Thursday, January 14, 2016

THE DIRT ON NINTH GRAVE (CHARLEY DAVIDSON #9)

In a small village in New York lives Jane Doe, a girl with no memory of who she is or where she came from. So when she is working at a diner and slowly begins to realize she can see dead people, she's more than a little taken aback. Stranger still are the people entering her life. They seem to know things about her. Things they hide with lies and half-truths. Soon, she senses something far darker. A force that wants to cause her harm, she is sure of it. Her saving grace comes in the form of a new friend she feels she can confide in and the fry cook, a devastatingly handsome man whose smile is breathtaking and touch is scalding. He stays close, and she almost feels safe with him around.

But no one can outrun their past, and the more lies that swirl around her—even from her new and trusted friends—the more disoriented she becomes, until she is confronted by a man who claims to have been sent to kill her. Sent by the darkest force in the universe. A force that absolutely will not stop until she is dead. Thankfully, she has a Rottweiler. But that doesn't help in her quest to find her identity and recover what she's lost. That will take all her courage and a touch of the power she feels flowing like electricity through her veins. She almost feels sorry for him. The devil in blue jeans. The disarming fry cook who lies with every breath he takes. She will get to the bottom of what he knows if it kills her. Or him. Either way.

Release Date: January 12, 2016
St. Martin's Press
Charley Davidson #9
Review copy provided by publisher

Liza’s Review:

I have listened to the first 8 books in the Charley Davidson series from Darynda Jones. Lorelei King is the narrator and she has brought Charley and the cast of characters alive for me. However, I was given the opportunity to read and review The Dirt on Ninth Grave early, and could not pass it up. I'll be honest and say I had some issues with Eighth Grave and I needed to read The Dirt on Ninth Grave to get some answers.

I absolutely loved pretty much everything about The Dirt on Ninth Grave. It took me back to the earlier books in the series and made me fall in love with the series all over again. Charley is Charley even when she doesn't know who she really is. The fact that she is now Janey didn't change anything about her character. She is still totally ADD, in love with coffee and willing to put herself in harms way to help people she has come to care about. I loved that even though she had no idea who they were, Reyes, Cookie and Uncle Bob all came to Sleepy Hollow to be near her. 

I loved that Janey and Cookie were immediately best friends, and laughed out loud every single time Cookie called her Charley and tried to come up with a reason why. My favorite was telling her that was the nickname she calls her husband Robert. I loved that Ubie was there for Charley and that she instinctively gave him and new nickname as Bobert without realizing why she gave him one. I loved that Reyes was there to watch over and protect her and man even when she didn't realize who he was, Charley still had such a pull to him.

Of course Janey being Charley, she is going to put herself in a situation where she is going to need all the help of her friends to get out of it. Honestly, I really thought the story line was so streamlined with The Dirt on Ninth Grave that I enjoyed it more. Charley does have a tendency to jump all over the place but really only focused on the here and now for the most part. Her figuring out she could see dead people and they could pass to the other side through her was both funny and heartbreaking at times.

I loved that the amnesia storyline was wrapped up within one book. I love Charley and her friends when they all work together to work cases and keep the world safe. I think while I found her amnesia refreshing as she stayed on point more often, it would have gotten old had it gone longer than one book. I loved we learned more about the Gods on each plane and there wasn't so much new information I couldn't keep up.


I will say Ms. Jones made me cry my eyes out on more than once occasion with The Dirt on Ninth Grave, so make sure you have tissues ready when reading or listening to the story. The Dirt on Ninth Grave gave me all the feelings I had at the beginning of the series and might just be my favorite book in the series to date. I am now more excited than ever for the release of The Curse of Tenth Grave in June.

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