Four years ago something impossible happened: magic started working. All of those Latin incantations – used as graffiti or song lyrics or anything – suddenly actually worked. Only for teenagers, though, and only in the UK. Once you get a few miles offshore, it all fades. Why? Well, because you have to be in range of the rift…

Ivy Mann makes her living fighting magic. She works as anti-magic security in a high school, stopping teenagers sneaking copies of Necronomicon onto school property, or wielding her machete, Matilda, against any hell hounds they manage to raise. It’s a living. At least, until she has the day from pretty much literal hell!

Zombies, ghosts, spells and incantations, there’s no time to catch your breath as Ivy struggles to keep some teenagers alive, make up for her past sins, and perhaps catch up with a few faces from the past. All the while wielding her trusty Matilda!

There’s a lot to like about this book, and I enjoyed the read. As our PoV character, Ivy has a brilliant sense of humour, eg:

“ I know what you are thinking, but I’m not half faery, or demon, or angel or anything like that. Mum’s a Body Shop consultant living in a bungalow in Birmingham and Dad enters crosswords.”

She also has a thumping sense of guilt, over something she and her friends did – something that will be revealed over the course of the book. Of course it ties in strongly with the events of the ‘now’, and the two sides of the story really boost each other.

On the less great side, I wasn’t wholly sure about the tone. It’s got ‘YA’ written all over it, with a cast of teens and indeed, young adults. Maybe I’m just not giving the ‘youth’ enough credit, but I wasn’t expecting quite the level of gore (not that it’s too graphic, but there is a lot of it) or the harsh topics including murder, suicide, other death, and abandonment. It never quite sat comfortably for me alongside the talking cat.

That said, I still enjoyed it. The pace doesn’t let up – the events happen over at most a day or two – and if anything, the book is a little on the short side. I’d love to have delved a little more into this altered world, ours with a recent addition of teenage magic – so I’m rather pleased that there are hints at the end that there could be more stories from Ivy Mann.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer with zombies is what first sprung to mind whilst reading Raising Hell. This was a fun little book, extremely gory and action packed! If you are in a reading slump this will soon get you out of it.

The writing isn’t of the most highest quality, but if I am honest I don’t think it needs to be. This is a fabulous B movie in book form, the sort you can thoroughly enjoy without having to think to much about what’s going on.

This book would be perfect for spooky season!! And I highly recommend you check it out ready for then. We’re following Ivy as things take a drastic turn for the worse as she’s patrolling the halls of a school. If you’re after a fast paced YA thriller which is easy to read then this is the one for you

I enjoyed this book - Ivy was a funny character and I was really interested in the fun, fast paced storyline. The writing style is one I enjoyed too.

I received this book for free from the publishers and NetGalley in return for a honest review.

I really enjoyed this book, it started with action, and confusion which just drew me in even more. I can't say that I have read a book like this before with the themes that were within this novel.

Ivy is a security guard at a school, and one day things take a turn for the worst! What you think will occur is completely not what happens.

I highly recommend this book for anyone looking for a fast paced thriller, with serious witchy vibes!

This was a fun, fast-paced read! I adored the premise (badass older teen fighting monsters in the UK thanks to her own past screw-up? What's not to love), the supporting characters were great fun (especially Ivy's Gran) and I am a sucker for urban fantasy books set in the UK, so this was right up my street. The pacing felt almost a little too frantic at times, and I would've liked some more time to really get to know the characters, but overall this was a very enjoyable read.

Many thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this book and its characters. Really good fun and lots of action right from the start. I would highly recommend giving this a try!

I will update the review with a link to our blog closer to publication date.
I'd like to thank the publisher and netgalley for providing me with an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

Ivy Elisabeth Mann, once your average teenager is now your more than average occult school security guard. A couple IG years earlier Ivy and a couple of her friends dabbled with magic in an attempt to resurrect a friend killed in a car accident, this opened a rift to dark magic giving every teenager magic powers! A recipe for disaster!

A couple of years forward, armed with her trusty Matilda (axe/machete !) Ivy has become a school security guard and her only companion is the reincarnation of her dead grandmother...in a cat!

Throw in a teenage goth with magical ability, attitude, and desperate to bring her little sister back from the dead, an overprotective but frustratingly handsome older brother. Then mix them in with hell hounds, a dark political agenda, and the odd zombie apocalypse and you have the recipe for a hell of a ride!

This was a fun read, Ivy’s charm is high on snark, with touches of loss, love and a true desire to fix the mess she played a part in creating! Grandma is a cat is perfect - absolutely loved the imagery.

Overall, if you’re looking for a fun read that’s high on action and not too in depth on emotion, thus is the book for you. Definitely YA in tone, level and storyline, but overall fun. Just be aware, this book does touch on abandonment, love, loss, suicide, blood, gore and a number of other gooey bits.

I really enjoyed it and hope we see more of these characters in future. The writing was pacy which fitted well with the pressured feel of the story which takes place over a very short period of time with a few flash backs thrown in as we uncover more about why the world is the way it is.

Not for the faint hearted there are some pretty brutal scenes in this novel, we get hell beasts and traditional flesh eating Zombies to contend with among other things.

Ivy was a great protagonist. I liked her ‘get on with it’ attitude and how she didn’t just sit around feeling sorry for herself. She absolutely did complain at times but she did it while still getting stuff done and I loved her for it. She was a true girl power bad ass in a Buffy-esque sort of way, I mean a machete who she’d named is her weapon of choice and she wasn’t afraid to use it.

if you are in the mood for a fast paced urban fantasy then this one is definitely worth checking out.

Perfect for fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer Raising Hell introduces us to one kick-ass hero, doing what needs to be done as a security guard at an English secondary school.

Ivy Mann and her friends tried a ritual that went wrong. Ivy's boyfriend is killed and they open a rift between dimensions which allows children and teenagers to do magic.

Ivy is not just fighting to keep kids alive, battling Hell hounds and zombies, but behind the scenes the machinations of a right-wing political party is trying to keep the rift open so they can use magic to increase Britain's influence.

A really enjoyable read, well paced with plenty of action. The characters are well formed and engaging and the romantic side story does not hinder the story.

My thanks to NetGalley and UCLan for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

So much fun! This was a fast paced, roller-coaster of a read. Once upon a time, Ivy and her friends did a very bad thing, she's been paying penance ever since.
There was so much to love about this, my very favourite being Gran (no spoilers here!) Think Shaun Of The Dead meets Buffy The Vampire Slayer by way of Misfits.
Also I loved the real British feel, especially the humour.

If you like goths, he’ll hounds, zombies, the undead and spells then this is the book for you.

Full of dark humour and lots of blood and gore I can’t wait to recommend this to my teenage readers. Loved it.

Well this just about had everything going for it.

From Zombies to magic and everything else in between.

Great characters and a wonderful story made this a great read.

I really could not put this down.

this book was such a joy to read!

Its funny, easy to read, very gory in places and I loved the sneaky political storyline. I felt like it was about 10 pages long because time just flew by whole reading it, I was totally engrossed. If you like Buffy and Shaun of the Dead, I think you'll enjoy this too.

Its silly but with a badass woman lead, a story that keeps moving and moving, and its interesting and entertaining from start to finish. A definite pallette cleanser from all the serious books I've been drawn to recently. I've had the BEST time reading it, I'll definitely be checking out more from the author in the future.

"I know what you're thinking, but I'm not half faery, or demon, or angel or anything like that. Mum's a Body Shop consultant living in a bungalow in Birmingham and Dad enters crossword competitions."

Once upon a time there was a girl, a talking cat, and the apocalypse.

It sounds like the start of a joke, but Ivy's life is anything but - a while ago she had just a normal life but after a very stupid thing she did Dark Matter is slowly leaking into the world, easily accessable by everyone who knows how to turn on a computer.

Hell is coming to earth and Ivy has no idea what to do next.

Raising Hell was a hilarious riot of a story with non-stop action, bloody fights and absolute absurdity. It packed a punch right from the first chapter and kept going - in less than 250 pages this story was ridiculously fun and easy to read, with some very cute moments scattered throughout. Featuring what could have been very typical storylines, Pearce gave her own unique spin on the supernatural. Ivy was instantly best friend material and it was a pleasure to watch her descent into the bowels of hell.

Also ... talking cat.

The appropriately named teen/YA fantasy Raising Hell was a solid 4-star read. It was fast-paced, action-packed and easy to read. My attention was caught in the very first chapter and held until the very end. The author’s description of the settings in and around London as the action progresses, made it was easy to feel I was part of the narrative. The characters were interesting and relatable. Their reactions throughout the story clearly illustrated their individual and often competing motivations. I could not wait to see how it played out!

I found Ivy to be interesting and relatable. Despite the grief from losing her boyfriend and the guilt she felt from the consequences of her actions the night he died, she was determined to right what she felt was her wrongs. In the aftermath of that night, she felt compelled to protect others from the chaos that was unleashed. The is illustrated in her determination to save Nora Ortega despite her actions and the fact that she caused Ivy to lose her job. Nicholas Ortega’s only concern was his sister. Therefore, he pushed for Ivy to be removed from her position and struggled with doing the right thing throughout the story. I found myself questioning his every move. Overall, I liked all the characters because I could understand and appreciate their motivations. Ivy wanted to atone for her mistakes by protecting others and Nicholas just wanted to save his sister's life. I found myself feeling compassionate for both characters.

I am usually very picky about the teen/YA book that I choose to read. However, Bryony Pearce did an excellent job of grabbing and keeping my attention and weaving a story that I could help but become invested in. I would recommend this book to readers young and old who enjoy a good action-packed fantasy novel.

Not sure I'd describe this as humour, but it was certainly full of fun and gore. I raced through the pages, which were pure, if a little bloody, escapism. An easy to read action-packed story that YA readers will love.

This was a Buffy-style fantasy set in England, a magical rift has opened and teenagers are trying to raise the dead but end up creating zombies.

I think this reads very young, there are some very silly bits and the overall tone is light. It reminded me of a goosebumps book/ horrible history and I thought it was something I'd have read and liked around 8-9 y/o, e.g. middle school age read rather than YA.

The characters were all a bit cliched, motivations and actions all seemed under-developed and unbelievable... Particularly Ivy, the main character, who wanders around with a machete, multiple injuries and a hero complex. But if you could suspend disbelief it was fairly fun, with enough action and pace keep it engaging. The romance was completely ridiculous, goes from 0-100 within less than a day within the story and made me cringe a lot. Ivy is supposedly a strong independent young woman who fights to protect children against magical forces, but of course after (spoiler sorry) defeating the bad guys she feels unworthy of love from the guy she's crushing on and needs him to validate her and explain to her how amazing she is. - Why is that trope still being fed to young audiences, whether YA or not.

If you're looking for a silly zombie plot then this would fulfil. I could see myself reading it and enjoying it as a child, and for that reason it felt a bit nostalgic. But the premise had a lot of promise and overall this did not fulfil.

I loved this book and its heroine. So much action right from the start and so much fun! Absolutely adored it.