Realistic Emotions

"This middle grade book handles death in an elegant, yet realistic way. I love how the lead gal feels everything is unfair. Just like most kids (and let’s face it us adults too) feel when bad things happen. To complicate things further our lead teen is able to see ghosts and 'collect' them just like her Mother and Grandmother (who lives with them). Therefore when an important person in her life dies she looks and hopes for their ghost to come to her. Death “Nobody wants to admit that death is something that eventually happens to everyone. ” In our world today, or at least in North America, we do not talk enough about death. There is a desire to avoid it, pretend it doesn't happen, or bury it in the ground never to be discussed again. It's silly when you think about it as the one thing we all have in common, if nothing else, is that we die. But due to the great unknown (and fear that comes from that) we tend to gloss over death and expect everyone to keep their feelings quietly to themselves. This is never a good option when it comes to mental health. I like that The Ghost Collector promotes discussion about death and how it feels when someone important dies. How do we 'move on' and close the gap they've left? What can give us closure or resolution to the trauma of someone dying (regardless of how they die)? Genuine Feelings I'm 37 today and you might think that I can't remember being a teen; but I most certainly do. As I have no children today and my teen years were a bit traumatic (although whose weren't?!) I have very vivid memories of my emotions at the time. One of the biggest things that I remember thinking as a child was that everything is unfair (for the record I still believe this to be true). Allison Mills does an excellent job of portraying this concept and shows it well in our leading gal. There is an attempt to sweep the death under the rug and so when she finally has an outburst with an adult about it her primary frustration is how unfair it is (and that she feels neglected). The emotions of our leading gal felt real to me; and even had me nearly in tears at one point (high praise as I'm not a crier). Ghosts The thing to perhaps be aware of here for some parents is that there is a prevalence of ghosts in The Ghost Collector. Mills presents them as obviously real and previously (very) human in nature. There isn't a lot of poltergeist or mean ghosts here; more animals, children, and a couple of significant humans. I personally love the ghost repertoire presented as it's (generally) in a positive light. The ghosts aren't there to be a nuisance or scare anyone; they have just lost their way and need help finding it. Overall By the end of the story we see our leading teen go through a transformation; both physically and mentally. I love the symbolism given to the cutting of her hair. This is something I did at 19 in order to try and restart my adult life on a better, less dangerous path. Mills uses the physical cutting of our gal's hair as a way to make that change apparent and tangible to the younger readers. I also enjoyed the musical references like The Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees, etc. This melancholy 70-80's music is the perfect sort of backdrop to the confusion, grief, and discomfort of being a teenager. Overall Mills does a good job of creating a space to talk about death, ensuring our leading teen grows and learns over the course of the novel, and does so without any romantic entanglements! Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review."

— MLadner (4/5)