Charley Davidson is the Grimm Reaper, the portal through
which the dead can reach Heaven. She’s also a private investigator and when her
best friend reports one of her friends has gone missing under worrying
circumstances, she has to get on the case. A string of murders lead to a long
buried past
One case would be enough to handle but there’s also Reyes, Charley’s mysterious and dangerous love interest – also the son of Satan. He’s hurt, he’s dying and Charley will find him in time –whether he wants her to or not.
This book should be silly. It should be ridiculous. I
should be rolling my eyes. But I’m not doing any of those things because I’m
laughing and smiling so much. Charley is simply hilarious and even if her
character is snarking away at some of the most bizarre times, it still works.
It shouldn’t, but it does.
For a while I just put this down to writing style and was
willing to completely ignore the shattering of anything resembling common sense
or the simple fact that absolutely no-one would act this way simply because it
was funny enough for me to not care about realism. But reading through this I
realise this is actually part of Charley’s character development – it’s
mentioned almost in passing that she wasn’t afraid of things even as a child
and that she generally doesn’t feel much fear either due to what she is (the
Grim Reaper) or due to what she’s seen (as the Grim Reaper) which means her
endless snark works. She isn’t cowering or worried because she genuinely isn’t
afraid, has seen worse and it doesn’t come close to suppressing her sense of
fun.
Which is what Charley is – immense fun. She’s sarcastic,
witty, confident and skilled. She’s good at what she does, she knows she is and
she’s quite happy to amuse herself along the way and she does (and me)
immensely. Her character interactions in general are excellent, but especially
with her best friend Cookie. I honestly think they have one of the best
friendships I’ve seen in the genre, I think I could read a whole book of them
doing nothing but drinking coffee and bantering back and forth
Does this levity always work? No, I’m afraid, though I always enjoy it. But there are at times, especially given the severity of the cases they’re working, when it seems badly out of place even while I’m laughing.
But Charley is more than just fun, at least. She is good
at her job, she does care and while she may be very light hearted, she does get
angry and hurt in this book – especially form her family; because she does
care. Her father and her uncle both, for separate reasons, treat her
appallingly and she doesn’t downplay that slightly. She also recognises and
snarkily challenges paternalistic sexism aimed at her from these men, and their
protestations of love and protection are not enough for her to instantly
forgive them – even if her grudge is expressed through constant (awesome)
snark. She also has, as I mentioned, an excellent relationship with Cookie (who
is also extremely capable and funny) and a growing one with her sister. There are
women who are less impressive, but they are countered by numerous good female
characters.
