Book review: Everlost by Neal Shusterman

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Description:
Nick and Allie don’t survive the car accident, but their souls don’t exactly get where they’re supposed to go either. Instead, they’re caught halfway between life and death, in a sort of limbo known as Everlost: a shadow of the living world, filled with all the things and places that no longer exist. It’s a magical, yet dangerous place where bands of lost kids run wild and anyone who stands in the same place too long sinks to the center of the Earth.

When they find Mary, the self-proclaimed queen of lost souls, Nick feels like he’s found a home, but Allie isn’t satisfied spending eternity between worlds. Against all warnings, Allie begins learning the “Criminal Art” of haunting, and ventures into dangerous territory, where a monster called the McGill threatens all the souls of Everlost.

In this imaginative novel, Neal Shusterman explores questions of life, death, and what just might lie in between.

Rating: 5 stars (out of 5)

Review:
Neal Shusterman's Unwind was one of my favorite reads of 2011, so I was excited to pick up Everlost. I thought the premise was interesting, and I found myself as intrigued with the realm of Everlost as the main characters were when they first arrived. Shusterman paints a vision of the afterlife with well thought out rules. The first quarter of the book flew by for me as I tried to understand where Allie and Nick were destined to spend the rest of eternity.

Then, the story turned into something different, a fairy tale that reminded me at times of Hansel and Gretel, Peter Pan, and Beauty and the Beast. Although most of Everlost wasn't the kind of story that I expected, it was still entertaining.

Toward the end of the book, Shusterman recaptured the magic of the afterlife again. The turn of events in the last chapters secured the book's 5-star rating for me. While not as good as Unwind, Everlost was another very good read that I would recommend to others.

I read this book as part of the Authors A to Z reading challenge. Next up: Ashes, Ashes by Jo Treggaiari.