"Love After Death!"

Raziela (Razi) Nolan is young, vivacious, and thoroughly enjoying life in the glare, glamour, and challenges of 1920's American prosperity. She's in love with the adventures and even the conflicts specific to her sex, who are just beginning to savor the potential of independent thought and behavior. So it's no surprise that Razi becomes part of the female rebels and takes part in women's first education about sex and birth control, an act that must be fully appreciated in its daring and potentially criminal/immoral implications of that historical period.

But life's circumstances unexpectedly cut off Razi's future. After hitting her head while jumping in a pool, Razi realizes that she has died but not completely left this earthly sphere. She is in that "between" state and chooses to remain there so she can experience what she missed with her relatives and friends, while being educated by other "in-between" spirits. What Razi really yearns for, though, is to contact the man she passionately loved while alive, to feel, communicate, and even perhaps to touch him and share his touch. The latter, however, is what she can never have as there are certain rules about her current state of existence.

In the days and years following, Razi attempts to find her beau by communicating through the material objects that he once loved. In particular an old desk now owned by a happy couple, Amy and Scott. What ensues is mysterious, shocking, and oh so poignantly bittersweet! For there are more secrets behind the surface romances that will eventually show their connected nature in a most shocking but oh so rewarding way!

Ronlyn Domingue has created characters who are fully engaging yet with enough depth of personality to totally intrigue the reader. The Southern setting is beautifully described in quaint, poetic prose that allows the reader to see, hear, taste, smell, and feel the era's romantic ambience. This indeed adds to the exquisitely portrayed relationships and story that may be reminiscent of The Lovely Bones but far surpasses that well known tale.

One note deserves repetition - Exquisite, Ms. Domingue! This reviewer is sincerely hoping for more of this finely written quality in the near future!

Reviewed by Viviane Crystal - March 14, 2006

Reviewed by Viviane Crystal
Courtesy Crystal Reviews
Posted March 17, 2006

In 1920s New Orleans, smart and fearless Raziela Nolan is in the throes of a magnificent love affair when she suddenly dies in a tragic accident. Immediately after her death, she chooses to stay between -- a realm that exists after life and before whatever lies beyond it. From this remarkable vantage point, Razi narrates the story of her lost love, as well as the relationship of Amy and Scott, a young couple whose home she haunts seventy years later. Their trials finally compel Razi to slowly unravel the mystery of what happened to her first and only love, Andrew, and to confront a long-hidden secret.