You Had Me at Halo by Amanda Ashby

OKby Carriebear

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June 29, 2009: Started off pretty good, but by the middle of the story I just lost interest. The story kind of drags on.

Amanda definitely had me at "Halo"by Phoebe_Jordan

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January 18, 2009: I found out about newly published author Amanda Ashby through the amazing website/blog called Free Book Friday, that is founded by author Jessica Brody. I'm so glad that I read and even heard the wonderful podcast interview of Jessica and Amanda about her first novel You Had me at Halo. Listening to the podcast about how Amanda came to write her first novel was so wonderful to listen to and understand how the concept come to be. I had to find out more about this novel and to get it immediately so I can read it. I also recommend that you all listen to it also so you can decide for yourselves if you agree with me about this book and Amanda Ashby's inspiration for writing it. I'm glad that I bought this book because it didn't disappoint and now I'm a fan of Amanda Ashby's work and I look forward to any of her future novels. Especially since I found on her website that she will have a Young Adult novel called Zombie Queen of Newbury High, about high school kids and zombies, which is a wonderful combination in my opinion.


Now for the book I thought that Holly Evans is such a wonderful character that needed a reality check and her dying and then coming back in a man's body is a BIG reality check. Holly seemed like a self-involved person with only her own personal gain on the top of her list and she doesn't seem to notice anyone who isn't of her status level. So here comes in Vince Murphy the computer geek who use to be friends with Holly when they were children until he moved away. They also work for the same company but don't hang with one another because they are both in totally different status levels at the company. These two characters are very different but yet so much alike that they completely make a wonderful couple together but don't know it. Holly has some mortal baggage to unload first, starting with the matter of how she died because she drowned in her bathtub under suspicious circumstances, but she did not kill herself. Holly had too much to live for, from her recent promotion to taking the next step in her relationship with her boyfriend who also works with her at the company.


Her life had a few loose ends in her life but her heavenly shrinks wants her to resolve them before she can get into any of the upper levels of heaven. He says she has to return to Earth to straighten things out but the problem is, she?ll need to borrow someone?s body to do so, and the body in question belongs to none other than computer geek Vince Murphy. Although Vince was supposed to have vacated the premises, he apparently never got the memo because he was only unconsious for a couple of hours before he came too with Holly in his body. This was one book that I will always remember and will always treasure because it was funny, romantic and exciting to read. I really had a hard time putting the book down the entire time I was reading it and by the time I finished it I really wanted Amanda Ashby to have written a sequel because it looked like Holly's life was only getting more exciting at the end.

I Also Recommend: Zombie Queen of Newbury High, Fidelity Files.