{"id":5605,"date":"2026-02-15T23:15:53","date_gmt":"2026-02-15T23:15:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/?p=5605"},"modified":"2026-02-15T23:15:53","modified_gmt":"2026-02-15T23:15:53","slug":"review-loving-remains-by-esmeralda-stone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/?p=5605","title":{"rendered":"Review: Loving Remains by Esmeralda Stone"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Synopsis:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Isaac Collins is trying to run Teagan\u2019s Funeral Home and keep his life as calm as possible.<\/p>\n

Cory Hughes is just trying to keep her head\u2014and her death consultant business\u2014above ground.<\/p>\n

Thrown together by circumstance, a bit of guilt, and a lot of attraction, Isaac and Cory begin an uncomfortable friendship and soon realize the things that make them different may also be why they can\u2019t seem to stay away from each other. And it could be just in time. Because not everything is as it seems at Teagan\u2019s Funeral Home.<\/p>\n

A romantic mystery for adult readers looking for mature characters, honest and open-door intimacy, dark humor, and a happily ever after that feels earned.<\/p>\n

Favorite Lines:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThere were some laughs that made you instantly laugh with them. Some\u00a0 laughs that you couldn\u2019t help but laugh at. And some laughs that were horrific and terrible, like a five-car pile-up you couldn\u2019t turn away from.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one should sit unclaimed for years on end, just waiting to see if someone remembered them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve learned that passing judgement on another person\u2019s actions without knowing all the information can cause more damage than letting things go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat death was supposed to be natural, which meant it was ugly and messy at times.\u201d<\/p>\n

My Opinion:<\/strong><\/p>\n

I received a copy of this book from the author in exchange for my honest opinion.<\/p>\n

Loving Remains<\/em> is one of those books where the premise sounds quirky\u2014maybe even a little playful\u2014but the emotional weight sneaks up on you fast. A romance set within the death industry could easily tip into gimmick territory, but this story doesn\u2019t do that. Instead, it treats death as something constant, unavoidable, and deeply human, weaving it into a love story that feels tender, messy, and surprisingly grounded.<\/p>\n

What really carries the book is its understanding of grief\u2014not just as a singular event, but as something that lingers and reshapes people. Cory and Isaac aren\u2019t blank slates waiting to fall in love; they\u2019re both already carrying loss, anxiety, guilt, and complicated histories with death long before they meet. Their connection doesn\u2019t magically fix those things. If anything, it brings them closer to the surface. That honesty gives the romance more depth than you might expect, especially for a book that also allows itself to be funny, steamy, and occasionally chaotic.<\/p>\n

The death-industry setting isn\u2019t just background flavor. It actively informs the book\u2019s questions about control, ritual, and what it means to \u201cdo right\u201d by the dead and the living. There\u2019s a clear tension between traditional funeral practices and more personal, less sanitized approaches to death, and the book doesn\u2019t pretend there\u2019s one perfect answer. Instead, it shows how those choices are often shaped by fear, love, and the desire to protect ourselves from pain\u2014even when that protection backfires.<\/p>\n

That said, Loving Remains<\/em> isn\u2019t a light read emotionally, even when the tone is warm. It deals openly with loss, trauma, addiction, and mental health, and those themes aren\u2019t just mentioned in passing. The pacing is steady, occasionally slower when it sits with heavier moments, but it feels intentional rather than indulgent. By the end, the book feels less like a traditional romance arc and more like a quiet argument for intimacy built on understanding rather than rescue.<\/p>\n

Summary:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Overall, Loving Remains<\/em> is a death-industry romance that\u2019s far more emotionally grounded than its premise suggests. It blends grief, mental health, and love into a story that\u2019s tender, funny, and occasionally heavy, without losing its warmth. It\u2019s a romance about choosing connection while still honoring loss, and it treats death as something to be faced honestly rather than hidden away. Readers who enjoy character-driven romance, stories that engage thoughtfully with grief and mental health, and books that balance emotional weight with genuine warmth may enjoy this book. Happy reading!<\/p>\n

Check out\u00a0Loving Remains<\/em> here!<\/a><\/p>\n

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Synopsis: Isaac Collins is trying to run Teagan\u2019s Funeral Home and keep his life as calm as possible. Cory Hughes is just trying to keep her head\u2014and her death consultant business\u2014above ground. Thrown together by circumstance, a bit of guilt, and a lot of attraction, Isaac and Cory begin an uncomfortable friendship and soon realize […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":5606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bookreviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5605"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5605\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}