Five Stars, Terrible Service: A Novel of the Afterlife

By Jaymes Mercer

Everyone dies with unfinished business. Delia Marsh died with a one-star review.

Delia Marsh kept receipts. Literal ones - a labeled folder for every tax year since 2016. So when her business partner hands her a coffee that tastes like a Christmas candle and her heart stops mid-pitch, she does what she always does: she files it.

The afterlife, it turns out, runs on an app.

Welcome to the Waiting Room - beige carpet, smooth-jazz hold music, and a bureaucracy that resolves every death with a five-star rating system. Your funeral gets reviewed. Your killer gets reviewed. And the entity at the top of it all is never named - around here, it's just "Corporate," and Corporate does not read its reviews. Until now.

Delia's official cause of death: "heart complications." Delia's actual cause of death: her business partner, a very good eulogy, and a coffee cup he signed with his own name.

With the reluctant help of a two-hundred-year-old customer success rep who's never once won an argument with the algorithm, Delia sets out to build the case, file the complaint, and leave the review that changes everything - before her killer is elected to city council on a 4.9-star reputation he doesn't deserve.

Perfect for readers who love:
Workplace comedy with real emotional stakes
Afterlife premises with heart underneath the jokes
A satisfying, non-violent justice arc - no cape, no crusade, just receipts
Found-family warmth wrapped in corporate-satire bite

Would Not Die Again.

Five stars. Terrible service. The most honest review you'll ever read.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0HJW5D219
• ISBN13: 9798174473546
• Release Date: September 2026
• Publisher: Independently Published
• Length: 278 Pages
• Weight: 0.72 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.5"