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The dead are quiet and ready to step into the light. The living are the ones who will bite you in the ass when you least expect it. That’s the ultimate lesson unsuspecting Nicki Styx learns after a near-death experience leaves her with the uncanny ability to see ghosts.

I idly plucked Dead Girls Are Easy from my bookshelf while trying to forget the load of dishes and hot, soapy water waiting to terrorize my hands once again. I’d picked it up during a recent weekend jaunt to the Springfield, Mo., Borders store, which as the best selection of books and a chai to die for.

I thought I’d just thumb through the pages, skim a little, and set it down for later tonight, when reruns and the threat of Swingtown commercials invaded by solitude. But after gorging on the opening scene, I could not put this book down. A few hours later, my romantic, yet ghoulish mind sated by the first in the Nicki Styx series, I finally found myself at a sink of cold water with barely a bubble to be found.

Nicki Styx is the adopted daughter of a now-dead Atlanta couple. Her best friend is gay, her style is a cross between vintage and goth, and she runs a vintage clothing store. Nikki meets hot doc Joe Bascombe (yummy) after she nearly dies in his ER. They immediately connect, but Nicki knows her life is about to change in a big way. She’s sent back from the Light on a mission: to help dead people right wrongs.

But that’s not all. Nicki’s going to learn some seriously weird – and personal – stuff as she battles a voodoo curse, a bargain with the devil and some really hot feelings for the man who puts McDreamy to shame.

Dead Girls is funny, fast-paced, with a dash of suspense. The author manages to create a tunnel of twists and turns that make readers glad they aren’t have the day Nicki Styx is. Seriously, you will NOT see some things coming, and you will wonder just how often author Garey sat at her PC and said, “What else can we dump on Nicki today?” The series is like Ghost Whisperer with a sense of wicked humor.

Garey’s novel falls in the category of the Casey Daniels’ Pepper Martin, P.I., and I guarantee fans of that series will devour each and every word of Garey’s hilariously ghoulish novel. The great thing about it is this series has stylistic, character and plot differences so great that they are not a cookie-cutter copy of Daniels’ series. It stands out all its own. With such a strong beginning, readers will expect a lot from the sequel.

The next installment in the series, A Match Made in Hell, is due out next month from Avon Romance, a division of HarperCollins. Garey will also be a featured guest on our book blog, The Redheaded Reader, the first week of August.

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