The Next Thing I Knew, A Review

John Corwin is an up and coming writer with many titles to his credit but his most recent, The Next Thing I Knew, sounded so mysterious it was impossible to pass. 


When Lucy Morgan drops dead along with everyone else on Earth she refuses to take death lying down even if, technically, her corpse is. She drags her ghostly social life back from the grave and enlists her friends to figure out the rules of the afterlife. More importantly, they want to discover who or what killed everyone and why the heck anyone would do such a mean thing. What they discover changes everything and if they can't figure out how to put their newfound ghostly powers to work, humanity will be extinct for good. 


So good, right? So last week I embarked on the adventure and was I ever so happy. Here I detail the whole roller coster it gave me and how much fun I had with it. I hope you get stung by the curiosity bug and read it too. You won't regret it.


I'll start by saying: I really hope this is the first book in a series, otherwise I'll be forced to pull an Annie Wilkes stunt and hijack me a writer. Boy, is this book engaging! The story is very original, they way it mixes all kinds of crazy stuff like ghosts, faith, love, meditation, and even aliens! The author does a great job of making it all cohesive and interesting. The characters are personable, fresh and funny; I found a few grammar problems and typos but nothing that can take away from the very pleasant experience the story gave me. From the moment it starts, it grabs you and keeps pulling you in relentlessly, which was a problem for me since I was reading at bedtime. Let's just say I haven't slept much this last week. 

As engrossed as I was with the story, I didn't realized it was coming to an end; it was also aided by the fact that the story doesn't tide neatly its loose ends and it just ends. Like that. I was flabbergasted. I actually, wouldn't recommend to finish a book leaving your audience hanging like that; then again, if you're writing a follow up, you mostly have your audience trapped already but you should let them know, with a note or afterword, that there will be more. If a second book comes out, I'll be the first one running to get my copy and if there isn't... well, I've told you my plan before. 

I totally recommend it, The Next Thing I knew is engaging, light, fun, exciting, and intriguing. The one serious note I have is, though the voices in the book are very young and feel very enticing, there are a few moments there where, either because of the vocabulary or because the scene being described, the book becomes not really oriented to young (I mean young) audiences. I consider this a bummer because the one group of people who could best identify with the protagonists can't join the party. Of course, this is mostly a matter for parents to decide but, as a mother of two youngsters, I would've loved for them to read it. They'll have to wait a couple more years, not much. 

All in all, a great experience you shouldn't miss. C'mon, what you're waiting for? Go get your copy!!


For more details on John Corwin and his works: Goodreads: John Corwin