Review: Reviver (#1) by Seth Patrick

Title: Reviver (#1)

Author: Seth Patrick

Published by: Thomas Dunne Books

Released: 2013

Summary: Revivers, the next big thing in crime solving. Revivers are people blessed (or cursed) with the ability to bring back the recently dead for a short time. Since Revival has been discovered, and uneasily accepted by the public, Revival has become a booming business. Revivers can settle insurance claims, help families have closure with the death of a relative, and make solving violent crimes marginally easier. Jonah is a Forensic Reviver, he goes into murder scenes and brings back the victims in the hope they can identify their killers. Jonah is happy in his job because he feels like he has a purpose, that he is helping people. Then one revival goes bad, and Jonah feels a dark presence with him that won't leave. His superiors put it up to overwork, and give Jonah some time off. Then the body of Daniel Harker is found, the journalist who discovered Revival and brought it to life. Jonah decides to team up with Daniel's daughter Annabel, to find out just what happened to her father, and ends up embroiled in a far bigger web than anyone realized.

My Thoughts: I really enjoyed this debut work from Seth Patrick. I was drawn in just by the Acknowledgements alone, when he described how Edgar Allen Poe influenced the whole idea. The concept of the book was really intriguing and made for interesting reading.

There were some slow parts and a whole lot of information dumping in the first half of the book, but I could get through that because I was interested to see where the story went. That would have to be my only negative of the book.

I really enjoyed all the characters, there wasn't one person that I hated. Never Greary is probably the stand out character, followed closely by Marmite the cat. Jonah is an okay guy as well, maybe in the next book he won't be so mopey and depressed.

This was a very enjoyable read with a cool concept, likable characters, and an intriguing end. It's a little morbid, but I guess that's to be expected in a book where death is really the beginning of the story. I also found it very cool that this story will one day be a movie (or at least that was being discussed when I wrote this review. I'm not sure if the movie part is actually happening or has happened already). This is a solid read that I suggest to every crime fan out there.

BOOKCITEMENT LEVEL 3/5

Death Is Only the Beginning