I always hope that readers, of my books, will take away whatever is most meaningful to them wherever they are at right now. It might be the message of love. Or what it means to really live. Or the role that emotion does - or does not play - in our lives. But I think ultimately, the thing I took away was the idea of surrender to God.

I was beloved. I had been hoped for. Somehow, I was necessary.

Merrie Destefano storms the world of urban fantasy with AFTERLIFE, breathing new life into the vast genre of the undead. Gritty, poignant, in the tradition of Bladerunner, with the nostalgia of New Orleans. With crisp and beautiful prose, AFTERLIFE blurs the line between the living and the dead to ask life's ultimate questions-even if they take nine lives to solve.

And I know that God made the heart the most fragile and resilient of all organs, that a lifetime of joy and pain might be encased in one mortal chamber.

The words, when they came to my heart, were so gentle, and familiar -- and so very sad: What is this you have done?

How mighty, how great the One must be, I thought, to send the heavens careening, and yet hear the cry of a single heart.

I always hope that readers, of my books, will take away whatever is most meaningful to them wherever they are at right now. It might be the message of love. Or what it means to really live. Or the role that emotion does - or does not play - in our lives. But I think ultimately, the thing I took away was the idea of surrender to God.