The Secrets of Lily Graves

March 31, 2014
Strohmeyer (How Zoe Made Her Dreams Come True) delves into murder mystery territory in a story helmed by 17-year-old Lily Graves, who has had a lifelong relationship with death. “I’d been warped, for better or worse,” she explains, “growing up in a funeral home and being lulled to sleep as a toddler by the whirr of Boo’s embalming machine injecting pink-tinted formaldehyde into the veins of corpses in the room below.” Lily’s goth-girl attire, fearless attitude, and knowledge of mortuary science help fuel an eerie story that opens with an aggressive graveyard confrontation instigated by Lily’s holier-than-thou classmate Erin Donohue, who believes Lily is after her boyfriend, Matt. Soon after, Erin is found dead, her wrists slit in a bathtub with “surgical precision,” and Lily and Matt both become suspects. Together, they attempt to find the killer, uncovering Erin’s many secrets as they do. Lily’s acid narration and proud outsider status are high points in what’s otherwise a fairly run-of-the-mill mystery, albeit one with enough twists to keep readers guessing until the final pages. Ages 13–up.

March 1, 2014

Gr 9 Up-Lily Graves is aptly named, living as she does in her mother's funeral parlor and working with her Aunt Boo to prepare bodies for burial. Erin, a fellow high school senior, rudely confronts Lily in a cemetery to remind her to stay away from Matt, Erin's on-again-off-again boyfriend. Though nothing more than chaste tutoring has happened between Lily and Matt so far, Erin is right to suspect they have a degree of mutual attraction. Complications emerge the next day when Erin is found with her wrists slit, and what was originally thought to be suicide begins to seem more like murder. Further difficulties arise since Lily's mom is dating the local chief of police and Matt is a prime suspect. Lily, her best friend Sara (a fan of television crime investigation shows), and Matt begin to investigate on their own, and find that Erin's virginal "good girl" reputation hides some darker activities. The overall tone of the book is that of a murder mystery/romance, and the occasional humorous parts (her mother's health-food obsession, a lighthearted exchange in the kitchen after the wake) feel out of place among the possible drug deals and death by embalming fluid. A secret about Matt's brother distracts from the main story without an appreciable payoff. Lily's gothic-style funeral home and her descriptions of how bodies are prepared for burial are interesting and seldom the topic of teen novels. Readers looking for something new and slightly macabre may be drawn in. Consider for larger collections.-Maggie Knapp, Trinity Valley School, Fort Worth, TX

Copyright 2014 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 1, 2014
Grades 7-10 Lily Graves has the perfect name, a fact her classmates never tire of reminding her. The women in her family run a funeral home, and Lily helpswith the cleanup, the funerals, and the embalming. Thankfully, her best friend Sara has her back, although even Lily finds her fascination with true crime a bit creepy. When Lily's tutoring of Matt Houser becomes more than book learning and Matt's gorgeous, brilliant, Harvard-bound girlfriend is found murdered in her own bedroom, Lily's life becomes even more complicated. Matt is a prime suspect and suddenly Lily is, too. Aided and abetted by funeral home, dead body, and burial information, Strohmeyer's light high-school romance morphs into something more sinister. Add to that assertive women navigating a male-dominated profession and police force, as well as possible sexual abuse and a conservative religious family, and you have an interesting yet easy read for a diverse audience.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)