Review - If I Die by Rachel Vincent

The entire school's talking about the gorgeous new math teacher, Mr. Beck. Everyone except Kaylee Cavanaugh. After all, Kaylee's no ordinary high-school junior. She's a banshee—she screams when someone dies.

But the next scream might be for Kaylee.

Yeah—it's a shock to her, too. So to distract herself, Kaylee's going to save every girl in school. Because that hot new teacher is really an incubus who feeds on the desire of unsuspecting students. The only girls immune to his lure are Kaylee and Sabine, her boyfriend's needy ex-girlfriend. Now the unlikely allies have to get rid of Mr. Beck…before he discovers they aren't quite human, either.

But Kaylee's borrowed lifeline is nearing its end. And those who care about her will do anything to save her life.

Anything.

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And I thought My Soul to Steal was an emotional rollercoaster! The fifth instalment in Rachel Vincent’s Soul Screamers series is the most emotionally wrenching yet, which isn’t surprising, considering Kaylee learns early on that she’s next on the reapers’ hit-list: she has less than a week to live.

Kaylee is trying to make things work with Nash again whilst trying to stop his ex, Sabine, from sabotaging their relationship – but the last thing she expects is her life to suddenly get an expiry date. It’s heartbreaking to watch the reactions of the people she loves and their desperate attempts to find a way around it – but there’s no breaking free of a reaper’s list. Meanwhile, Kaylee is also trying to stop an incubus from preying on the girls at her school.

I really feel that Kaylee came into her own as a character in this book, both in the way she deals with her own oncoming demise and in the way she is forced to confront something else that has been staring her right in the face all along. Tod’s always been my favourite character (mainly due to his bringing a much-needed laugh to otherwise depressing moments!) but in this book…well, I’ll avoid spoiling it for anyone who hasn’t read the series!

The tone of this book is undoubtedly bleaker, but the story is as gripping as ever, and I absolutely couldn’t relax without finding out how it ended!

Conclusion: this series probably isn’t healthy for me, and I ought to go and read something cheerful now…

Rating: *****