WARNING: THERE MAY BE SPOILERS BELOW
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| “My heart broke when he died, split in half and fell down into my stomach or somewhere deep and muddy, and I'm still not sure where it is now. I hear it beating sometimes in my ears, or feel its fast pulse in my neck, like I do now; but in my chest, where it should be, it mostly just feels empty.”- Putting Makeup on Dead People, Jen Violi |
Since her father's death four years ago, Donna has gone through the motions of living: her friendships are empty, she's clueless about what to do after high school graduation, and her grief keeps her isolated, cut off even from the one parent she has left. That is until she's standing in front of the dead body of a classmate at Brighton Brothers' Funeral Home. At that moment, Donna realizes what might just give her life purpose is comforting others in death. That maybe who she really wants to be is a mortician.
This discovery sets in motion a life Donna never imagined was possible. She befriends a charismatic new student, Liz, notices a boy, Charlie, and realizes that maybe he's been noticing her, too, and finds herself trying things she hadn't dreamed of trying before. By taking risks, Donna comes into her own, diving into her mortuary studies with a passion and skill she didn't know she had in her. And she finally understands that moving forward doesn't mean forgetting someone you love.
Jen Violi's heartfelt and funny debut novel is a story of transformation-how one girl learns to grieve and say goodbye, turn loss into a gift, and let herself be exceptional...at loving, applying lipstick to corpses, and finding life in the wake of death.
I actually attempted reading this book a few years ago but didn't get far with it- the book and I didn't quite click for some reason. I put it back on my radar because of the funeral home lit mini series I'm doing and this novel is considered a staple of that micro-genre (there's going to be one more book added to this series for sure, and I'm debating on whether or not to write a full review for The Loved One. Let me know if that's something you'd be interested in. I also have a nonfiction companion book coming that I will read and write a review for).
Unfortunately, I'm afraid my original attitude towards Putting Makeup on Dead People was correct. This book and I just don't click. The thing is, I don't know if it's me or not. There's a certain something about the book that makes me turned off by it, a lack of subtlety or a certain... unrealisticness and this teenage wish-fulfillment quality that made me think Violi wished she had a best friend like Liz or a pair of handsome crunchy granola bars after her when she was a teenager. Donna felt like a book character, and did things that can only happen in the book world, like apply to mortuary science in the spring of her senior year and get in for the fall semester. Donna also wasn't a particularly proactive main character and it made it hard for me to like her as a main character. Liz just goes up to her and decided they were going to be best friends, Charlie just happened to have a crush on her, Tim just happened to like her, etc. Hell, even JB just happened to go up to her and talk about being a mortician. And that's all she apparently needed to want to become a mortician! She just decided to become one, without talking to anyone or even really thinking through the idea and taking the time to decide whether or not that's really want she wanted to do with her life. Hell, she didn't even talk to her family about it, the people who are presumably paying for this school.
There was a certain shallowness that overwhelmed the novel. None of the central conflicts or relationships felt anything but skin deep. Like her getting mad at her mother for dating again after her father's been dead for four years (her mother had quite the heel-face turn already, I mean she just decided to go to yoga one day and changed basically overnight). That should be a big, emotional moment, and while she does stop talking to her mom for some time, I can't feel any of the emotion behind it. Same with Donna's relationships with Tim and Charlie or Liz or basically anyone.
The best parts were hands down the parts involving Donna's job at the funeral home. They were interesting to read about and should be the focal point of the novel, but ironically enough, for a book that's literally called Putting Makeup on Dead People there's very little of her actually doing her job. Instead, most of the book is taken up by her spiritual journey or love life or family life, none of which I want to read about. It would be one thing if I was told to expect that in the synopsis, but I wasn't, and it wasn't like the spiritual/love/family stuff was a direct result of her funeral home job. No, it had more to do with her friendship with Liz than anything else, which made me think that Violi tried to combine two books in one, except one was an almost complete novel and the other was a story idea she scribbled on an old napkin.
I will say this, though, I really liked the final page of the book. I was unimpressed with Violi's writing style for the most part- it read like a "book" I would find on Wattpad and the sense of humor is nonexistent- but the ending was really pretty and reminded me a bit of the wonderful ending to We, the Drowned.
So, unfortunately it turns out that 2014 Laura was indeed correct and this book and I don't click. As a funeral home novel it's very underwhelming, as a regular YA book it's fairly typical and on the shallow side. It doesn't do anything bad enough to fail at either of those things, but it doesn't do anything particularly well either. It's a basic YA novel. I admit, I did give it a bit of a higher score than it probably deserved because, again I liked the ending and the funeral home parts, but other than that I'd advise you to skip this novel. Read The Dead I Know or The Boy in the Black Suit instead for the same basic idea but better.
There was a certain shallowness that overwhelmed the novel. None of the central conflicts or relationships felt anything but skin deep. Like her getting mad at her mother for dating again after her father's been dead for four years (her mother had quite the heel-face turn already, I mean she just decided to go to yoga one day and changed basically overnight). That should be a big, emotional moment, and while she does stop talking to her mom for some time, I can't feel any of the emotion behind it. Same with Donna's relationships with Tim and Charlie or Liz or basically anyone.
The best parts were hands down the parts involving Donna's job at the funeral home. They were interesting to read about and should be the focal point of the novel, but ironically enough, for a book that's literally called Putting Makeup on Dead People there's very little of her actually doing her job. Instead, most of the book is taken up by her spiritual journey or love life or family life, none of which I want to read about. It would be one thing if I was told to expect that in the synopsis, but I wasn't, and it wasn't like the spiritual/love/family stuff was a direct result of her funeral home job. No, it had more to do with her friendship with Liz than anything else, which made me think that Violi tried to combine two books in one, except one was an almost complete novel and the other was a story idea she scribbled on an old napkin.
I will say this, though, I really liked the final page of the book. I was unimpressed with Violi's writing style for the most part- it read like a "book" I would find on Wattpad and the sense of humor is nonexistent- but the ending was really pretty and reminded me a bit of the wonderful ending to We, the Drowned.
So, unfortunately it turns out that 2014 Laura was indeed correct and this book and I don't click. As a funeral home novel it's very underwhelming, as a regular YA book it's fairly typical and on the shallow side. It doesn't do anything bad enough to fail at either of those things, but it doesn't do anything particularly well either. It's a basic YA novel. I admit, I did give it a bit of a higher score than it probably deserved because, again I liked the ending and the funeral home parts, but other than that I'd advise you to skip this novel. Read The Dead I Know or The Boy in the Black Suit instead for the same basic idea but better.
5 out of 10
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