to the publisher, author, and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest rating and review.

Thank you so much NetGalley and Random House for providing me with this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

I enjoyed this book for the most part, I just felt as if the blurb and marketing didn't do it justice. I really enjoyed our MMC Ezra constantly being the glue that kept his family together, and the struggle with his gender identity and queerness was incredibly relatable and well-written. The family dramas and dynamic felt the most dynamic and fleshed out for me in this story, it was what I enjoyed most—perfectly tying in their culture and interpersonal relationships to portray their flaws and shining personalities.

However, this book's multiple subplots seemed to muddy the water for me. I couldn't fully enjoy the romance aspect after the beginning sections because of how many plots I was juggling to track all at once. I felt as if the overarching story got lost in the detail and over-explanation. It was difficult to stay invested and to care about the forces driving Ezra as a character.

Once again I am incredibly happy with the queer and trans representation that was done beautifully and not a side plot to be thrown in off-handedly!

In the grand scheme of things I think the marketing let me down and I know there will be many others who love this book and will find it to be their soul match!

Once again thank you so very much NetGalley and Random House for allowing me to read this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

Rules for Ghosting
by Shelly Ray Shore
3.5⭐️

This is definitely not what I expected when I picked this arc, I thought this was going to be a witchy/paranormal romance but this turned out to be more of a fiction book about family dynamics and death/grief with a romance subplot. Marketing aside, this was a surprisingly good love story, again not something that I’d normally pick but it was hard to put down once I started reading. Ezra and Jonathan had a beautiful love story but for me it falls under sweet and gentle love, they were both what each other needed at the right time.

This book was written and paced well, no issues other than it was marketed different than how it reads (also the cover is amazing but doesn’t match the tone of the book). Also I feel like the mom was forgiven a bit too fast (for cheating for so long) but then again staying mad never changes anything.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing for this arc!