{Review} The Dead and Buried by Kim Harrington

Title: The Dead and Buried
Author: Kim Harrington
Format: Netgalley e-galley
Publisher: Scholastic Point
Release date: January 1st 2013
Date Read: January 30th 2013
Rating: ✭

A haunted house, a buried mystery, and a very angry ghost make this one unforgettable thriller.

Jade loves the house she's just moved into with her family. She doesn't even mind being the new girl at the high school: It's a fresh start, and there's that one guy with the dreamy blue eyes. . . . But then things begin happening. Strange, otherworldly things. Jade's little brother claims to see a glimmering girl in his room. Jade's jewelry gets moved around, as if by an invisible hand. Kids at school whisper behind her back like they know something she doesn't.

Soon, Jade must face an impossible fact: that her perfect house is haunted. Haunted by a ghost who's seeking not just vengeance, but the truth. The ghost of a girl who ruled Jade's school — until her untimely death last year. It's up to Jade to put the pieces together before her own life is at stake. As Jade investigates the mystery, she discovers that her new friends in town have more than a few deep, dark secrets. But is one of them a murderer

Just so everyone knows, I'm trying to limit my cursing in this review because someone *glares accusingly at that someone who knows who she is* told me that I do that too much. I'll be substituting every expletive with the name of a fruit or vegetable.

THE DEAD AND BURIED is a book that I had really high hopes for since at that time, I seemed to think that I have pretty good luck with these sorts of books (I don't really have that good luck with mystery ghost books actually - I have no idea what I was thinking). However, THE DEAD AND BURIED really disappointed me.

The book actually started off really well, like many of the evil books do. The main character Jade was interesting and compelling. I really liked her gemstone hobby and the fact that she knew useless things about practically every gemstone was awesome. In case you don't know, I collect useless facts so this was right up my alley. 

So, I had this crazy idea that maybe, just maybe, the rest of the book might be great too.




Crazy idea, I know. I have no idea what I was thinking at the time. Obviously, not much.

The main problem I had with the book has the romance plot. It was just URGH no. Horrible. I suppose the best thing I can say about the romance was that the two loves interests weren't total mushrooms but that wasn't because they were nice and cute. 

It was because they were nothing.

No, what I hated about the romance was Jade. Jade turned into a complete orange when it came to the two guys. Minor spoilers ahead but nothing major really since the whole cheating scandal is treated like it wasn't cheating at all. 

Jade enters a non-relationship with Kane. Non-relationship because she tries to tell her dad that she's not dating him even though they go on numerous dates - I mean non-dates. Kane however thinks they're dating and so does everyone. I think Harrington was trying to excuse what Jade did by saying that the dates are "non-dates" even though she makes it clear that Kane thinks they are and so does every pickle-ing person in the whole town (even the dad).

She then cheats on Kane and with Donovan who insists that they not tell anyone. Donovan and Jade have numerous make out sessions all while Kane and Jade go on their "non-dates". On one of these non-dates, Jade goes to the bathroom to make out with Donovan before returning to Kane who calls her "his girl" and gives her hot chocolate. She accepts without feeling bad that she cheated on her boyfriend.

Next is a spoiler for the rest of the plot, not just romance. It turns out that the dead girl, Kayla, was cheating on her boyfriend with Kane and guess who is the boyfriend?

That's right: Donovan. 




DONOVAN. The guy that broke up with his girlfriend because she was cheating on him is making Jade cheat on her boyfriend for him. 

... I'm speechless. I'm banana-ing speechless.

AND GUESS WHAT THE BEST THING IS? 

Jade ends up with the apple Donovan. So guess what girls? It's ok to cheat as long as your cheating for a hot guy.

Ok, I've spent long enough detailing the romance. Onto the characters.

Characters

Jade started off really awesome but that awesomeness tapered until it hit rock bottom and didn't work on climbing back up - at all. After about 40%, Jade as an awesome character slipped further and further until I could barely remember that Jade was an awesome character at one point.

I've already detailed why I hate her somewhat so this will be a fairly short part but there are some other parts which made me see red.

Number one, she was hypocritical. She was saying how horrible a person Kayla the dead person was even though she copied some of those qualities in her own actions. As everyone says, actions speak louder than words. Judging everyone? Check. Cheating? Check.

The next part I hated was the slut shaming. Jade was saying how horrible it was that she slept around. It was obvious that Kayla wasn't a virgin and personally, I found Jade's words to have a minor slut-shaming feel to it. 

The rest are simple, everyday YA heroine occurrence which honestly, most of you know about already and there's no reason to talk about them. Pick pretty much any of my reviews and take the qualities from there.

The other characters were unoriginal and bland. I found no personality to them and didn't hate any of them really. Just disliking. No need to cover that really.

Plot and Writing

Plot

The plot mirrored the standard plot of basically every murder paranormal mystery there is - ever. 

- Girl moves into haunted house. 

- Girl goes to school and everyone is like "OMG she moved into zeh haunted house".

- Girl gets scared. 

- Someone (usually little sibling) gets possessed. 

- Girl needs to find out who killed ghosty. 

- Ouija board. 

- Kissing. 

- More kissing. 

- OMG THAT'S WHO KILLED GIRL?

Yup. That's it. Except sometimes, this can be done really well sometimes.

THE DEAD AND BURIED was not one of those cases however. It was done really really badly. And the murderer exposed scene? One of the worst I've ever read. Just terrible and I can't see the person's motive. Seriously people. It's like Harrington said "Umm... we gotta wrap this up quickly so... yeah, that person works. Let's make up some random backstory to it. And we're done." I’m not even overreacting. 

Writing

Not terrible, but not fantastic either. Horrible tension building and very little plot twisting. I have to say that the writing was engaging enough to keep me reading. I finished the book in a day because I just had to keep reading.

Likes and Dislikes

Liked:

- the beginning

Disliked:

- Jade
- plot
- writing
- everything

In conclusion

Definite not recommend. In fact, unless you're Ade and can't resist it, don't read it.

ps I made it through a review without any cursing. *party*

Lisbeth is an American teenager who blowing shit up in videogames and discussing decapitation in great detail. She's also obsessed with Oceana, but you're not supposed to know that.