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I didn't expect to like this book - it reminded me of Three Times Lucky with it's heavy-handed quirkiness and gee whiz style. Then Deborah Wiles worked her magic, (read Countdown by her if you haven't already!) and the characters and their messy lives came alive and I was pulled in. I still found the character's names distracting, but I loved the stories of their ups and downs with each other. ( )

I'm not going toblie; this one made me cry. More than a little. ( )

I read this book in one sitting. It was such that I wanted to.

Comfort Snowberger: Explorer, Recipe Tester and Funeral Reporter — an unusual description for a ten-year-old girl, but then Comfort comes from an unusual background. Comfort has been around death all her life — her father is the town undertaker and the family lives above the mortuary in Snapfinger, Mississippi.

Things change, in Comfort’s world, in March. Great-Uncle Edisto, patriarch and one of the founders of Snowberger’s Funeral Home, dies from a stroke. It upset Comfort, but she “got through it.” In September of the same year, Great-Great-Aunt Florentine, widow of the other founder of the funeral home, died. She had gone out to work in her vegetable garden, as usual. Comfort found her lying on the ground. At 94, Florentine felt it was time to go. These two deaths strike closer to Comfort than the usual deaths that come through the mortuary.

Comfort finds herself dealing with the loss of two family members she’d known all her life, along with a couple of curve balls that come in the form of her best friend not being there for her and having to take care of her cousin, Peach, when he and his momma come for the funeral.

It falls on Comfort’s shoulders to care for him. Peach is a neurotic eight year-old and Comfort has become his security blanket. In dealing with Peach and the experiences both go through, Comfort learns a lot about the both of them and the strength of family.

Written from the view point of Comfort, it is a story of a young girl learning about life, death and family on a more personal level. It is a book that not only kids can learn from, but also adults. ( )

Comfort Snowberger takes death in stride. Her family owns the funeral home in her small town, after all. But when her Uncle Erdisto and Aunt Florentine die, her cousin Peach shows up, and her best friend seems distant, she just wants to retreat to her closet where she does her best thinking.

Beautiful characters in a story based on family, friendship, and loss in a small-town America. Wiles weaves a well-paced plot. Heart-breaking and heart-warming. ( )