A hauntingly beautiful and deeply emotional read. The atmosphere was perfectly set, and the storytelling kept me hooked from the very first page. I couldn't put it down!

A hauntingly beautiful and atmospheric read. Sam Wilket does a fantastic job of balancing emotional depth with a chilling supernatural premise. The pacing was steady, and I found myself really rooting for the protagonist throughout her journey. It’s a touching exploration of grief and family secrets that kept me hooked until the final page. Highly recommended for fans of gothic mysteries!

It's thrilling when, with just her debut novel, A Good Daughter's Ghost, Sam Wilket has already cemented her place as a master of the horror genre. A richly-told and heartbreakingly-powerful story of a loss, family, and cultural belief, this unputdownable novel flips and exceeds all expectations while simultaneously doing what all the best contemporary YA fiction does: introduces teens to some of the coolest music from the 70s and 80s. A treat for horror fans of all ages, this book will compel you to listen through your dad (or granddad)'s vinyl collection while digging deeper into Chinese folk religious practices.

Truly, this story had everything I wanted for the type of ghost story it was trying to tell. It was a brilliant slow build to the terrifying concept of losing control of yourself, especially for a main character who spent so much time maintaining control in the face of sitations and people that were causing her a tremendous amont of stress. The tension was PALPABLE. I loved feeling like I wanted to burst out of my skin and scream on the main character's behalf, or imagining being trapped and aware while my body moved without my permission.

It also highlighted the true horrors of grief and desperation in the face of unimaginable loss. And loss, in so many ways, really was a truly strong theme in this narrative. Loss of control, loss of friendship, loss of your idea of someone, loss of your idea of yourself, and very real, physical loss of a person to an untimely death. I could easily put myself in the shoes of the main character, as well as several others, and I could just as easily sit back and watch all of the chaos unfold once that over extended rubberband of tension finally snapped each time it did.

The cultural aspects of this book were fascinating as well, and so was the look at what it meant to be part of a culture so thoroughly, but to not look like you belong to it, and to have both outside judgement and judgement from within your own self placed upon you due to this. The relationships in this book were deep and at the same time it showed how fragile they could feel when put under the right kind of pressure.

The only issue I had with it was that bullying in books and movies always seems so overplayed and unreal to me. But while I couldn't imagine some of the bullying here being real, the main character's response to it was VERY real, and that pulled me right back in when the sort of ridiculous things teenagers were doing started pulling me out. And to be honest, maybe I just had less inventive bullies than others when I was growing up? Either way, it was satisfying to see where things went with that.

I do highly recommend this book for anyone looking for a tense, supernatural, coming of age story about a girl getting to know herself and learning to trust her instincts while facing horrors that no one should have to face. Read it!