Review: Hereafter

Title: Hereafter
Author: Tara Hudson
Date Released: June 7th, 2011
Pages: 404
Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Description:
Can there truly be love after death?

Drifting in the dark waters of a mysterious river, the only thing Amelia knows for sure is that she's dead. With no recollection of her past life—or her actual death—she's trapped alone in a nightmarish existence. All of this changes when she tries to rescue a boy, Joshua, from drowning in her river. As a ghost, she can do nothing but will him to live. Yet in an unforgettable moment of connection, she helps him survive.
 
Amelia and Joshua grow ever closer as they begin to uncover the strange circumstances of her death and the secrets of the dark river that held her captive for so long. But even while they struggle to keep their bond hidden from the living world, a frightening spirit named Eli is doing everything in his power to destroy their newfound happiness and drag Amelia back into the ghost world . . . forever.
 
Thrilling and evocative, with moments of pure pleasure, Hereafter is a sensation you won't want to miss.

Review:
Hereafter was more of a romantic story than a creepy story that was meant to scare you, with some mystery weaved in.  Originally, that's what I thought it was about since it is about a ghost after all, but it was far from that. 

The story centers around Amelia who can only remember three things: her first name, her age, and how she died, but not why she died.  She cannot remember a single thing from when she was alive, but everything changes when she rescues Joshua, the boy with the midnight blue eyes, from drowning at High Bridge which is notorious for its accidents.  The two almost immediately have a connection and as they spend more and more time together, Amelia starts remembering everything from her past life, her mother, her father, and eventually how she died.  But Eli, another ghost who haunts High Bridge, wants to keep her as an apprentice and drag her away from the mortal world that she has become attached to.

The storyline was really cool and was definitely not meant to scare you.  It centers around the love of a ghost and a boy and it was really sweet seeing the attraction grow.  Although, at times it felt a little weird because it made me think, "What if someone saw him making out with no one?  What would they think??" their relationship pretty much worked. 

Where Hudson set Hereafter was perfect as well.  The creepy bridge was perfect and the netherworld that she created seemed just as creepy. 

The thing that kind of threw me off a bit was the plot.  Sometimes, it dragged on a bit and it would get a little bit boring, so I'd start skimming a little bit.  It's not like it was a horrible plotline, but there were just a few things that were sort of not very attention grabbing.  Although, I really loved the whole romance aspect and the the story itself.

I found both Amelia and Joshua to be okay characters.  Amelia seemed like a really cool character.  She was kind of like the lost wandering soul, who was lonely, although sometimes, she would go into that sort of pouty girlfriend mode.  Joshua was pretty cool, too, with his midnight blue eyes, although I found it just a bit weird how he moved their relationship waaay too fast.  There was also one incident that really confused me.  He got really angry at Amelia because she randomly left him on accident, and it was just really... weird how he got sooo angry at Amelia. 

Hereafter was an interesting ghost story mainly concentrating on the romance with a bit of mystery intertwined.  Sometimes it would drag on a bit and I'd lose focus.  However, I think that it was a great story overall and I really liked the idea, so I'll be looking forward to seeing what happens in the next book, Arise!

Cover Review:
I absolutely love this cover!  The colors that they chose are just sooo calming, and now that I've read the book, I understand why they have the river in front of Amelia with the forest right behind it.  I think it's also cool how her dress becomes transparent.  It's a really cool cover overall!

Cleo :)

*Description and cover from goodreads.com
**Review copy borrowed from library.