''Not Quite Dead Yet'' by Holly Jackson, the New York Times bestselling author of the "A Good Girl's Guide to Murder" series, a young adult crime thriller with millions of copies sold and a hit Netflix series, is our "GMA" Book Club pick for August.
In "Not Quite Dead Yet," her first adult novel, Jackson introduces Margaret "Jet" Mason, a young woman who uses her last few days to solve her own murder after being fatally wounded in an assault.
'The Compound' by Aisling Rawle is our 'GMA' Book Club pick for JulyAt 27, Jet has never been able to finish anything. She's dropped out of school, abandoned a promising career and ended countless relationships.
Her town's annual Halloween festival serves as a stark reminder of her unfulfilled life, each familiar face in the crowd making her feel more disconnected.
But she's about to leave it all behind for a fresh start until, just as she walks in her front door, someone attacks her from behind, fracturing her skull and leaving her for dead.
Thirty-six hours later, Jet wakes up in the hospital to devastating news.
The attack has caused a bone fragment to press against her brain, and an aneurysm is forming that will soon rupture, leading to certain death.
"Jet has two choices: Undergo immediate surgery to remove the bone fragment, with less than a ten percent chance of survival. Or don't, and die sometime in the coming week," a synopsis reads. "With the odds stacked against her and death a foregone conclusion, Jet knows what she has to do."
"She has never finished anything in her life... until now," the synopsis continues. "With her last remaining week, she's going to find out who murdered her."
Read an excerpt below and get a copy of the book here.
By clicking on these shopping links, visitors will leave Goodmorningamerica.com. These e-commerce sites are operated under different terms and privacy policies than Goodmorningamerica.com. ABC will receive a commission for purchases made through these links. Prices may change from the date of publication.
This month, we are also teaming up with Little Free Library to give out free copies in Times Square and at 150 locations across the U.S. and Canada. Since 2009, more than 300 million books have been shared in Little Free Libraries across the world. Click here to find a copy of ''Not Quite Dead Yet" at a Little Free Library location near you.
Read along with us and join the conversation all month on our Instagram account, @GMABookClub, and with #GMABookClub.
***************************
Jet walked across The Green, onto the street beyond. It was dark, but not yet late enough to worry about it.
The town was still thrumming and shrieking, with departing cars and the undead.
A gaggle of teenagers outside the little church, too loud and giggly for just sugar. Found Mom and Dad's liquor cabinet, she'd bet.
Past the houses beyond, Jack-o'-lanterns still glowing outside, mean triangle eyes glaring back at her.
Someone hadn't bothered carving theirs; just a bunch of naked pumpkins and gourds, lining the steps up to their front door.
Jet turned up College Hill Road, saluting the skeleton hanging outside the Romanos' at number 1, its limbs creaking and flailing in the fall breeze. Up the hill to number 10.
Home.
This big obnoxious house that Dad had renovated and extended, and extended again.
It stuck out against the normal houses on the street, against the Finneys' directly opposite at number 7.
Jet might just hate the Masons too, you know.
She jogged up the large, ringed driveway, past her truck, giving it an affectionate pat on the cargo bed.
A Ford F-150 in powder-blue. Mom thought Jet had bought it just to piss her off.
Mom wasn't totally wrong.
Just one Jack-o'-lantern outside their red front door, but its eyes had blown out, gone dark.
A bucket on the front step with a sign: Please help yourself. One candy per person. What world did her mom live in? Damn, the bucket was empty. F--kers.
Jet searched her jacket pocket for her house keys, the Ring doorbell camera eyeing her, so she eyed it back, stuck out her tongue.
She unlocked the front door, and Reggie was at her feet in a rush of red fur and a helicopter tail, the happy squeaks he only made for her. He jumped up and pawed her knees.
"Hello, hello, handsome. Who's a good boy, huh?"
Jet bent to tickle him behind the ears. Those silly, long, English cocker spaniel ears.
The dog ran off, skittering around the corner and back two seconds later.
"Oh, did you bring me some dirty socks?" Jet said, thumbing his muzzle, the proud wiggle of his little body at the sacred offering. "Thank you so much, my absolute favorite."
Jet closed the front door and moved through the hall, crisp white walls and Moroccan rugs, too neat, too styled, like a show home, and -- man -- was Jet in trouble every time she dared to treat it like a home, dropping crumbs or leaving her boots out.
Through to the kitchen at the back of the house, Reggie trotting in behind her.
There was a plate of cookies on the kitchen island. Sophia had baked them, dropped them around earlier, black-iced bats and orange pumpkins.
Sophia did things like that. Baked.
Jet picked up a bat, bit off its head. Damn, they were actually good.
She finished it off, wiping her sticky fingers on one of the dishtowels by the stove, a matching set of three: little marching lemons, and oranges and avocados, because everything had to match in this house.
Jet turned and passed the cookies again. F--k it, actually; she took one of the pumpkins too, wandering through the wide, corniced archway into the living room.
Cookie in mouth, she reached into her pocket for her phone. Unlocked.
Thumb finding Instagram before her eyes did. She bit off half the pumpkin, the sweet orange icing cloying against her tongue.
Girls from school or college who were now married, having anniversaries and babies. Or no weddings and babies, but fancy dinners and sipping glasses of champagne to celebrate new jobs.
That could have been Jet too, a humble-brag post about a big promotion at a firm with an acronym everyone pretended to recognize. If she hadn't quit and left Boston overnight.
Jet finished off the cookie, sticky fingers against the screen. It didn't matter. Jet had time to find the right thing; she had all the time in the world, remember?
And then life would really begin, and when it did, you better believe she'd be shoving it down all of their throats in return. Just you wait.
Reggie stood in front of her, started to whine.
"Sorry bud. Human cookies."
The whine lowered, sinking into a growl.
"Wh–"
A rush of feet behind.
A fast crack to the back of her head, the wet of splitting skin, crunch of skull.
The phone slips from her hands. No growl anymore but a scream. Jet should scream too but another explosion, harder.
The feel of blood, the sound of things breaking inside her head.
Someone's killing her.
Jet can still think that, but she blinks and the light doesn't come back and....
***************************
Audio excerpted courtesy of Penguin Random House Audio from "Not Quite Dead Yet" by Holly Jackson, read by Alex McKenna. © 2025 Holly Jackson, ℗ 2025 Penguin Random House, LLC. All rights reserved.
From "NOT QUITE DEAD YET" published by arrangement with Bantam, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright © 2025 by Holly Jackson.
