Dire’s Club

by Kimberly Packard

Publisher: Abalos Publishing
Publication Date: March 23, 2021
Pages: 326 Pages

Categories: Action & Adventure / Contemporary / Women’s Fiction

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Dying isn’t just hard on the ones left behind, the regret of unfinished lives weighs heavily on the terminally ill. That’s where Dire’s Club steps in, a specialty travel agency that takes a small group of dying people on one final adventure-so they can be free of guilt, be more than a diagnosis, and find a way to confront life … and death.

Life Coach Charlotte Claybrooke built a successful second career guiding people out of grief, but the impending tenth anniversary of her own heart-wrenching tragedy sets her on a journey to find life among the dying.

Staring death in the face was Jimmy Dire’s business. He met it with a warm hug, a kind word, and a smile. Dire’s Club gave the terminally ill one final, bucket-list adventure before passing on, but dying was expensive. The bills, like Jimmy’s lies, were piling up. It’s only a matter of time before he’s forced to face a different type of death.

A rock god, a telenovela star, a grandmother living her life-long dream, and a young tech genius round out this group of strangers facing death together. But when tragedy strikes, their bond is shattered. Lies and fraud surface, forcing the dying to come together to save someone’s life.

Everybody dies. The lucky ones have fun doing it.

Dire’s Club trailer from Kimberly Walton on Vimeo.

This story packs a powerful punch and I pondered what I would do if diagnosed with a terminal illness. Would I want a service like Dire’s Club to live out one last wish?  It also shines a light on depression and how events can trigger a spiral downward that can last for years.

This novel is full of flawed characters. No one is perfect and they each have their own battles to face and we are lucky enough to be on that journey to watch them work to resolve their issues. It is not an easy task for the characters to face their fears, accept their fate with a terminal diagnosis, and strive to live a full life for what time is left for each of them. But somehow they manage to persevere through and become stronger because of it all.

Charlotte looks like she has it all on the outside but inside she is living with the pain of losing her fiance. I think she blames herself since he was out training for a triathlon on his own. Survivor’s guilt is tough in a situation like this and I felt for Charlotte and what she was going through. While she doesn’t have a terminal illness, she signs up for Dire’s Club to find relief from her sorrow. What she doesn’t expect is to find a group of people that will die soon and yet have so much more to give to the world. It is the dreams being fulfilled for these other members of the club that will change her way of thinking, but it is no easy task.

Jimmy Dire has his own secret past which led him to begin Dire’s Club but this past could come back to haunt him but his devotion to this company to give one last adventure to those that are terminal is admirable. Not everyone may think the say way, but many do. It might be his only saving grace.

This story touched my soul. Everything I thought I knew about life and death was challenged for the better. We never know what a person is going through and even if we were in their same position, how we handle it might be very different than someone else.

There are a few lines that really stood out to me that I am sharing with you.

“Or we could live,” Charlotte said. “Today, tomorrow, and the tomorrow after that, until we’re out of tomorrows.”

“We’re all dying, Charlotte. From the moment we’re born, we march toward death.”

We give this book 5 paws up.

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