Book Review: The Body Finder by Kimberly Derting

Title: The Body Finder
Author: Kimberly Derting
Series: Body Finder #1
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release Date: March 16 2010
My Source: Library
My Rating: 4/5

Violet Ambrose is grappling with two major issues: Jay Heaton and her morbid secret ability. While the sixteen-year-old is confused by her new feelings for her best friend since childhood, she is more disturbed by her “power” to sense dead bodies—or at least those that have been murdered. Since she was a little girl, she has felt the echoes the dead leave behind in the world . . . and the imprints that attach to their killers.

Violet has never considered her strange talent to be a gift; it mostly just led her to find dead birds her cat had tired of playing with. But now that a serial killer has begun terrorizing her small town, and the echoes of the local girls he’s claimed haunt her daily, she realizes she might be the only person who can stop him.

Despite his fierce protectiveness over her, Jay reluctantly agrees to help Violet on her quest to find the murderer—and Violet is unnerved to find herself hoping that Jay’s intentions are much more than friendly. But even as she’s falling intensely in love, Violet is getting closer and closer to discovering a killer . . . and becoming his prey herself.


This book was a well written original story about a young girl who has a creepy ability to sense dead bodies. This was a suspenseful and sometimes a bit freaky book. I won't lie- there were moments that reading this book alone at night I got a little bit creeped out, but I do love it when a book can do that! The book is told in 3rd person, most of the time we only see Violet's mind, but occasionally, we see from the perspective of a certain serial killer. That is when the book gets creepy (in an awesome, suspenseful way). The reason for his killings is never really explained, but the viciousness and calculated murder plans are scary to read about. It makes me not want to walk outside alone in the dark. If you get scared easily and don't like stories with a darker edge to them, you might not like this book. I thought it was really well done though, wasn't TOO creepy, and it was actually a bit facinating. I like crime shows and stuff like that, and it definitely had an essence of something like that since they were solving murders.

The characters and the love story were really great. Violet was a good main character- she wasn't special or anything, she wouldn't make my list of top 10 characters, but she wasn't awful either. Jay, the best friend/love interest was great too. It was extremely refreshing to read a book that was urban fantasy but none of the characters were paranormal creatures (vampires, werewolves, angels...etc.)! Violet and Jay were just normal teenagers, and their romance was developed really well. I loved the fact that they were best friends all their life and the summer before their junior year started to realize they were in love with each other. Doesn't every girl wishes she had a guy friend like that sometimes? There were moments I thought it was a little rushed, and not realistic, because after being friends for that long I think there would have naturally been more awkward moments, but overall, it was mostly good.

I'm excited to read the next book in the series, but it didn't leave us with a cliffhanger ending, which I did appreciate for once. Cliffhangers can be great, but this story wrapped up really nicely. The next book is called Desires of the Dead and comes out in March of next year! I hope it's as good as this one.

Overall, I liked this book a lot! It wasn't quite special or unique enough for me to love it, but I still enjoyed reading it and I would recommend it to fans of typical YA literature!

*content warning: Characters bring up sexual content a couple of times, and there is some language, but it wasn't a lot.