Review of The Dead Girls Detective Agency by Suzy Cox

Title/Author: The Dead Girls Detective Agency by Suzy Cox
Publisher/Date published: HarperTeen, September 18th 2012
How I got this book: received it from the publisher as an egalley

Goodreads summary: Pop quiz: What would you do if you had to solve your own murder to get anywhere in death?

Maybe if I hadn't slept through my alarm, slammed into Kristin - my high school's reigning mean girl - or stepped in a puddle, destroying my mom's new suede DVF boots (which I borrowed without asking), I wouldn't have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and I wouldn't have been pushed in front of that arriving train. But I did, and I was.

When I came to, I was informed by a group of girls that I'm dead. And that because I died under mysterious circumstances, I can't pass straight over to the Other Side. But at least I'm not alone. Meet the Dead Girls Detective Agency: Nancy, Lorna, and Tess - not to mention Edison, the really cute if slightly hostile dead boy. Apparently, the only way out of this limbo is to figure out who killed me, or I'll have to spend eternity playing Nancy Drew. Considering I was fairly invisible in life, who could hate me enough to want me dead? And what if my murderer is someone I never would have suspected?

Guys, I was counting on this being a fun read, if maybe slightly macabre, and it totally was!

Charlotte is a pretty average girl who happens to be murdered on her way home from school. Yeah, I would be kinda pissed if that had happened to me. So I was kinda surprised that she wasn't! At least not at first. She took it better than I would have.
I liked that Charlotte really wanted to learn more about the business of being a ghost in limbo. There seemed to be a lot of limitations to being dead (aside from the obvious ones) and though I get that, I was wondering at some things, like ghosts not being able to cross water and I would have liked to have at least somewhat of an explanation about why that was. And who had made The Rules and enforced them. I could have done with a little more background there.

This book went into something you hear people say sometimes: how they wish they could see who would come to their funeral. While I haven't really thought about it myself, everything that Charlotte witnesses after she dies makes me wonder how well anyone knows their significant other or their friends, or their classmates. She'd been together with her boyfriend for 17 months and he still did things that surprised her.

But without going delving further into deep and dark things, the whole ghost thing and Charlotte getting to know the Dead Girl Detectives was pretty fun! And then there's the boy-ghost Edison, who Charlotte finds herself being frustrated with and attracted to, so he brings all kinds of conflict. I must say that I kinda loved Edison, he was snarky and had weird ways of showing it, but I believe he really liked Charlotte.

The ending felt a bit rushed and I was wondering at how few pages were left before the end and wondering how Suzy Cox would wrap it up nicely. She did, but I was left feeling a bit like the last chapter had been fast-forwarded and I would have liked it better if it had lasted a little longer.

This was such a quick read for me and had some laugh out loud funny moments. I could easily see this turned into a movie that 13 year-old me would have LOVED (also, I'd totally watch it now as well cause I'm still 13 inside).

My rating: 3,5 stars