I LOVED this book. A Lipan Apache teen can raise animals from the dead and communicate with spirits. She tries to solve the murder of her cousin.
Largely set in Texas; imagine magic, ghosts, vampires, live streams, teleportations, search engines, newspaper clippings, library, doctor's office, all merging into a single story.

Pros:
- how beautifully magic is woven into this America. How magic, ghosts and stories about ancestors are a way of life
- I enjoyed the paranormal in the story. Ghosts of dogs, mammoths, each having a big role; the mediums who communicate with the dead.
- the STORIES! Legends, folktales, adventures of the ancestral matriarch, the generational gift to raise animals from dead, the ethical lines between what can be done and what cannot be done.
- PS: These teens have very interesting career choices for college!
- Loved how the story talks about native land being taken away by white people, and how histories get re-written, the white washing of crimes etc. I loved Ellie's mom's dialogue with Euro-vampires on her own land. Racism and colonialism are interweaved in the murder mystery.
-How fiercely the characters safeguard their Lipan Apache identity over the whitewashed terms in American history. I loved how this book was written just the way it should be, not watered down or made overly-educative. A good book informs, encourages the reader to learn more and Elatsoe does that! I loved learning a little bit more about the Lipan Apache history and culture.
- I love how respectful the characters are of other cultures. The murdered cousin's wife is from a different culture, and the book gives a lesson on how we can peacefully co exist while respecting other cultures.

Cons:
- The characters are young adults but read like middle grade characters.
- Sometimes the dialogue felt forced. It pokes out from the smooth storytelling.
Consider this when friend Jay is browsing through magazines at a doctor\s office and sees a picture of burgers garnished with pepper jack cheese and sliced avocado.
Pictures like this make me grateful for those new veggie patties that taste like real animals because they're made of plant synthesized haemoglobin," he said. We should make some.
I kept thinking of the so many different ways this conversation could've been rewritten to feel more natural in conveying the same idea.

Notes:
Ellie is a fierce, unapologetic asexual.
Ellie and Jay have a great friendship, with no romance.

Overall I loved it. It was an absolutely magical read. I binged the first half in a single night. In spite of the younger voice and occasional clunky dialogues, I was very much in the spell of Elatsoe and I highly recommend it.

Rating : Actually a 4 but I give it a 4.5 because of how much I enjoyed it.