Over My Dead Body by Sweeney Boo

 
Over My Dead Body by Sweeney Boo
My Rating: ★★★★

I received a copy from HarperCollins Children's Books through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Younwitty, a secret school of witchcraft, is getting everything ready for their Samhain celebrations. It’s the day that the veil between the living and dead is at its thinnest, and it’s a spectacular day for the school and coven to celebrate all night long. When a student named Noreen goes missing, it weighs heavily on many of the students, especially Abby Younwitty. Noreen is the closest thing to family she’s ever had, and now she’s missing after going into the forbidden forest. Determined to find Noreen, Abby is willing to do anything she can to find her friend and bring her back safely, even if it means she’ll be kicked out of the coven.

I absolutely loved this book! We follow Abby, a witch senior foundling of Younwitty, and her familiar, Seymour. While she likes to sleep in and is often late getting to where she needs to go, no one can say she’s not 100% devoted to her friends. It’s why she’s willing to face getting kicked out of the coven if it means she did everything she could to find Noreen. I love Abby and Seymour and would love it if we got a second installment, but it appears that this will most likely be a stand alone book.

Other than Abby and her familiar, we also see a lot of her friends, Goldie and Enver. While they are both devoted friends, neither are willing to put their necks on the line when it looks like the investigation is way out of their league. We also frequently see Abby’s roommate, Violet, who strongly dislikes Abby. There’s also the school staff, which includes Goldie’s father and the strange groundskeeper who unintentionally spooks many of the students. One of the things that I love about the characters is that there is a lot of character growth throughout the story, especially for a few characters in particular. I also found that many of them were relatable in different ways, making them even more realistic.

I did find that there were some similarities to Harry Potter. There’s the forbidden forest that everyone is banned from stepping foot in, a groundskeeper that seemingly doesn’t like anyone, ghosts that will go out of their way to bother students if they are out after curfew, and a protagonist who is willing to stick their nose where it doesn’t seem to belong if it means it’ll help someone in addition to solving a mystery.

However, that’s where the similarities begin and end. The remainder of the book is different down to many of the characters with the surname Younwitty. These characters are each a foundling, which are magical people born to non-magical folks. Foundlings do not know their biological families, and because of this, Noreen Younwitty and all of Abby’s other friends are the only family that she’s ever had. It makes me sad that foundlings never got to know their biological family.

I’m curious to know how the process of being taken in by the coven and school goes, but it’s not information that we are given. This is where headcanon comes in, but I’d love it if we got another book set in the same world that covers this even if it meant we didn’t follow Abby and her friends again. All in all, this was a wonderful read, and I’m excited to check out more of Sweeney Boo’s books in the future.