I received an advance review copy for free from BookSirens, in exchange for an honest review, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
I was very intrigued by the title and premise of this book, as I enjoy murder mysteries. The fact that it involves a ghost, was a bonus. Also, I do like to find new authors and series to read, and A.J. Gallant was new for me.
Overall, the premise was great. In most of the other stories I have read involving ghosts, usually, if the ghost is "new" to death, s/he learns how to cope with this situation. Gallant took an interesting approach that I had never read, by getting inside the head of the protagonist, Anita, and have her ask and question this new existence in a more philosophical way. Additionally, the second main protagonist, Detective Olivia Brown, was faced with questioning and accepting her "gift" of being able to communicate with the newly dead, Anita, as well as the spirit world. The overall story concept was a very good one.
With all of that said, that's why I gave only 3 stars, instead of my typical 4 stars or slightly higher.
A minor factor while reading involved typos and grammar errors. Not a huge deal for me, as no one is ever perfect, plus it is a common occurrence in both self-published and traditionally-published books. It is a factor that often is noted when receiving advance review copies (ARCs). Not that it makes or breaks it for me, unless reading becomes unreadable, distracting, or frustrating and in the case of this book, that was not the case. However, I was surprised to learn that this book was actually written in 2016.
The overall story was enjoyable. What could have been improved, in my opinion, was the presentation in using third person omniscient. Many times, the types of murder/cozy mysteries I read are in first person, and the third person in this story was a good way to approach this story because of needing to intertwine the interests of the two main protagonists. It was also good being able to get into the heads of the antagonists too.
With that said, the book seemed to be almost "too busy" with so many different characters, which for me, and in my opinion, made the story hard to follow at times. As a result, it was hard for me to really find the main characters more relatable (three-dimensional); all of the characters seemed to lack depth and seemed pretty flat. I really wanted Anita and Olivia to feel like real people so I could better connect with their plights and journey as they developed through the story. And by the end, when it was time to wrap the story up, there was a brief moment of, "well what happened to Olivia" almost "cliff-hangar."
Unfortunately, the ending seemed quite rushed and was a disappointment, in my opinion. What could have helped, although the length of the book was pretty good, might have been by adding just a little more detail to the characters' emotions (although their motivations were pretty well developed, I believe) and descriptions. The story, at times, jumped around a little too much, and made it harder for me to follow what was happening.
Typically, I will read several books at the same time, and it's important that I can remember the events/characters/circumstances. Luckily, though, the story was still compelling enough that I wanted to find out what happened. Thus, I read this book in only a few days; something, I typically and hardly ever do.
I still would recommend I Was Murdered Last Night to anyone who enjoys murder mysteries/cozy mysteries/ghost stories for the story told!