If you hate cliffhangers, do yourself a favor and don’t pick up this series. Seriously, EVERY. SINGLE. BOOK. I myself, am a glutton for punishment, so off I go with a smile on my face. Book three, Midlife Ghost Hunter, ended once again abruptly. Bree and Crash were in the forge and things were just heating up and…WHAMMO. End of book. Thankfully, Shannon took pity on us and started Midlife Zombie Hunter at the exact moment that we left off with Bree and Crash getting busy. BUT Bree’s suddenly writhing on the floor and not in a good way. Hello, hospital, and hello morphine! Of course, because chaos follows Bree everywhere she goes, the hospital is about to be spelled on lockdown thanks to a zombie outbreak. She’s then offered a buttload of money to figure out who is raising the dead. That will get her everything she’s wanted since the start, right?

If you’re expecting that you are finally going to get answers in book five, oh my sweet summer child, no. We are strung along for another ride. Crash is attempting to be heroic by protecting Bree from the shadow world, but what he doesn’t realize is that she can protect her damn self…mostly. His knight in tarnished armor act is getting old. Is he? Isn’t he? Does he? Doesn’t he? Ugh. He thinks she can’t possibly want to be with a man tied to the darkness but can he open his friggin eyes already? She’s in it deep as well. Robert is looking better and better every minute. Except Crash’s fae queen ex-wife has absconded with him. Her friends are acting strangely and loyalties are called into question. It’d be really easy for Bree to sink into despair about right now but in typical fashion, she pulls herself up and keeps fighting.

"For just a moment I didn’t see myself. Not my forty-three-year-old face or body. Not the wrinkles I was earning every damn day or the increasing laxity of my skin. Not the failure I so often saw. Certainly not the girl who wondered if she’d ever get it right. No, I saw someone else. I saw a damn boss bitch ready to take on the day. I saw a woman who had earned her scars. I saw a woman who faced each day with all the energy she had left. I saw a woman who loved with all her heart, even when it hurt her. I saw a woman I liked very much; a woman I’d like to see more of."

This ending is absolutely heartbreaking. Sometimes you have to lose everything to find yourself. Bree’s offered an impossible choice by an unlikely ally, but there’s always a trick with the fae. Now that she finally knows a bit more about her bloodline and the powers that she has, she might have someone who can help her learn to use them. And if that means that Crash doesn’t have the same zing for her anymore? Well, it might be the best way to protect her heart.

I don’t know what is going to be pulled out for book six, but we have to wait until January to find out. *whines*