The Ghost and the Goth

Title/Author: The Ghost and the Goth (The Ghost and the Goth #1) by Stacey Kade
Publisher/Date published: Hyperion, June 29th 2010
How I got this book: own it

Goodreads summary: "After a close encounter with the front end of a school bus, Alona Dare goes from Homecoming Queen to Queen of the Dead. Now she’s stuck as a spirit in the land of the living with no sign of the big, bright light to take her away. To make matters worse, the only person who might be able to help her is Will Killian, a total loser outcast. He alone can see and hear (turns out he’s been “blessed” with the ability to communicate with the dead), but he wants nothing to do with the former mean girl of Groundsboro High.
Alona has never needed anyone for anything, and now she’s supposed to expose her deepest, darkest secrets to this pseudo-goth boy? Right. She’s not telling anyone what really happened the day she died, not even to save her eternal soul. And Will’s not filling out any volunteer forms to help her cross to the other side. He only has a few more weeks until his graduation, when he can strike out on his own and find a place with less spiritual interference. But he has to survive and stay out of the psych ward until then. Can they get over their mutual distrust — and the weird attraction between them — to work together before Alona vanishes for good and Will is locked up for seeing things that don’t exist?"

So, as I've also heard other people mention this book isn't meant to be deep. It's not. And that's completely fine with me, cause it was such a cute, relaxing read!

The ghost-lore in this book is pretty straight forward: some people linger after their death and Will can hear them and around him, they become solid. As in they can touch him and other things when they're near him. Though Will tries as hard as he can to keep this hidden. Cause, guess what, dying doesn't mean people get easier to handle. They all want something and have unfinished business and the only one able to hear them is Will.

I just loved both main characters. With every chapter you switch between their POV and it works. Alona is so snarky, it was hilarious! But that's not all there is to her, she's also smart and if she tries (really hard) she can be nice. And her life wasn't exactly the walk in the park it seemed like from the outside.
Will is a little rebellious, but underneath he is a good guy. A really good guy. Oh, and the title is sort of wrong: he's not a goth. He even says so himself, but I guess The Ghost and the 'boy-who's-not-actually-goth-but-perceived-as-such' doesn't make for a nice title.

Anyway, this was a quick, fun read and I'm looking forward to finding out what happens next for Alona and Will!

My rating: 4,5 stars