The Awesome

by Eva Darrows

Seventeen-year-old Maggie Cunningham is tough, smart, and sassy. She's also not like other girls her age, but then, who would be when the family business is monster hunting? Combat boots, ratty hooded sweatshirts, and hair worn short so nothing with claws can get a grip, Maggie's concerns in life slant more toward survival than fashion or boys. Which presents a problem when Maggie's mother informs Maggie that she can't get her journeyman's license for hunting until she loses her virginity.

Something about virgin blood turning vampires into pointy rage monsters. Blood and gore and insides being on the outside and all that.

Maggie's battled ghosts and goblins and her fair share of house brownies, but finding herself a boy - fitting in with her peers - proves a much more daunting task than any monster hunt. Did you know normal girls don't stuff their bras with holy water balloons? Nor do they carry wooden stakes in their waistbands. And they care about things like "matching" and "footwear." Of course, they also can't clean a gun blindfolded, shoot a crossbow, or exorcise ghosts from a house. Which means they're lame and Maggie's not. Because Maggie's awesome. The Awesome, in fact. Just ask her. She'd be more than happy to tell you.

After she finds herself a date.

Genres: Young Adult, Fantasy, Paranormal, Horror, Urban Fantasy, Vampires, Humor

246 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2015

About the author

Eva Darrows is Hillary Monahan is also an international woman of mystery. Holed up in Massachusetts with three smelly basset hounds, she writes funny, creepy things for fun and profit.

Reviews

[Joe · Rating 2 out of 5]

Next up on what I'm not calling a jag or a marathon but might as well become the type of novel I favor from now on is The Awesome by Eva Darrows, in which a uniquely skilled but vulnerable woman is confronted by forces that would make anyone else squeeze into a locker and suck their thumb. Published in 2015, the outrageous and often flagrant storyline involves a teenage monster hunter in the present day whose only option for earning her journeyman's license and joining her mom on lucrative assignments is to lose the one quality that agitates creatures of the night: her virginity. This is a high concept that hooked me and is as good as the novel itself gets.

Our heroine and snarky narrator is seventeen year old Margaret "Maggie" Cunningham, who's been raised by her single mother, Janice. Maggie was first told at the age of nine what everyone in the world knows, that the "oogedy boogedy" things are real and that the nastier ones are exterminated by hunters like her mom. Janice takes her daughter on her first assignment at the age of thirteen: a poltergeist infestation centered around an antique vase. Nearing legal age now, Maggie aspires to follow in the family trade but can only earn the top contracts if she loses her highly potent virgin blood, a prospect that the home schooled, socially awkward night stalker feels should be simple.

Dolled up and accompanying her friend to a kegger, Maggie is introduced to a tall, dark and spiky haired boy named Ian. The 6'4" basketball player grows plastered as the evening progresses and lacks in conversation, but is deemed a suitable subject when he tells Maggie that he likes her and has a bedroom where she can complete her assignment in privacy. Ian manages to get a condom on and initiate Maggie's deflowering before passing out. Still a virgin the morning after, Maggie gives her would-be romeo a piece of her mind on the way out. Waiting up for her mother, Maggie is surprised by Janice's encouragement that she keep trying.

I gritted my teeth and shut off the television, fixing my eyes on the dead, black screen in front of me. "You realize it's totally screwed up that you're fine with me finding a piece of random ass, right? You should be going on some spiel about self-respect right now."

"Why's that?"

"I dunno. Most mothers would."

"Well, then most mothers think sex is shameful for a woman and I think that's a heaping pile of shit. As long as you're okay and your boy treated you right, no spiel. If he treated you bad, I'll cram his dick down his throat and watch him choke." She threw herself onto the couch next to me, and I got my first good look at the claw marks raking her face. Four gouges marred her cheek, crusts of dried blood and dirt mucking up the edges, the thickest one in the middle split so wide I wondered if she needed stitches.

"Oh my God. What happened?" I started at the injury, feeling faint that the top part of the longest cut was less than an inch from her eye.

"Werewolf. Help me clean it in a few? Not yet, though. Kinda want to sit around and eat Doritos with my daughter for a minute. Unless she's going to be a bitch and pick a fight because she's in a bad mood, in which case I'll go and eat Doritos in the kitchen and have a beer."

I twitched. She was right. This was the second person I'd taken my bad mood out on today, and she was the second person who didn't deserve it. Well, Ian kind of did, but not totally.

While Maggie takes her mother's advice to go out with Ian, Janice takes her apprentice around the nightclub Plasma where newly fanged vampires hang out, the idea being if any approach, they'll know the results of Maggie's coupling. A female vampire does smash into their van. Angered, Janice runs the vamp over and puts a silver bolt fired from a crossbow into its forehead. Maggie's taco double date with a sober and attentive Ian goes much better than expected, but when she returns home with her would-be lover boy to hear her mother in some distress, barges in to discover Janice in the throes of passion with a nice guy vampire named Jeff Sampson.

Upset at mom for embarrassing her in front of Ian and debasing herself with the undead, Maggie is easy pickings for two human ghouls who show up while she's home alone, wanting the apprentice monster hunter to come speak to their master, a vampire named Maxim. Turns out the vampire that mom fried in the street was someone to somebody and in the highly dramatic world of vampire politics, someone has got to pay. Maxim requests that Maggie stop Janice from filing paperwork on the slaying. She refuses at first, but accepting a Coca-Cola spiked with vampire blood, turns ghoul, granted special powers in exchange for loyalty to her new master, Maxim.

Janice brings home a teenage zombie named Lauren whose radiation treatments have risen her from the dead with far greater mental capabilities than they see in the walking dead. Janice observes peculiar behaviors in Maggie and determines that her daughter has been put under the spell of a master vampire, whose identity Maggie is unable to divulge to another living soul. Her tense relationship with Lauren relaxing, Maggie realizes she's able to tell the zombie everything about Maxim, as her new friend falls outside the norms of "living soul." Meanwhile, a paintball date with Ian goes so well that nothing can keep Maggie a virgin for much longer.

Ian worked his way from my chest to my stomach, and I was reminded of his drunken girl belly ramblings from the party. It made me grin in the dark, and I put a hand on his head, my thumb stroking over his brow. He pulled back and I heard some shuffling, then he climbed up over me to give me another kiss. His bare chest met mine, and I ran my fingers down the warm skin of his back. I liked how this felt, his weight on me. I liked that from our mouths to our bellybuttons were sealed tight against one another, like you didn't know where one body started and the other ended. t felt intimate. It felt good. It made me make growly noises I equated with livestock.

The Awesome has a terrific title and I initially liked Darrows’ irreverent, obscenity laden comment on the paranormal romance. She doesn't spoof Stephenie Meyer or Charlaine Harris but focuses on two of the biggest issues for a seventeen year old: her relationship with a single parent and her relationship with sex. Addressing these topics in a story about mother-daughter monster hunters seemed like a fun concept, but the novel itself is lazy and scattered and not well executed at all. Chuck Wendig provides a blurb for the (fantastic) cover and that should be considered a red or green light depending how you feel about his Miriam Black series.

I never find material about creatures forming clubs to be compelling; in fact, they tend to be rather silly and trite. Darrows makes zero effort to build a universe like Men In Black in which otherworldly beings exist and are registered by the authorities. How long have these laws been on the books? Why? What are the credentialing requirements to hunt monsters? Why isn't a federal agency managing this? Are there monsters all over the world? Where do the monster hunters go for their supplies? And wouldn't that have been a cool scene! Why would virgin blood agitate monsters? Why would there be any virgins left if so?

These questions and others were on my mind rather than the book, which Maggie's snark makes tedious after a chapter or two. The pop culture references (Twilight, Snooki, Justin Beiber) have already dated the novel, as well as upping its obnoxiousness. Worst of all is how lazy it is. Darrows is reluctant to follow Janice or Maggie on the job and passes up opportunities to develop them fully. We’re told how awesome these women are, but aren’t shown it. There's much repetition and filler--“okay" litters the dialogue, characters apologize repeatedly--and overall it is a promising but shoddy effort.

[❀Aimee❀ Just one more page... · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had so much fun reading this.

Is it high brow? *snort*

Did I laugh out loud frequently and read excerpts to my husband? So many times. Beware if you can't stand books with some crudeness to them.

Maggie is from a family that hunts the "bad" monsters that get out of line - ghosts, brownies, vampires, werewolves, and even leprechauns. This is a world that begrudgingly acknowledges these monsters and those that keep them in line. Her mom is training her to be a hunter as an apprenticeship.

"I would have asked more questions, but the ghost chose that moment to rush us to get to Ronald. It was the first time Id ever been run through, and let me tell you, you never forget having that particular cherry popped. It's like someone shoving a snow cone down your throat and a popsicle up your butt at the same time. It's hideous, the most invasive thing you can experience this side of the grave. It didn't help that freezing cold ghost goop smeared me from head to toe. My hair was plastered to my scalp, my clothes hung heavy thanks to lumpy black jelly.
"Holy shit! Gross!"
"Maggie!" my mother snapped.
"Holy crap! Gross!"
"Better."

She admits she is normal, nothing like most main characters in books. She is a little awkward, has a "normal" body, and has giggle inducing inner dialogue and snark. I love that Maggie isn't perfect and that the guy thinks she's amazing and sexy.

I had big boobs, which was good on one hand, bad on the other, namely because the weight of my boobs made them ooze their way toward my armpits. I'd seen the movies - women on their backs should have boobs pointed at ninety-degree angle at all times. We weren't supposed to go floppy and spready. Gravity wasn't supposed to do it's gravity thing. Gravity sucked. Fuck gravity."

She and her mother have more of a sister-like relationship. Her mother is pretty much the opposite of every mother stereotype out there, but it works for them.

"Around grade school a few of the boys decided it'd be cute to call me Margaret Cunnilingus. Mom says she knew I was destined for hunting greatness when I beat them up at recess, all the while screaming, "Do you want some more?"

This book was just so fun to read. I really needed a book like this that made me laugh so much. I'm looking forward to more from author Eva Darrows!

Please note that my quotes are from an advanced reader copy and may not match the final book.

Thank you Rebellion/Ravenstone Publishing and Netgalley for a free digital copy in exchange for an honest review.

[aimee (aimeecanread) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I just adore the cover, the title, and oh yes, that fabulous-sounding synopsis. So it was no surprise that I was interested in reading and reviewing this book.

But ultimately, The Awesome ended up being both a hit and a miss for me. There were some aspects that turned out being a pleasant surprise, and others that maybe made me want to gouge someone's eyeballs out.

Things About The Awesome That Were Actually Awesome:

1. All of the relationships were fabulous.  This book touched up nicely on all sorts of relationships, and each was done wonderfully, like so:

a.) The family love: Maggie and her mom were really close, to the point that they'd sometimes playfully take jabs at each other, like my mom and I usually do. They were supportive of each other, and even when they did fight, they find ways to make up. I think this quote sums up their relationship nicely:

"You're my favorite daughter. I almost never resent that it took twenty-three hours to launch you from my loins or that you gave me hemorrhoids my last trimester."

b.) The friendship: Maggie wasn't a social butterfly or anything, but she appreciated her friends. She sometimes envied them, but for the most part was thankful for them being there for her. Her only two friends, Julie and Lauren, were both really friendly, sweet and supportive.

c.) The romance: To be honest, at first I wasn't too keen on the romance, but it eventually grew on me. Ian was an awkward guy[1], but he was also sweet and endearing. There wasn't any instalove, per se, but the romance did escalate a bit quickly. I was okay with it, though, since it was more of a trial-and-error kind of thing, and I was A-okay that they never went with the "I love you" route. They were just your ordinary, sweet couple and I appreciated that.

[1] You guys know that I love my awkward guys.

2. Maggie was imperfect in the best ways possible.  I find Maggie to be a bit like me, actually. Sometimes she says things that nobody else wants to say--her brute honesty may make some dislike her, but she keeps it up because that's how she is. I also love how she doesn't have the perfect body (she describes herself as flabby, actually) and she's a bit insecure about it, but she doesn't mope and is totally okay about it.

3. This book had a little bit of everything.  Action? Check. Romance? Check. Crazy supernatural beings? Check. There was even a hint of paranormal politics, which was cool (although I wish they'd expounded on this more).

 

Things About The Awesome That Lacked Awesomeness:

1. The humor came off as dry.  I was expecting to laugh my ass off reading this because honestly the synopsis alone made me chuckle, but I ended up rolling my eyes at the "humorous" writing style used in the book. I found that a lot of Maggie's jokes became redundant (I should've tried counting how many times the words "boob" and "dong" were used in the book). It felt like a writing style that was a better fit for a middle grade novel (minus all of the sex jokes).

2. The "WTF is happening?!" vibe came off.  There were a couple of times where I literally had to go back a few pages to look for some foreshadowing, because THE HECK IS HAPPENING? Some things that happened in the book were pretty crazy and felt like they didn't fit in with the original plot of the book (which was Maggie trying to find a date).

My Awesome Verdict:

The Awesome had a lot of potential to become a fun, sass-filled book with gorgeous relationships, but ultimately (and unfortunately) wasn't as awesome as the title promised.

[Beck · Rating 1 out of 5]

In her attempts to lose her virginity, the main character tries to have sex with a guy who is so drunk that he can't form sentences and ultimately passes out. Consent much? And then she has the nerve to get mad a him because she couldn't successfully rape him. Fuck that.

[Bonnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

‘Sure, I was good at a lot of stuff. How many girls my age could kill a dude with her bare hands in under fourteen seconds? That’s a skill, and one that’d get me places in life, but it didn’t help me here. All the combat training in the world couldn’t make being a normal teenager any easier.’

Being a teenager is hard. Being a teenager is even more difficult when your only interaction with that age group is via the television. Seventeen-year-old Maggie has been home-schooled by her single mother who also happens to be a monster hunter (think Van Helsing in the modern age.) Maggie has been trained since she was young to do the job as well and is completely content with the cards that life has dealt her with one small issue: becoming a full-fledged, licensed monster hunter requires her to lose her virginity. Easier said than done.

Okay, not to be totally lame, but this really was awesome. And extremely hilarious. Not only was Maggie fantastically snarky, and sure oftentimes undignified and more than a bit crass, but she was such an amazingly confident character that you cannot help but love her. She’s realistically awkward when it comes to her “first time” but honestly the best thing about it is how awesome the topic of virginity was handled. (Yes, I know, I’ve already said awesome twice. It’s FITTING though.) It’s all displayed in such a non-shaming way and I loved the comfortableness between Maggie and her mother in how the topic broached. There wasn’t any awkwardness and her mother was straight up and honest with her about using protection and about being confident and comfortable with her body. While the summary implies that the sole focus of the story is Maggie losing her virginity, it’s actually so much more and bottom line, the relationship between Maggie and her mother is the very best.

“You’ll go on that date tomorrow, and before you get all pissy-pants over the suggestion, listen to me, Margaret Jane. […] I tell you that because life goes on despite our jobs. It’s too short not to have fun while we can. Sitting at home with guns and silver expecting the worst is no way to live. Trust me on that. I know.”

The relationship/friendship between Maggie and her mom reminded me a lot of my relationship with my mom, except alas, we don’t go out hunting vampires and other night beasties together. My mom was also one of those awesome women that didn’t tread lightly around the topic of sex and seeing how vastly different other parents handle that subject makes me forever thankful to her for that. It’s a natural thing that shouldn’t have a taboo placed around it. It’s something I feel should be openly discussed because having someone to answer those difficult questions will only lead to smart decisions in the future. Seeing the topic of sex addressed in that way and a parental relationship like that is rare in fiction, but shouldn’t be so.

The Awesome takes Maggie on a hilariously snarky, undead adventure that will leave you eager for more. While satisfying enough as a stand-alone, this still has definite room to grow, and I definitely want more.

I received this book free from the Author in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

[Dana · Rating 1 out of 5]

Absurdly horrendous. You think I would have taken the hint with the title and the description but no, apparently I am a glutton for punishment. The plot is paper thin and the MC is pathetic and disgusting.

Example of MC's innermost thoughts: “ Man I have to wizz like a racehorse, Like whoa bad pee time ”.

I am in the minority in regards to this book, so perhaps you will end up liking it. Personally I just have to many books to read to bother trying to slog through the trash.

Buy, Borrow or Bin Verdict: Burn


Note: I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.

Pst: Much appreciated if fangirls would refrain from bitching on this review.

[Brigid · Rating 4 out of 5]

Let me just take a bit of your time. Assuming nobody has any shit to do of course. You better not though. It'll be real quick.

The Awesome.



Could you pick a better title? PROBABLY NOT. And who would want to? No one. That's who. Because this title is the personification of Maggie.

Maggie is this wicked spark of a girl. It's almost as if Darrows peeked into my soul and saw the horrors within, and thus created a heroine I would truly relate to.

I'd heard this word 'shy' before, but its meaning, it did not compute. 'Shy' was like dinosaurs or the dodo bird-a thing I knew existed, but had never experienced firsthand.

Magie, next to a select few other heroines, is slowly becoming my literary bestie:

- She says weird shit all the time that no one understands
- She's a curse word genius
- She's a weapon nerd
- She fucks up and admits it
- Feminist af
- Confident
- Superior creature (as well she should be)
- Determined in her career as a ghost hunter
- She's the first heroine I've read that's okay with having brown hair
- She makes up a term entitled vag-blocking
- Puts the W in witty

This book is a sex dream for any feminist. Don't you dare walk away because I mentioned the S word. This book sets an example for other Young Adult authors out there. It promotes healthy sexual attitudes. It gives a heroine who is a virgin while also not being innocent. One of the worst stereotypes is the innocent virgin. I think that's why so often virgins get a bad rep in books. To be honest, it's more of a societal problem. Virgin shaming is a real thing. You think there's only slut shaming? Wrongoooo. It's because of the emphasis on innocence.

Maggie is a lovely vulgar creature, let me tell you. Some readers have even mentioned being grossed out by the things she says (which by the way is EXACTLY what made me pick this up).



This is the future of sex positive YA and we should all root for Darrows.

Maggie is REAL. She says shit like any teenager. She gets angry. She also apologizes when she fucks up. But, she's always smart in the face of danger. For example, the girl doesn't prioritize fashion when fighting monsters.

Maggie's mother tells her the only way for her to hunt a vampire is if she loses that bastard virginity of hers.

And if you're not up for the boys, you're more than welcome to find yourself a nice girl. I'm hip, I'm happening, I am totally down with you crazy kids exploring your sexuality.

That's right her virginity has made her job DANGEROUS. But here's the deal. Vampires go into a frenzy when they smell virgin blood. So Maggie decides it's time to lose it. She's actually quite casual about it. She see's a way for her to move along in her career, and she goes for it. And you know what? Good for her. I like heroines that are confident with their sexuality.

If I couldn't be a hunter tonight, I'd be a master seductress-a wily, conniving minx who'd lure some  unsuspecting boy into my baited trap.

Problem: She's not so great at playing the girl meets boy game. She knows shit about how to dress to make a guy notice her. She's easily annoyed by teen slang. Her personal favorite: 'SUP.

I loved that the romance wasn't at the forefront. I like romance, but often it turns into insta-love and that often makes me gag. Yeah. I'm one of those people that doesn't get bothered by romance. The more epically awesome the romance, the better. I do prefer the slow burns.

The truth was nothing. I am a hard-hearted bitch from Hell, damn it. Ian...well, he sparked something different in me. For seven whole seconds he exposed my creamy, nougat center.

They make my heart sizzle. You know....like bacon. Thank fuck this romance was slow. The plot was the most important thing. Maggie was the center of the book, always.

The only thing that I have some issues with was the world. I understand that because this book is in first person that it was hard to make the reader understand the world. But, I feel like there should have been some way the author could have shown how everybody knew about monster hunters as well as the monsters. It just....confuses me. I love that it's in first person, but it does cause a problem in terms of the world building.

Yet even with such a big problem, I will say that Maggie is worth it and so is her mother. I wish I had such a sex positive mother as a teen. This book is fuck full of mother and daughter hilariousity and it's going on the favorite shelf because of it. These two are the supernatural heroes of my heart.

[Mauoijenn · Rating 4 out of 5]

First, this book was hysterical and inappropriate.
Second, the MC is perfectly described and written.
Third, I almost gave it 5 stars but I felt the author was trying too hard in some areas in the book.
Fourth, I laughed too much.
Fifth, its a great book to indulge in.

[TheBookSmugglers · Rating 3 out of 5]

Maggie Cunningham isn’t your typical teenager. Daughter of a single parent, Maggie spends her days honing her skills to become a full-fledged hunter like her mom, Janice – that means homeschooling, with major emphasis on supernatural ass-kicking, and a minor in creative and quippy profanities whilst kicking said supernatural ass. There’s just one tiny problem in Maggie’s awesome life – in order to become a journeyman and complete the next step of her Hunter-in-training status, she’s gonna have to have The Sex.

That’s right: The Sex.

See, there’s something special about virgins that drives vampires batty (bad pun intended). Virgin, untainted blood is a powerful vintage – and wannabe hunters who walk around boasting that virgin blood are liable to get bitten and killed very quickly. If Maggie wants to graduate from level 1 and 2 jobs with her mom, she has to give up the V – the only problem is she doesn’t really know any dudes, let alone how to date them. With her best friend Janice’s help with the hookup, Maggie prepares herself for her most baffling, ridiculous, and terrifying job yet.

The Awesome is Eva Darrows’ first novel under that pseudonym – Darrows is also Hillary Monahan, author of The Summoning (another YA horror/supernatural book I read and enjoyed, and also boasts some similarities to The Awesome which I’ll get to shortly). And The Awesome is both awesomely packaged (the first edition of this book is gorgeous) and awesome in terms of character building and voice. Easily, the best part about this book is its heroine, the (rightly) self-proclaimed eponymous Awesome, Maggie. Quippy, witty, with as many snarky non-sequiturs as a Diablo Cody movie character, Maggie protects herself from monsters, disappointment and other would-be hurts with words and a badass attitude. She knows how to fight, how to stitch or glue up someone’s torn back, she knows to listen and keep her head down and react instead of overthink things when death is on the line. She also, secretly and maybe subconsciously, worries about her mother and their relationship, about being a “regular” teenage girl, and about how to go about getting The Sex to happen. In short: I love Maggie’s voice. While she does have the tendency to overdo it with the nonstop snark (in the tradition of great UF heroines for all ages), I love that she’s actually not jaded or world-weary. Maggie talks a big talk but her insecurities and vulnerability emerge, particularly regarding her relationship with her mother, with her friend Julie, and her relationship with Ian, which rings as incredibly genuine and natural. More than that, I love that for all of Maggie’s insecurities and fears, especially where Ian and Janice are concerned, Maggie always remembers one central truth: she knows that she is awesome.

For every bit as much as I loved Maggie in this book, I also loved the relationship between Maggie and her mother, Janice. This is not a traditional mother as superior relationship; the pair are incredibly close, and while their relationship can be strained because of Janice’s Hunter lifestyle (not to mention her choice to dance around in underwear, her open frankness when it comes to sexuality, and her fashion choices), the mother and daughter are a team. The respect is mutual in this relationship, and it is utterly fantastic to read the support and love between Janice and Maggie in The Awesome (as well as the snark and the many profanities the duo exchange).

Other things that were, well, awesome: Maggie’s depiction of the first time having sex from a teenage female perspective, drunken hookups and the aftermath of a house party, the awkwardness of navigating the ‘are we dating now what is this?’ waters. All of this stuff reads beautifully and Darrows nails it, especially the insecurities and things a lot of girls think of after their first time. I LOVE that sex isn’t something to be ashamed of here, and that Maggie’s mother is supportive, and that Maggie herself takes ownership of her choices with regards to her body and sexuality, and that there isn’t a weird judgement speech equating sex as having no self-respect. This is awesome, positive and powerful as a message.

Also awesome: the magical rules and worldbuilding of The Sex. The idea of magic being linked to sexuality and virginity isn’t a new thing in fiction; I remember reading and enjoying Diana Peterfreund’s Unicorn Hunter books, in which heroines are hunters of killer unicorns until they lose the V card… but being incredibly disappointed with the loopholes in those magical rules in that series, particularly when it comes to same-sex relationships. I’m very happy to say that The Aweseome deals away with some of that weird magical loophole homophobia – the rule for The Sex here is skin on skin penetration and completion. (Janice describes how this process works for lesbian hunters to Maggie when she asks.)

For all the good things in the story, however, there are some not so awesome parts: particularly when it comes to plot holes and overall packing/lack of story development. The AwesomeThe Awesome, and nothing really takes off here until the book’s final act, and the vampire drama is kind of unimportant window dressing. There are also plenty of unresolved plot holes and questions: who the heck is Jeff and why is he such a powerful vampire? What the heck happened to Laura and why is she such an unusual zombie (also what is her purpose in this story)? Why could Maggie smell certain things like Laura’s grave rot initially but can’t anymore (virginity magic)? Plenty of little and not-so-little things are frustratingly open-ended in The Awesome, which makes me think this is book 1 in a planned series.

Ultimately, though, The Awesome isn’t so much about the action as it is about a teenage girl learning how to balance her family expectation, friends, and social life. With monsters.

Fast-paced, fun, and snarkalicious, I enjoyed The Awesome very much. And I absolutely recommend it, especially to anyone looking for a sweet new urban fantasy novel from a kickass teen point of view.

[Eilonwy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was lots of fun!

17-year-old Maggie is an apprentice monster-hunter training with her mother, but there's a catch: Maggie can't hunt vampires until she loses her own Big V, because virgin blood drives them wild. Enter Ian, cute cousin of Maggie's best friend, who seems willing to do the deed. And, of course, enter many complications, because nothing can ever be too easy.

If you have a problem with lots of swearing, crudeness, and vulgarity, then this is not the book for you. I really enjoyed Maggie's extremely potty-mouthed narration, but it might have worn thin if this book were longer.

The story managed to hit some solid and even poignant emotional buttons while maintaining a very fast pace as every single thing that happens leads right into the next event/snag. I enjoyed Maggie's relationship with her cooler-than-everyone-else mother, and her budding relationship with Ian. Maggie is kick-ass without being unbelievably competent for her age. I liked that it's established that she's a bit pudgy, but it never becomes a huge issue in the story; it's just a part of who she is. The character development in this book is really sweet.

I liked the worldbuilding, too. The monsters in this world aren't secret. Everyone knows about them but just mostly ignores them; there's a Department of Paranormal Relations and a daily Monster Finder list for people like Maggie's mom who love kicking some supernatural butt.

I really enjoyed this, and while it stands alone, I will gladly read a sequel should one be written.

Thanks to Aimee's review for getting me to read this! I would never have picked this up going by either (a) the cover (yikes!), or (b) the blurb. But I'm really glad I did.

One negative note: This review makes a good point about sexual consent and how the lack of it is played for laughs in this story: Beka's review. I'm going to have to consider whether I should knock a star off my rating for that. It didn't bother me in the context of this light story, but maybe it should have. :-(

[Whitley Birks]

I read the preview on Amazon because I had one burning question about the basic premise of this book: do vampires only care about girl virgins? When talking about the sweet, sweet nom-ability of virgin flesh, the book doesn't mention gender, but it then goes on to only mention girls when discussing specific people.

So, another question: if hunters are a large group in this book (they are) and if it's virginity in general that's a problem, why are girl-virgin-hunters and boy-virgin-hunters not just getting together and popping cherries as a business arrangement?

This book only makes sense if you assume that virginity is a female-only concept. (I mean, there's a million other problems with this premise and the concept of virginity = innocence in general, but for some reason this aspect really needles me in this case.)

[TL *Humaning the Best She Can* · Rating 5 out of 5]

[Katelynn · Rating 1 out of 5]

The lack of consent here between the main character and a drunk guy really grossed me out (especially since her internal monologue consisted of her telling herself how bad ass she is, while the drunk guy drunkenly kept asking her if she was okay). From that point, it was hard not to hate everything that followed. The cover and title are cool but unfortunately this is all style and no substance. I think everyone going on about its originality is kidding themselves. The monster hunter thing is a dime a dozen, although usually the main characters in this genre are male. It's great that this is about a girl and her mother for once, but they're kind of horrible people, and this has just an all around terrible message for its readers. I should have known better when the blurb says Maggie isn't "like other girls her age" like that's some kind of compliment. What's so wrong with other girls? Why do we have to strip away all femininity from a girl and make her as male as possible in order for people to take her seriously?

[Heather · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to Rebellion / Ravenstone for providing me with a copy in exchange
for an honest review

I don't usually curse during my posts (which is unusual as I am a potty mouth in the non virtual world) but in the case of The Awesome from Eva Darrows I have to say it was literally f***ing awesome!!

I only received my copy yesterday and was going to keep it closer till it's UK release date on the 7th of May but I decided to have a little peek at the first couple of pages last night and before I knew it I had read the entire thing.

So what makes this such a great read, well the plot is this, we meet the seventeen year old Maggie Cunningham and her mother Janice, they are hunters. No not the deer and pheasant kind, the vampire and ghost kind, they are like a spunkier female version of Sam and Dean Winchester.

Janice is a single mum and has been home schooling Maggie, she is by no means shy and retiring and her slightly crazy ways have certainly rubbed off on Maggie. Maggie has been learning all about monster hunting, accompanying her mum from job to job, learning how to dispatch ghosts and how to deal with scrapes from the supernatural. She has got the job down to a tee but the one thing she is not allowed to do is help her mum hunt vampires, baby vamps love themselves a virgin and Maggie hasn't popped her cherry yet.

Now as a mother I couldn't stop laughing at how Janice handled this, the woman has no filter really and she encourages Maggie to go out and find herself a boy who doesn't even have to be nice to do the deed with, which would be great but Maggie is hopeless in normal teenage situations so she ropes in her friend Julie and goes to a party hoping to find a guy.

Getting steaming drunk she meets Ian, thinking she has struck gold they move their party upstairs and by now they are both fall down drunk but they start to get it on and when it comes to the most important part the most mortifying thing happens, he passes out cold.

Not knowing whether she is still a virgin or not, she tells Janice who decides the best way to find out is to go slightly down wind from a vampire bar and wait in the car. Unfortunately her cherry in still intact and a young vamp escapes from it handler and tries to devour young Maggie, they manage to speed away but these young vamps are fast and strong, and before they have escaped it has caught up with them, Janice manages to take it out which is fine but there is a problem, this was no common vampire, it was the first born of a very important vampire and when that vampire finds out they is going to be repercussions.

Janice and Maggie find themselves in the sights of the vampire and it really starts to kick off , with this you are introduced to some just brilliant characters such as Lauren their unexpected young house guest back from the dead with a taste for meat and not forgetting the awesome Lubov, a ghoul assistant to the baby vamps maker who is kind and kick ass at the same time, other notable characters are Ian, the boy who Maggie nearly did it with who seems unfazed by her whole lifestyle and drives an M3 which puts him in Janice's good books plus the mysterious vamp Jeff who is Janice's bit of stuff but there seems to be more to him that meets the eye.

The Awesome really is a killer read, it is funny, it's fast paced, spunky and a little scary in bits, it is like a cross between Supernatural and the early Southern Vampire series novels that have been jammed in a blender with a shed load of vodka and spice. I really loved it and I can see it going on past this first novel, I want more from these characters!!

From the first words till the last you will love Maggie and Janice and their crazy dangerous world!

Awarded 5 out of 5

[Tink Magoo is bad at reviews · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was in the mood for something a little different and the heroine in this seemed like she could be my type of girl, so I decided to give this a whirl.

Maggie is socially awkward, determined and crude, I actually really liked her. While there were things I loved about this - all the relationship dynamics, the non glittery vampire, the sex, the snark - there were just as many things that bugged me.

The plot kinds lacked a bit and I didn't initially feel the whole Ian thing, BUT I will say that I thought the whole 'first time sex' thing was done well, a lot more realistic than some books. The whole thing just lacked a little something extra to make me love it.

[Sarah (thegirltheycalljones) · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars!

I would have probably never read The Awesome if it had not been for the Book Bub newsletter, letting me know "it costs 99 cents today!".
The blurb was so fucking weird and over-the-top that I couldn't let it pass and immediately texted the existence of this book to Reyes, with whom I had the chance to buddy-read it!

The Awesome is a very light and very entertaining quick read, outrageous in many ways. I really liked this kind of outrage.
You know how you're not talking the same way to people you know really well and who know you really well? Like you can take shortcuts and speak your mind without thinking because they'll take it as it has to be and not twist your words and misunderstand you?
Well, it's basically what I felt reading this book : like an old friend was telling me a story, with all the gruesome details, weird thoughts, borderline acceptable statements and socially awkward attitude.
But I took it with a smile on my face because it's pretty obvious the intentions of this book are clear and devoid of anything negative.

The writing is fun, like an AK47 shooting both graphic curse words and chinese food could be. Maggie, the MC, has some very realistic teenager traits along with some less realistic ones, and she cannot stop her mind and her mouth from blurting raw thoughts 24/7.
That is at times a bit exhausting (mainly because a) you can't breathe because it's a never-ending burst and b) no teenager I ever met, including myself, is that smartly snarky) but the book is quite short and there's a regular pace that takes you along and suddenly poof! The end.

There is a controversial scene that I'd like to briefly talk about. As it's in the blurb, I don't consider it spoilery : Maggie needs to lose her virginity if she wants to be able to hunt vampires, because virgin blood gets vampires all cray-cray. As she's sick of not getting the full-hunter status because of it, she just goes for it and accepts an invitation to party in order to get laid and be done with it.

The rest is kinda spoilery because it gives away the issue of a scene, but the topic is way too important for me not to talk about it.

The thing is, Ian, the boy she's gonna get in bed with, appears to get drunk along the night, and when actual sex stuff happens, he's wasted.
That apparently created a lot of anger among readers, claiming it was not alright to try to have sex with a wasted person and that if the situation was reversed-gender the world would have exploded.
And to that I say : of course, I agree 200% and more. And there are too many books that think a scene is okay "because it's a boy". It makes no sense, what's not okay for girls is not okay for guys, because it means it's not okay for human beings, regardless of the gender.

BUT.

Mixing up "drunken sex" and "rape" is not right either.
In this specific book, about this specific scene, it's imo very clearly "drunken sex" : in Ian's perspective, a situation when he wanted to have sex but couldn't because of, here, alcohol.
As I said, it's an important topic and it deserves attention but also precision. I personally think that it is an insult to rape victims to lump it together with drunken sex.

Well, I can talk - a bit, I'm not that wild - about drunken sex and I never considered it an assault, or an aggression, or, Jesus, a rape.
Did I regret it the next day? Was I kneeling on the ground screaming to the skies "Whyyyyyy?!"? Did I swear "I'm never gonna drink that much ever again"?
Sometimes oh yes, sometimes hell no! But even when I thought "I shouldn't have", well, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Meaning, it was fully consensual. The guy didn't force himself on me while I was drunk. I wanted to have sex while being drunk, big difference. The fact somebody's drunk doesn't always go with "no consent". It can, sadly and infuriatingly, but not always.
As it happens, I can talk about rape too and you can tell the difference, drunk or not.

I truly believe this book didn't cross a line. Ian got drunk but he was interested in Maggie before being so and ended up not very performant because too much booze is bad for your boner.
Ian's only problem is that he didn't manage to do anything in the end, and is scared it'll make him look like a loser.
Maggie's reaction to this was what it's supposed to be : Eh, shit happens, no biggie, dude.
There is no shaming, no assault, no unhealthy relationship.
Everything is about the intentions, and the author clearly had good ones. She's depicting some realistic teenage moments, and Maggie's first time was a very pleasant surprise to read!

Only the Mom was completely too much. I think making her Maggie's big sister instead of her mom would have been much more relatable and not less fun.

I really hope there's a second book coming up because the first one ended with too many unanswered questions and I want to know what's the deal with some characters!!
(I've just noticed that this book was published in 2015 which makes the chance to get a next one close to zero but one can hope)
A crazy little book, light but more interesting than the blurb suggests. I do rec for some recess!

[Christina (A Reader of Fictions) · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars

When Meg (Cuddlebuggery) says to read a thing, I listen. Eventually. It took me a while to get to The Awesome, I’ll admit, but it wouldn’t be happening at all were it not for Megasus’ amazing review. Surprising no one, Meg was completely right about The Awesome, which lives up to a title that really ups the expectations. The Awesome is a hilarious, bitchin’ story of badass chicks kicking serious paranormal butt.

You will either love The Awesome or hate it, most likely. It’s very driven by Maggie’s voice and, if you’re not one to enjoy filthy language and “inappropriate” topics, then you’re probably not going to like it. If you have a very narrow definition of what constitutes femininity, once again probably not your thing. Maggie and Janice don’t give a shit if you don’t like them as they are though. Thus why I love Maggie and Janice so damn much.

The Awesome actually made me laugh out loud a couple of times, which isn’t something I do all that often with books, even really funny ones. It’s kind of like the Stephanie Plum books, but not drawn out into a million different ones and with the heroines actually being total boss bitches. What I’m trying to get to here is just how funny this book is, which is very.

Maggie and her mom, Janice, are badasses. I know I’ve mentioned this before, but it bears reiterating. They do not fall into the narrow box society wants to put women into. They shot that box, then they set it on fire, and then they staked the ashes just to be safe. Janice, for instance, likes to dance on the furniture naked everyday, and this isn’t something that bothers Maggie. Maggie’s room is strewn with weapons and dirty laundry. Janice makes all sorts of dirty jokes, even about her daughter’s sex life or lack thereof. They do have boundaries, but they’re miles past the boundaries of most. Basically, I love the shit out of their dynamic and how much it’s not affected by societal norms. Because seriously fuck those.

In order to further her paranormal bounty hunting career, Maggie’s hoping to have The Sex. See, vampires think virgins are extra delicious, so you can’t become a journeyman hunter until you’ve had The Sex, and, no worries, lesbians can totally accomplish this without dudes involved. Obviously I extra love this book for making sure to mention that and for the fact that there are zero dude hunters in this book.

So yeah, major plot point is Maggie’s quest to have The Sex. For something that starts out as a career goal, Darrows writes some awesome sexy bits. The romance actually turns out to be super adorable, which creates a hilarious juxtaposition with the rest of the novel. Also, there is serious love for female bodies of different shapes in this book and <3.

If you want more hilarious paranormal high-jinks with a badass heroine, check out Gina Damico’s Croak. I’m so excited to see what Darrows is going to write next, because fuck yes. The short version is that if you like women who punch and shoot things, lots of swearing, and The Sex, you will love The Awesome.

[K.R. Conway · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m going to preface this review by simply stating that I’m totally a feminist – I think women can and should rule the world, fight better in wars (we multitask and are far sneakier), and yes – God is probably a woman because have one’s reproductive parts hanging on the outside of one’s body HAS TO BE a joke on the male species at large.

I went to a historic all women Ivy League college. I wear tattoos. I can curse like the devil on crack.

Above all, I LOVE strong, hilarious heroines, which makes Eva Darrow’s, THE AWESOME, one of my all-time favorite, roll-on-the-floor-and-pee-myself, kick-butt girl power books.

Main character Margret is in a total pickle because, well – she needs a male pickle to pluck her virginity so she can hunt vampires. Why? Because Margret is a monster hunter in a world where monsters are the “well crap” norm, and vampires go a bit insane at the smell of virgin blood.

To Margret, this vamp-virgin stuff is BS, but her mother is basically like, “Suck it up and do the deed so we can get back to work.” Eventually Margret’s like, “WELL, FINE – I’m stuck at home and twiddling my fingers while Mom goes out with her uzi to smoke some dead guys,” so she ends up at a house party, filled with skunked teenagers, and almost has a solid stab (*cough cough*) at breaking her blasted virginity. Alas, the de-flowering dude passes out before he can finish the job.

The next morning, however, Weiner Boy is truly sorry and Margret and him start up a slow friendship.

ANYWHO, I bought THE AWESOME for that concept – this Monster hunter girl needs to roll some random male to get busy with the vampires. That concept is not, however, what made me absolutely adore the book.

Instead, I fell head over untanned-butt in stalker obsession with THE AWESOME because the characters were all fantastically fabulous! Margret is loud, fearless, flabby-armed, and curses left and right. Her view of the world is dead on, dry humored, and BRUTALLY honest. The boy in her life takes her in stride and really likes her, warts and all, and you can see why he does, because she’s, well, AWESOME (duh!).

Mom is a hair-dying hippie that probably smoked more pot than she should’ve and heads out with lesbian ladies to kill monsters for the government like she’s headed to a Tupperwear party. She also is rolling around having floor nookie with a vampire, which really horrifies Margret for so many reasons. Then you add in a duck-eating zombie with morals living in the basement (who steals scenes), a Russian ghoul who has boobs that need their own zip code, and a brilliantly twisted world where monsters are accepted, but are loathed sorta like tourists, and you’ve got a hit.

And not just any hit, but a knock-it-off-Pesky’s-Pole-and-brain-the-hotdog-vendor sorta of home run hit.

Loud, a bit raunchy, and wickedly funny, THE AWESOME is perfect for adults and OLDER teens (15+) who loved One Crazy Summer, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, The Breakfast Club, and yes – American Pie.

If you were a fan of those outrageous teen movies of the 80s and 90s, this is the book for you!

[Jeff Raymond · Rating 4 out of 5]

Early raves and reports on this one made me pick this up from Netgalley the moment it was offered. What I thought I was getting was another YA paranormal piece, but what I got what a really fun mix of genres that is best described as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Gilmore Girls having a weird kid that turns out to be Superbad.

Our heroine is Maggie, a teenage demon hunter in training. A little foul-mouthed, but who would be surprised given that her mother is a sailor in comparison. Maggie's got some work to do, but part of the problem she's running into in her training is that vampires are really into virgin blood, and given that Maggie is still a virgin, well... she needs to take care of that. And, of course, balance out her training and a situation that she's inadvertently gotten herself into along the way.

I used the cultural comparisons for a reason. It's Gilmore-esque because it's a really great, perhaps a little unhealthy mother-daughter relationship. You can tell they care about each other, though, and see themselves as more of a team than anything else. Given the fact that there's literal vampire hunting and demons and such, the Buffy comparison is apt, but so too is the quickfire dialogue and the use of these supernatural ideas to be a parallel to growing up. I don't know if I've read a paranormal piece that's done it better, to be honest. And then, of course, the fact that this is, in many ways, a bizarro sex comedy in all its forms. Drunken debauchery, awkwardness, the whole nine yards.

Really, it's just a lot of fun. Plenty of openings for this to be a series, and the heroes are fun with the villains appropriately nasty and villainous. It's a quick paced read, very few flaws, and probably closer to a 4.5 when it's all said and done. Check this one out.

[Petra · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was just so funny and..well, you know..awesome! I highly recommend it.

[Tammy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The nitty-gritty: A fast-paced and funny story told by a very mouthy narrator, which ultimately fell into the "too silly" category for me.

Have you ever tried running in anything with heels, or for that matter, anything squeezing your calves like sausage casings? When you fight monsters, you tend to do a lot of short distance sprinting, and if my life depends on my capacity to get out of Dodge, I want sneakers with a good tread and nothing else. You know those horror movies where the silicon-inflated babe totters down the street in stilettos while a werewolf lopes after her at six thousand miles an hour? All I have to say to that is, "Bitch would have gotten away if she'd picked better shoes."

I was initially drawn to this book because of the graphic novel-like cover, and I was hoping the story would live up to it. But while The Awesome was very funny and had a great premise, in the end it left me with a “meh” feeling. I enjoyed it the same way I might enjoy a TV episode of The Bachelor: over-the-top, ridiculous at times, but hard to look away from. This book has been getting some pretty darn good reviews from fellow bloggers (here and here) so I may be the odd man out on this one, but I’ve never been a fan of potty-mouth humor, and this book is loaded with it, which is the main reason it just didn’t click for me (more on that later).

Margaret “Maggie” Cunningham is a seventeen-year-old monster hunter, following in her mother Janice’s footsteps. In Darrows’ world, things that go bump in the night—vampires, werewolves, ghosts and more—are public knowledge, and it’s up to hunters who work for the Department of Paranormal Relations, or DoPR, to keep the public safe from the worst of them. Maggie has been hunting with her mother for four years, but she still isn’t considered a full-fledged hunter, due to the embarrassing fact that she’s still, ah hem, a virgin. You see, vampires love virgin blood, and they pretty much go crazy around it. So until Maggie has rid herself of the burden of virginity, it isn’t safe for her to hunt vampires.

When the story begins, Maggie is determined to have The Sex (what she calls it!) once and for all, and she goes to a party, where she has a very uncomfortable encounter with a very drunk boy named Ian. Suffice it to say, things don’t go according to plan, and from here on out, the story is non-stop action, as Maggie and Janice find themselves in deep water with none other than a vampire prince out for revenge.

I’m going to start with the positive. Darrows is a solid writer and paces her story very well. I was never bored, and the pages flew by quickly. Her characters are well-developed, and while I wasn’t in love with all of them, I can see how many readers would be. Maggie and Janice have one of the most unusual mother-daughter relationships I’ve ever run across, so kudos to Darrows for bringing something new to the table. Janice is one of those mothers who holds nothing back. No topic of conversation is too gross, too mature, or too uncomfortable that she can’t discuss it with Maggie. And while Maggie often protests her mother’s sometimes shocking pronouncements, I could tell that she was secretly pleased to have one of those “cool” moms who is more of a best friend than a mother.

When Maggie and Ian walk in on Janice having sex with her vamp boyfriend—talk about awkward!—Janice more or less says “Hey, you should have knocked first.” She’s completely unapologetic about her actions, and for that I enjoyed her character.

I also really liked Lauren the zombie girl, who Maggie and Janice meet in a cemetery. Lauren’s personality is the complete opposite of Janet’s, which is probably why I loved her so much. She eventually becomes one of the family, and I liked the way she balanced out the over-the-top personalities of Maggie and Janice.

The other bright moment in the book for me was the growing relationship between Maggie and Ian, the boy she has chosen to lose her virginity to. He starts out as a means to an end, but Ian actually turned out to be a nice guy—way nicer than Maggie—and I loved their awkward first steps into becoming a couple.

Which brings me to: When does colorful language cross the line and become nothing more than annoying? For me, it happened very early on in The Awesome. Frankly, Maggie and Janice came off as trailer park trash, which is why I started to cringe every time either one opened her mouth. Janice is fond of saying things like this to Maggie:

��Don’t put this on me, kid. You’re seventeen. Most kids your age are getting their sex on. Not my fault you’re holding onto the almighty hymen.”

Yeah, it’s funny. But after a whole book full of gems like this, you can see where it might get old.

Even worse—and these were the times I felt as if I were reading a middle grade book—were the many variations of words for sexual organs. It’s as if Darrows didn’t want to use the same word twice, and so she tried to come up with as many words as she could. After a while, I started highlighting them on my Kindle, because there were so many: wang, junk, no-no parts, jiggling funbags, stiffy, wing-wang, flopping jangs, schlongs, and lady junk, to name a few. And then there were the euphemisms for having sex: “hide the pickle,” “bumping uglies,” “slip me the dong,” and my favorite, “Sir Humps-a-lot meets Lady Buck-N-Ride.” Oh. My. God. I don’t mean to come across as a prude, but honestly, it was just too much for me.

I was also disappointed in the overall plot, which was pretty thin and didn’t have nearly enough meat for my taste. The characters seem to be in a whole heap of trouble, and Janice is getting death threats because she killed the wrong vampire. But I was never convinced that any of the danger was real, and never for a moment was I worried about the outcome of the story.

For such a humorous and light novel, you wouldn’t expect the world building to be earth shaking—and it wasn’t. Darrows mentions things in passing, like the rules about when a hunter is allowed to kill a monster, but she never delves any deeper than what’s necessary to move the plot along. And that was OK. For this story, which is more about the humor and the crazy characters, the scant world building was just fine.

So yes, I had fun reading The Awesome, but it’s not a story that will stick with me. For younger readers, particularly in the thirteen-to-sixteen year old age range who may be interested in reading about a teen’s first sexual encounter, and who aren’t offended by the many slang words for “penis,” this book is sure to be a hit.

Many thanks to the publisher for supplying a review copy.

This review originally appeared on Books, Bones & Buffy.

[Erin · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book had so much potential...Maggie was such a fun character...but there just wasn't enough. Not enough story...not enough background on, well, anything...not enough plot.

I'm just disappointed that there wasn't more to this book because I definitely would have read it. But kudos to Ms. Darrows...no horrible sequel producing cliffhanger ending.

[aPriL does feral sometimes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Seventeen-year-old Maggie Cunningham loves her job and her mom, Janice. They are licensed Monster Hunters. They hunt down rogue ghouls, ghosts, golems, vampires and zombies according to the rules and regulations set by the agency Department of Paranormal Relations (DoPR). (All monsters are supposed to register with the DoPR and refrain from violent behavior. If they refuse, they are rated one to five stars according to their danger to society, and hunters are paid on scale.)

Maggie has been working with her mom since she was 13. However, because Maggie is a virgin, she is still an apprentice. Once she has taken care of this little problem, she can be promoted. (Her virginal state makes her irresistible to young vampires.) Since she spends all of her time working with her mom and is home-schooled, meeting boys is not easy. Fortunately, she still is friends with one girl her age, Julie, whom she met in junior high.

Excerpted from the book:

"Mom wandered into the other room with her phone. I listened to her hash out the details of that night's job with Allie, all the while stealing misery-inducing gulps of her coffee. I was far too lazy to get the sugar from the kitchen. It was a whole ten feet away, and my chair was too comfortable to vacate. Instead I suffered through bitter crap-in-a-cup, working myself into a snit when Mom talked about cool stuff like crossbows and silver bullets."

""This sucks.""

"Not wanting to sit at home brooding about the life-threatening fun fest I couldn't attend, I picked up my burner phone, one of those jobbies you bought at 7-11 with prepaid minutes, and called my old friend Julie. Who was I kidding? She was my only friend. But one friend was better than no friends or so I told myself. I wasn't telling Mom this, nor would I tell Julie, but if I could sucker an invite into Julie's plans, I was on a mission. I, Margaret Cunningham, would try my hand at being a slutbag.

Because ready or not, Maggie needed a promotion."

Unbeknownst to Maggie, in a few days, a vampire will have both Maggie and her Mom in his sights. She will need every lesson Janice has taught her....

[Tyler Gray · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was pleasantly surprised throughout this entire book!

It's action packed, funny, will give the feels in places, and just all around awesome! I do think it lives up to it's name!

Maggie is a bad-ass character but also has her flaws and insecurities, like any teenage girl. I loved her so much! Her mom is also a great character, not perfect by any means but is a pretty good mom and above all loves her daughter!

Yes, it says Maggie has to lose her virginity in order to hunt vampires, and that is explained and everything. I was worried it would annoy me with heteronormativity to be completely honest and while Maggie herself is straight it IS brought up that it doesn't have to be m/f to count when Maggie asks her mom about two lesbian hunters. So take the virgin blood driving vampires crazy as you want but at least that was mentioned that same-sex counts to! I really liked that.

Of course that was only the first surprise! The entire book surprised me as I wasn't expecting much but I loved it! The plot, the characters, the pacing, the writing, the humor, the themes that were in it and a message mentioned in the acknowledgements "If people take anything away from this book (beyond bawdy humor and a few new creative curse words) it's that the world isn't ever going to validate you, so you better get good at doing it yourself. There's no shame in knowing your worth as a human being-in knowing how awesome you really are" Yes there is a lot of language in the book, Maggie has quite the mouth but it never felt annoying, often times funny. Maggie is just quite a lovable character to me! I highly recommend this book!

4.75 out of 5 stars!

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book certainly hit the spot as far as snark and sass go. Maggie's not-quite-normal upbringing makes her a little different from others her age. She's not afraid to speak her mind and she's capable of standing up for herself. The downside is her social skills are a little rough around the edges. Which makes looking for a hook-up kinda amusing. She really doesn't have much game when it comes to friendships or relationships and things don't quite turn out as planned.

Her mom made me laugh. She says things as they are and she's more like a big kid than a woman with an almost-adult daughter. Given her profession, I totally get why she lives so large. She doesn't do everything right when it comes to Maggie, but she tries. She tries magnificently.

I'm kinda hoping we get another book in this world because it was fun. Very fun. And I am SO SO SO curious about a certain undead someone who has SECRETS. And a certain other someone has issues they need to work out. There's just STUFF I want to know more about.

So, here's my vote for more sassy, snarky fun. With monsters!

-Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal

[Spigot · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hot damn.
This was the shit.

A heroine confident in her abilities but who still makes mistakes and - most importantly - learns from them?
A parent who is actually present and parent-y and has a personality?
Sex and body positivity and a supportive, respectful, sweetheart love interest?
Multiple lady friends who get more than one-off scenes?
Damn good world building and fuckin hilarious first person narration?
A highflying, entertaining as hell read that doesn't fall into any of the gross YA pitfalls I always brace myself for?

Yeah.
Hot damn.

It's aptly named, too, isn't it? Because it's way too awesome to be associated with the majority of its genre.

This is what I want, YA authors.
Your book doesn't have to be literary or profound or deep or meaningful or complex. It's actually totally okay if it isn't. Literary and thematic is great, I love that shit so much, but you know what else I love? Fun and entertaining reads that aren't unbearably fuckin gross and trite.

It ain't that hard. It shouldn't be that hard.
So why are there so few books like this one?

[Erin Cataldi · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book spoke to my soul; it was immature, crude, ridiculous, funny, and just damn good. You have have to have a dark irreverent sense of humor to enjoy it (I would assume it might enrage conservative christians for instance), but it might appeal to other audiences as well. It was darkly comedic and open about sexual experiences and was kind of reminiscent of Andrew Smith's "Grasshopper Jungle." The story follows a seventeen year old monster hunter who is apprenticing under her mother. While other kids are out shopping at the mall and listening to the latest pop songs, Maggie is out performing exorcisms, chasing werewolves, and kicking ass. She wants to get promoted but she is unable to do so until she loses her virginity. Vampires can't resist an innocent virgin and will frenzy when they scent pure blood. So until Maggie pops her cherry she can't hunt vampires and be a full fledged monster killer like her mother. What's a girl to do? Seriously, a must read. Sooo freiggin funny.

[Clare O'Beara · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not really my scene. A girl whose family hunts monsters from imps to werewolves for a living (she starts on a poltergeist) is continually foul-mouthed, dislikes everything about herself, dislikes her mother and her life. She goes to what must be the worst party ever for a seventeen year old and gets heavily groped, hoping to lose an asset for some reason, but the guy passes out; not surprising as they are pretending they are old enough to drink beer. Meanwhile her mother is getting clawed by a werewolf.

Much talk of body parts in general conversation and how I wished they would just get on with the story. Then there are vampires hanging off the windscreen wipers and silver crossbow bolts flying everywhere, with 'gobs of flesh' to clean up in buckets afterwards. So rather chaotic; I must be the lawful type. This is an American-set story.

I'm sure there are people who will feel this story suits them handsomely. If so, enjoy.

[⚔️Sarah⚔️ · Rating 4 out of 5]

This girl is speaking my language. Never have I read a book that was written in a way that it was like my brain spilled out onto the pages. This is written very much how I think and how I say things it was incredible and hilarious. Maggie truly is The Awesome.

Reading the description of the book I was a little apprehensive because Maggie could not advance in her career while still being a virgin and she really wanted to slay some vamps. This topic could have been handled terribly but Eva nailed it. Maggie's mom Janice teaches her to secure and comfortable with herself, her mind, and her sexuality. It was really refreshing.

It was a great adventure all around. She opened us up to such an interesting world of creatures I wish there was a little more room to see Maggie and Janice go on a few more jobs. Hopefully there will be other adventures where we can see the world more.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, this was sooooo good. Maggie is magnificently irrevent, snarky, and confident. It took me a few chapters to warm up to her voice (and she still grated on me sometimes with some obnoxious phrases) but still. She's just an unapologetic bitch sometimes and I loved her for it.

So the formula for this one goes: kick-ass girl + awesomely complicated yet loving mother/daughter relationship + adorable boy + beautifully realistic yet still super steamy and sweet sex scene + vampire and zombie shenangia + action + humor = The Awesome.

Heads and shoulders above the vast majority of paranormal YA. Full review maybe to come.

This book saw me through a hellacious day of jury duty. I am forever grateful to it.