{"id":1533,"date":"2013-09-09T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-09-09T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/booksyalove.com\/?p=1533"},"modified":"2013-09-06T07:01:00","modified_gmt":"2013-09-06T12:01:00","slug":"beautiful-decay-by-sylvia-lewis-book-review-her-touch-is-death-except-for-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/?p=1533","title":{"rendered":"Beautiful Decay, by Sylvia Lewis (book review) – her touch is death, except for him"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"book<\/a>Rot, mold,
\nputrefaction,
\nall in her touch.<\/p>\n

Necromancers<\/a> in current YA lit are a dime a dozen, but viviomancers?<\/p>\n

Sylvia Lewis’ first novel is a doozy, with Ellie facing her first possibility at love, online-only friends who can’t know her true nature, a sort-of-zombie, and supernatural corporation owners on a cost-saving (soul-sucking) quest.<\/p>\n

Grab this summer 2013 paperback now – you’ll never look at mold in the shower the same way again, ever (I promise).
\n**kmm<\/p>\n

Book info<\/strong>: Beautiful Decay \/ Sylvia Lewis. Running Press, 2013.\u00a0 [author info<\/a>]\u00a0 [publisher site<\/a>]<\/p>\n

My book talk<\/strong>: Ellie can’t let her skin touch anyone or anything, unless she wants rot to overrun it all. When a new guy at school seems intent on getting close to her, she realizes that this curse may be a gift… maybe.<\/p>\n

Even with gloves on, it’s dangerous for 16-year-old Ellie to be near people – dangerous for them, as the tiniest touch of her skin will cause any germ on or in them to suddenly multiply uncontrollably. The smell of bleach-water pervades her parents’ upscale house (they’re rarely home), and the queen bee clique at school bullies her endlessly (just out of her reach).<\/p>\n

Why Nate says that she has an “ability” instead of a terrifying medical condition is a mystery to Ellie, until she discovers that his touch has exactly the opposing effect of hers. She is a viviomancer and can make life grow abundantly, if she can learn to control her ability. So that makes Nate a necromancer, a death controller?<\/p>\n

Nate’s home life is even more distressing than Ellie’s, and her online friend Mackenzie has to make a personal appearance to rescue them both. That’s when things start to get weird…<\/p>\n

When the beetle walking across her hand stays alive,
\nAnd Nate’s mom isn’t alive, but isn’t quite dead,
\nAnd the factory bosses are sure that undead workers would be a great money-saver.<\/p>\n

A very different gift resides in Ellie and another in Nate, but whether they’ll live long enough to learn how to use them is not guaranteed in this paranormal with a twist.\u00a0 (One of 6,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com<\/a>) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rot, mold, putrefaction, all in her touch. Necromancers in current YA lit are a dime a dozen, but viviomancers? Sylvia Lewis’ first novel is a doozy, with Ellie facing her first possibility at love, online-only friends who can’t know her true nature, a sort-of-zombie, and supernatural corporation owners on a cost-saving (soul-sucking) quest. Grab this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,41],"tags":[90,22,4,11,20,5,37,18,40,44,43,39,38,27,15,9,21,35,33,3,8,28],"class_list":["post-1533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-paranormal","tag-abandonment","tag-behavior","tag-belonging","tag-communication","tag-conflict","tag-coping","tag-death","tag-family","tag-fathers","tag-friendship","tag-growing-up","tag-love","tag-magic","tag-medical","tag-relationships","tag-school","tag-self-image","tag-surprises","tag-survival","tag-teens","tag-us-author","tag-villains"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1533"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2614,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1533\/revisions\/2614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/booksyalove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}