Review--Reborn Yesterday by Tessa Bailey

A timeless love story with bite.

It was a night like any other for funeral home director Ginny Lynn, until the exceptionally handsome—and unfortunately deceased—young man on her embalming table sat up, opened his emerald eyes and changed the course of her life forever, making her feel quite fluttery while he was at it.

Humans aren't supposed to know Jonas Cantrell, or any vampire, exists. It's kind of a major rule. Despite his instantaneous bond with perfectly peculiar Ginny, he has no choice but to erase her memories of their one and only meeting.

That was the plan. Before a reluctant Jonas can wipe Ginny's mind clean, she reveals a secret that brings their worlds crashing together. Human and vampire. Past and present. Darkness and light. And while their love is strictly forbidden, it might be the only thing that can save them…

Reborn Yesterday is a standalone paranormal romantic comedy with a happily ever after. 

Reborn Yesterday is my first book by Tessa Bailey! I was shocked when I discovered this paranormal title under her name but I was happy to dive right in, because who doesn't love a good vampire romance tale? This one was definitely another book that surprised me by its sweetness and how it was once again, not my usual kind of read but I can say that I did order the other two books of the trilogy before I even finished this one!

Ginny is your sort of typical quiet, shy girl with dreams of a better tomorrow. She wasn't annoyingly sweet. In fact, I felt myself identify with her a bit in the whole socially awkwardness. Hers came from working in a funeral home however. After her father passed away, she and her stepmom continued to run the business, despite her stepmom's desire to sell the place whereas Ginny would rather keep it running for family business reasons, and the fact that the numbers weren't in her favor to sell.

One night she was working on a newly delivered body, that of a young man her age and as she was going about to prepare the body for his final showing, he sits up on the gurney. After her initial shock over a dead man waking up has passed, Ginny can't help but feel an intense connection to Jonas. Jonas reveals that he is a vampire and that his roommates decided to play a prank on him by leaving him in the basement of a funeral home. He tells Ginny these things because he plans to wipe her memories of him and everything that happened later, but Ginny convinces him to give her a little more time, let her enjoy his company for awhile more and not seeming to want to rid her of her memories of him, Jonas agrees.

Ginny makes a brief mentioning before he leaves her that she thinks someone is out to kill her. Whether this was a poor attempt at gaining his sympathy or the truth, Jonas isn't sure but plans to find out. And as luck would have it, there's some truth to the statement. Though after reading through the story, I can't be quite sure how we came to this conclusion exactly. I mean, once I got the answer, it was obvious, but I'm not sure where Ginny got her suspicions. She did make one comment very early on that had me confused. I wasn't sure where this name came from or if she was going back to the biblical origin of the name. It was said so offhand I wasn't sure if I should be looking for a character of this name that never came. 

Jonas has no choice but to introduce Ginny to his vampire world in order to keep her safe while he looks for the threat against her. He brings in Roksana, a Russian vampire slayer to keep her safe. Another question I had that wasn't quite answered was why Roksana was working with the vampires when she says she plans to kill them all. I mean, I know in general our vampire slayers don't always slay all the vampires, but I felt like we needed more to Roksana's story and background to understand how she got to be in the position of bodyguard. Thankfully, her book is next, so hopefully I'll get that backstory info!

Meanwhile, Jonas and Ginny try to fight their growing passions because of course, in this world, romances between vampires and humans is strictly forbidden. So we pretty much know where things will end up between these two! There was another twist to the mystery elements that was added in that made for an interesting segue and the more prominent mystery of who might be after Ginny was resolved in a timely manner.

All in all, the book was a fun and delightful read, but wasn't without its flaws. I felt like some things were easily explained away or just flat out ignored and forgotten. But nothing terribly so that you lose sense of the story. The romance was sweet, even if it came on a bit quick. I remind myself that this is a paranormal romance and that is usually the trend with those when it comes to romance. The characters were by far one of my favorite parts of the story! From Ginny and Jonas to their cast of friends, who I expect will be the stars of the next books as well! I can confirm two of them in the next book, but I haven't looked at the third one yet.

If you're looking for a fun and lighthearted vampire romance, Reborn Yesterday is the read for you! It's predictability was sort of a nice break from some of my other reads where I am constantly trying to deduce the whodunit. This was a refreshing break from all that and still a good twist of a mystery with characters I won't soon forget!

Overall Rating 4/5 stars