Title: #StrangeLit: Darkest Dreams
By: Jay E. Tria, Madelyn Tuveria, Myra Mortega, C. J. Edmunds, D. A., Motzie Dapul, Therese Barleta, Yeyet Soriano, Chen Cabaluna, Mikael Javellana
Genre: Paranormal/Urban Fantasy
Book Bundle Description:
This is what happens when you allow yourself to unlock your dreams: You may just find the darkness that lurks there. Explore the tragic, the romantic, and the comedic side of our darkness in these stories.
“Majesty” by Jay E. Tria
What would you do if the ghost of someone you love appeared in front of you?
Majesty is a beautiful ghost, with her hair of fire and eyes gray like smoke. That was Andy Fey’s first thought when the ghost of her best friend Majesty Hall appeared in her bedroom, only two months since her death. Majesty doesn’t know why she’s there, why only Andy can see her.
Andy wasn’t sure if she could tell Gale, that boy who claims that he and Majesty were in love. Funny, sarcastic, and a self-proclaimed serial heartbreaker, Gale is proving to be a good friend in grief, though his trail of broken hearts could soon include hers.
As Andy and Gale wade through their sorrow, Andy wonders if Majesty is here to help ease her into this new, complicated friendship, or if she has a mission all her own.
Available on Buqo app!
Links:
Goodreads
Rating: 4/5 stars
My Thoughts:
This will be the second time I’m writing a review for a book bundle, particularly for #StrangeLit. The first one I wrote was for #StrangeLit: Fateful Turns and there, I focused on reviewing the short stories. So for this second book bundle review, I decided to just focus on only one. At first, I said to myself that I’d do the same thing here as the review I wrote for Fateful Turns. But then, I decided against it at the last minute of thinking on what to read and review.
So here I go. My own thoughts after reading Jay E. Tria’s novella Majesty.
This will be the second time I’m reviewing a book that Tria wrote. Though I must say, this novella was shorter than the others she wrote. Anyway, I was glad I was able to read this. I remembered seeing a solo release and the cover reveal about this novella before. At the time, I was already intrigued about the story, especially when I saw the story description. Thanks to this, I managed to finally read it, though it took me five days to finish reading this.
It really isn’t that scary, though. It turned out to be more of a fantasy than a paranormal, in my perception. Maybe because, even if I keep on seeing the word “ghost” and all descriptions pointing to that word in this story, the way Majesty was described here and how she interacted with Andy even after she died made it all okay for me. It was a really beautiful story for me, if you ask me. Though I have some friends who suddenly died and left this world without a word, it’s probably different if that person was really close to you and who accepted you as you are.
I was sort of neutral when the news about a batchmate of mine from college drowned on 2014’s New Year’s Eve. We were close—more like acquaintance. But he was also special in some way to me. When I read this story, I couldn’t help wondering about myself. What would I feel if someone really close to me—the one who changed a great deal about my life—suddenly left me in this world without a word? I never got my answer, but it appeared that Andy and Gale managed to grabbed hold of them.
Andy and Gale were the characters used here to tell something about one’s ability to move on from grief without actually drowning from it and let you take your life. They were described as completely opposite to each other in terms of interacting with people. But it seemed that when Majesty entered their lives, she balanced all that for them. And when Majesty died, it was Andy and Gale’s turn to balance each other’s personality. It was her way of trying to help her friends she left behind to move on.
Though in the end, I have to say that I couldn’t tell if Gale was telling the truth about him and Majesty being in love or it’s just that they have a sort of relationship close to that description. Both Gale and Majesty left slightly vague answer to that. Or maybe that’s just me being too focused on their process to move on from the grief they were feeling.
This is one story that would surely remind me about that time in my life. I kind of regretted not even visiting my batch mate’s wake that time. I sort of developed a certain amount of fear of visiting someone else’s wakes and it gives me nightmares for a few days. I don’t even know why. But I hope someday, just like Andy and Gale, I could be able to visit my batchmate’s grave even if it’s just to say thank you that he became a part of my college life by helping me and my groupmates with our thesis. Now that’s something worth remembering, if you ask me.
Thank you for this novella, Ms. Tria.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Jay E. Tria writes contemporary Young Adult and New Adult stories about characters that live inside her head, about people she meets and people she wishes to meet. She also reads, daydreams, and blogs. She loves skinny jeans, sneakers, live gigs, and adopted cats. She is not a cool kid.
Books: Blossom Among Flowers | Songs of Our Breakup
Official site: www.jayetria.com
Facebook, Twitter, Wattpad: jayetria
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