The following review is part of my being in the author’s review team, which ensures that you can read it before the book comes out.
The following review is the first of as many as I can write before Aged to Perfection, a 19-novella anthology featuring everything over 40, will be released, and likely more afterwards. Paranormal Women’s Fiction in its best form: as many as you can get!
What the story is about
Merely Mortal
Book: Aged to Perfection
Author: Michelle M. Pillow
Date published: 15 February, 2022
Synopsis:
Tamara, a mere mortal, desperately enlists the help of a self-proclaimed ghost hunter when an age-old curse begins claiming the lives of her supernatural siblings.
Memorable birthday
Being over 40 is a great thing. Unless, like Tamara Devine, you are the only mortal in a magical and immortal family and that contrary to them, you come with an expiry date. An unknown one, but an expiry date just the same, and because of that very finite possibility, your mother celebrates each and every single of your birthdays as if it were the last, in order to make up for the time that you won’t have.
An annual celebration that includes every kind of supernatural creatures, from vampires to shifters, warlocks and witches, and even a necromancer, Levi, a long-time friend of the Devine family. Or that uncle who, each year, makes her choose which tombstone she wants, just in case.
On this specific birthday, Levi brings her a present, one that she cannot refuse because he is an elder: a pendant that will, according to the necromancer, “help her with her mortality problem”.
Then all hell breaks loose, as three of her siblings fall victims to a fire that starts in the very hall where the party is being held, a fire that is slowly causing Tamara to choke to death, until she puts on Levi’s gift.
Race against the clock
With her remaining siblings’ lives on the line, Tamara tries to explain to her family what the problem is, but to no avail. Since she is “merely mortal”, they don’t pay her the attention that she needs. Consequently, she goes in search of Paul, a human PI she met on her birthday, in order to hire him to find the source of her family’s curse and save her siblings.
There starts a race against the clock with a man who might steal her heart as well as save her family’s lives.
Staying glued to the pages
To say that I devoured this novella is an understatement. I was glued to the pages, turning and reading, turning and reading, until I reached the amazing and surprising conclusion.
Action, more action, passion, emotions, everything combines to make this story as gripping as it is unforgettable.
My verdict
A definite one-shot deal, Merely Mortal is a story that I will likely reread many times over, if only because, despite it being (too) short, it is one that is, honestly, unforgettable, and more than worthy of
Five stars without expiry date!
Caro's Reads 
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