Bless Your Heart

Bless Your Heart by Lindy Ryan is not a book for rushing to the end; it’s the kind of book that invites you to come in and stay for a while. It may invite you  to have a seat on the porch and ask you if you want some cornbread and buttermilk, and you'll say no you don't like buttermilk but could you have it with regular milk, and it'll look at you,  shake its head a little bit, but it'll get you regular milk - whole milk, none of this skim milk that’s basically water, and definitely not oat milk or almond milk or any other tree milk, and it’s no use saying, but, I’m vegan because you know that cornbread was made in a cast iron skillet seasoned with lard.

That really got away from me, but that’s what happens when you spend time with four generations of Southern women who don’t let a little thing like running a town’s funeral home while protecting said town from a restless dead or two detract from their manners.

Bless Your Heart by Lindy Ryan  is what would happen if Designing Women (look it up, kids) had a baby with Buffy, the Vampire Slayer (the show, not the character).

It follows the Evans family, four generations of women - Ducey, Lenore, Grace, and Luna working in their family-run funeral home - while protecting the town from the Strigoi - in this context, basically a vampire/zombie. It is set in a small southeast Texas town in 1999, and it is funny, surprising, a little scary, even a little sad. Ryan does a beautiful job building this little world and letting us get to know the characters in it.

The minute the book was over, I put the second one in hold at my library, and I can’t wait to spend more time with them.

Note: I listened to the audiobook narrated by Stephanie Németh-Parker who did an excellent job giving the characters, in particular the Evans women, distinct voices without resorting to caricature. Excellent production!

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for the audiobook for my honest review.

Support your favorite indie bookstore (and me) by using my link to order the audiobook from https://libro.fm/referral?rf_code=lfm60355 OR if you prefer using your eyes to read, support your favorite indie (and give us both 20% off if it’s your first purchase) by using my link at https://refer.bookshop.org/candidanorwood.