All the Forever Things

February 1, 2017
This high school romance comes with a twist, as the protagonist's family lives in and runs a funeral home.Gabriella is 16 and has only one friend, her bestie, Bree, who works with Gabe applying makeup to the corpses. But Bree soon starts dating Bryce, a good-looking but crass football player who has taunted Gabe for years. Gabe cannot understand why Bree has abandoned their friendship to spend so much time with him. Meanwhile, Gabe meets Hartman, a new student in their school. Hartman confesses to being just as much of a nerd as is Gabe, but both are too awkward to move their relationship forward. Nevertheless, Hartman keeps turning up at the funeral home, trying to cope with his father's recent death. As Gabe becomes ever more frustrated with Bree's inattention, she and Hartman finally begin to break the ice. But when Bree wants Gabe to drive her party to the prom in a hearse, things begin to go wrong. Through Gabe's present-tense narration, Perry emphasizes her protagonist's distress over losing her only friend as well as her newfound interest in romance with Hartman. She does her best to navigate her "Graveyard Gabby" image--she's even bought into it with her cultivated Wednesday Addams image, an endearing quirk--but her understandable sense that life is fleeting hampers her ability to grow. Perry's cast is a predominantly white one. The funeral twist makes for an interesting and unusual romance. (Romance. 12-18)

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March 1, 2017

Gr 8 Up-If there's one thing Gabe knows she can count on, it's that she and her best friend Bree will never grow apart. Dubbed "Graveyard Gabe" by the obnoxious Bryce Johnson because of her family's funeral home business, Gabe thrives on her weirdo status-helping her parents out with funerals and cadavers, endlessly browsing vintage thrift shops with Bree, and absolutely loathing smug-faced Bryce. It's a comfortable world for Gabe until Bree becomes the object of Bryce's affection. Soon her friend is giggling and blushing instead of scorning. While Gabe attempts to choke down her hatred for her longtime nemesis, the new addition to their junior class, Hartman, may just be the brooding distraction she needs from her otherwise crumbling social life. Perry manages to give the whiny Gabe enough quirks to make her life interesting. Bree is a much more sympathetic character, balancing her gritty home life with the shock of the most popular boy in school showing her attention at the possible expense of a friendship. The plot becomes too predictable at times-disasters on prom night offer a convenient close to the friendship struggle. The life of a teenage girl who works in a funeral home initially seems like a compelling premise, but unfortunately Perry does not deliver a strong narrative to support the characters. VERDICT Purchase only where YA romance collections need to be refreshed.-Michael Marie Jacobs, Darlington School, GA

Copyright 2017 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2017
Grades 9-12 What do you do when your best friend in the whole world starts to fall for the one guy who has made your life hell since middle school? Gabrielle (Gabe) and Bree do everything together, including running a vintage fashion blog and providing cosmetics services for Gabe's family's funeral home. Bree helped Gabe reinvent and embrace herself as a Wednesday Addamstypebrooding, dark, death-obsessedafter egomaniac Bryce humiliated her in eighth grade. Now Bryce only has eyes for Bree, and Gabe is floundering without her other half, especially when she can't tell if she and new guy, Hartman, are more than just friends. Perry (Stronger than You Know, 2014) has crafted vivid, rounded characters who navigate complicated, mature questions about death and dying with sincerity. Perry struggles to find steady pacing, but her characters reflect the real hardships of long-time best friends, as Gabe cautiously admits, We'll never be the same Bree and Gabe again, and maybe that's okay. A layered novel about love and forgiveness in the face of loss.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)