Bad Witch Burning by Jessica Lewis

 genre: young adult paranormal

Katrell's on the edge - living with her mom and her mom's horrible boyfriend, she knows that what she needs is some CASH.  Money is the way out of her dead end life and she's got a way to make some.  See, Katrell can talk to ghosts - for real - and people will pay for a chance to speak to their loved ones that have passed on.  Then Katrell is given a warning at the same time that she figures out something new she can do: she can bring people back from the dead.  And people will pay a LOT more for a resurrection than they will for a conversation.

Resurrecting people, though, turns out it can create its own set of problems.  Big problems,   Problems that Katrell really feels like she needs to handle on. her own - like everything else.  But there is a darkness to this kind of magic that Katrell doesn't understand, can't control and it takes its toll.  Is it true, that like her warning said, that she's going to "burn it all to the ground" before she can figure this out?

So many trigger warnings here - abuse, animal cruelty, domestic violence.  Katrell's life is so painful, it's a truly emotional experience to try and comprehend her trauma.  The magic here isn't explained as well as I'd like, and there is a sort of magical realism because no one seems particularly unmoored by the fact that she can bring people back from the dead.  It's just accepted as a thing that can happen.  I did appreciate Katrell's best friend Will - their relationship arc throughout the book was very powerful to me, they way they both found ways to be strong and to take care of each other even through some really upsetting stuff.  I feel like there are teens who could find a lot to be interested in here - it's a thriller with a zombie-like feel and while sometimes it felt repetitive for me (especially Katrell's physiological manifestations of her inner hot mess), I appreciated the way that our author helped us understand why Katrell made the decisions she did.  We saw her life for what it was, how hopeless and stuck she felt - and that her magic gave her a sense of control that ended up controlling her.  I found the resolution and conclusion satisfying, as Katrell makes choices and finds a way through the mess she's made.