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Dying for a Living by Kory M. Shrum
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And you thought dying once would be hard…
On the morning before her 67th death, it is business as usual for agent Jesse Sullivan: meet with the mortician, counsel soon-to-be-dead clients, and have coffee while reading the latest regeneration theory. Jesse dies for a living, literally. Because of a neurological disorder, she is one of the rare people who can serve as a death surrogate, dying so others don’t have to.
Although each death replacement is different, the result is the same: a life is saved, and Jesse resurrects days later with sore muscles, new scars, and another hole in her memory. But when Jesse is murdered and becomes the sole suspect in a federal investigation, more than her freedom and sanity are at stake. She must catch the killer herself–or die trying.
Dying for a Living is the first book in Kory M. Shrum’s gripping contemporary fantasy series. If you like page-turning action, tough as nails heroines, and perfectly-paced suspense, then you’ll love this “hilarious” and “supernaturally fantastic” ride.
MY REVIEW
Great new power, dying. Imagine a day-job where you take on someone’s death – prevent them from going through the door into the great beyond. But you have to go through all their pain right beside them, and no guarantee that it will actually work, if medical doesn’t get there in time to patch them up – because pain and damage is still a thing. You are just buying them time to get better.
Time from your life. Taking a couple days to a couple weeks to get better.
Would you go into work each day?
How about if your job is hated because of what you are? People want to come to you to have them save their life, but may try to end you otherwise because what you do isn’t natural. They want to be alive, but don’t want the unnatural around. Like voodoo or immigrants.
Overall a great beginning for a series and an exciting premise.
My problems with the story – both of these are personal likes and do not affect the quality of the story at all: (1) I don’t like the main character. She is totally believable – a person who lives in the moment, running from commitment because she might die (again) tomorrow. Her personality is a complete match to who she is and what she does, but I don’t like her personally. (2) The story also has one of my least favorite tropes: destined-one – but again, that is on me, and it doesn’t really play a factor at all in this first book of the series.