Mama Cried by Talia Haven

Jenny doesn’t remember much before the playground where she plays with her friends and her puppies, but she does enjoy herself.

But her fun is at an end when one of the Guardians, Azula, arrives and takes her to make a very important choice.

This book is a very short story – which usually leaves me with little to say and kind of frustrated by lack of content.

But being a short story worked here. There was no need for exposition or world building. There was no need for epic description or even detailed characterisation. The past of these characters, the details about them, their history, their lives and even where they go from here are all purposeless. The nature of the world with the afterlife and the Guardians and the playground and the dogs all lack explanation – and don’t need it

Not only would any exposition be unnecessary, it would also really damage the power of this story

This story is stark and very present. It’s about the pain and grief and forgiveness and the shallowness of that and easy paths to redemption. It’s incredibly powerful, it cuts to the bone and it’s amazingly moving

This story is 12 pages long. It doesn’t need to be one page longer and never have I read something so short that had so much impact and emotion and thought provoking material in it.

Normally I wouldn’t read something so short and I certainly wouldn’t review it. Had I realised how short it was before picking it up I would have put it back down again. I’m very glad I didn’t.

Dead Like Me, Season 2, Episode 4: Shallow End

Oh dear, we open with George voice-overing about how everyone wants to know they’re loved – or whether people even like them. This episode is going to be sickeningly twee or very angst laden. Or both. Get your vomit bags ready.

To reassure young George of that question, Joy decided to take the insecure girl to swim day. Reminding us that Joy, bless her heart, tries very very hard but doesn’t always get it right. Still, uncool 10 year old George at least can look down on even less cool Beth-Ann.

And in the present poor Joy is having similar difficulties with Reggie, who also doesn’t fit in, has no interest in doing so and has a razor sharp tongue to go with it.

To the Waffle House where everyone is delightfully random – bouncing off each other so incredibly well covering withholding love to make people desperate for your attention, how Roxy scares people and Mason playing with pepper spray.

And a messy Reap ends up with George going into work covered in bloodstains, much to her work colleague’s consternation. And to her consternation, her computer has been hacked by Neo-Nazis in Oregon now using it to send out mass mailers; she has Ethan, the nice IT guy, to fix it but in the meantime feels the need to convince everyone she isn’t a Nazi. On the plus side she does gain a super intelligent and efficient lackey in Ethan – she tries to figure out why and realises that her keeping him at arm’s length and reacting with panicky violence probably counts as “withholding love” to encourage people to want you.

She revels in the sudden power and popularity that comes from being an arsehole. Especially since being a nice girl never got her anything (though it has to be said the sarcastic George was never what you might consider a fluffy person). And she even laces into Crystal – ooh she’ll regret that.

George starts to have second thoughts about the whole being mean thing, though she’s not sold on niceness; especially when Delores tells her that Ethan just quit.

Meanwhile Daisy has a reap in a plastic surgery clinic, where her self-confidence makes her a little out of place among the enraged fighting women in the waiting room and the trans woman, Stan, waiting surgery who is, alas, her Reap when caught in the cross fire of thrown high heel shoes. Daisy is there to provide lots of comfort and they go to church together. At church Stan rants and curses at god and tries to throw a bible at the cross, incensed by her own exclusion. Stan asks Daisy to throw the Bible, but she refuses. Daisy urges Stan to pray and Stan says “I’m willing to forgive him, but I want him to say sorry first.” The stain glass window breaks and Daisy runs outside to chase off the kids who threw a rock. Stan’s trip to the afterlife arrives in front of the window, in the form of a figure robed in light opening their arms to Stan.

Dead Like Me, Season 2, Episode 3: Ghost Story

Open with George at work giving us a story about someone sinking in a swamp while she sinks under her huge work load (courtesy of her promotion) and Delores is so eager to tell her about the Happy Time Retreat she hasn’t signed up for yet! George is less than eager. In  between being a fluffy bunny, Delores makes a deadly accurate observation – George uses humour and sarcasm to keep people at a distance, pointing out she has no personal objects on her desk, no photos of friends or family at all.

Of course, George reflects part of the reason she isn’t joining Delores’s team is because she’s already been drafted to the dead team. To underscore that, she and Daisy go on a reap of two women speaking Spanish to a Brazilian personal trainer at the gym while George considers ways of making some fake photos of her fictional family. Though post Reap of the vapid stereotypes, Daisy agrees that George does use humour and sarcasm as a distancing technique.

At the Waffle House everyone else gathers around for their random comments about the fake parents picture George has made (I do like how they bounce off each other); and Rube agrees that she doesn’t fit in. Which is fine, George doesn’t want to – but she doesn’t want to stand out either. She even doesn’t join the Waffle House card club to get free waffles, despite every other Reaper joining.

Flashback to her childhood and her parents hiding from carollers with her at Christmas so they wouldn’t be dragged into joining them. (Side note – is this actually a thing in America? People gather on someone’s doorstep and sing at them? Do they even check if the people inside celebrate Christmas first?) Her family has always been loners who didn’t join in.

Back to work and the Retreat Facilitator joins the campaign to make George do stuff with people, he’s very pushy and leaves George feeling like a “loser” for holding down the fort. She goes to the Waffle House and tells Rube she’s going on the Retreat to help stay low – because being on the outside is making her stand out more. Rube still wants her on call though and objects to George’s sarcasm.

George joins Delores on the Retreat, though her sarcasm is very much in evidence. She doesn’t join in the game (saying what animal you are) very well and is snarky and prickly throughout – with added enthusiasm that out in the wild is a perfect place for everyone to truly get to know everyone. Which prompts lots of opening up about people’s secrets and pains and struggles and one recently split up couple starts to bicker. Millie continues to snark and not join in until everyone stares at her and she thaws and says – she’s a cat. Not a housecat, a stray – mean, distant

Rube also takes some time off (I wager to follow George) leaving them with the dire warning not to fuck up – meaning Mason who promptly loses his post it. He freaks out and panics and joins Daisy who is Reaping a biker in a notorious biker bar and discussing poetry (which I love – why can’t you have biker poets?)

At camp, I was right – Rube shows up to see George and give her her post it. Delores notices him so, again, they trot out the Alcoholics Anonymous excuse. George comments how even when she tries to join the circle, death drags her out again

George goes on her walk to find her Reap target while Rube joins the camp for storytime – telling a love story – a story of a man and a woman in love who fell out and he left in anger (I kind of like how Rube assumes leadership of the whole group without even trying) and then got stuck in a swamp trying to get back to her with lots of parables around it. The bickering couple both protest he could have got back to his wife, I imagine indicative of them regretting splitting up. Rube has a message for George about facing fears together and George’s internal monologue praises having a spot in the circle.

Daisy’s idea is to break into Rube’s flat where Mason hits Rube’s booze and they discover a vast supply of post its (hey, Crystal had a vast supply of stolen post its too – and didn’t seem to shocked by helping them work on their paperwork). They sample more of Rube’s booze and, predictably, get rather distracted, covered in post its and dancing. But in between the celebrations, Mason drops a bomb – someone’s going to die alone today and Mason keeps praising how perfect and beautiful Daisy is. Mason goes on with a powerful, despairing question as to just what, in the whole scheme of things, does one more unhappy soul mean. Daisy pushes him to remember the post it – because he always looks at it, always, before he puts it in his pocket. Proving also that Daisy watches Mason, pays attention to him. She lays next to him on the bed and tells him he needs to remember this one, or they will die alone.

Dead Like Me, Season 2, Episode 1: Send in the Clown

First episode of a new season – and that means a recap. Actually, it’s a pretty good recap, nicely summing everything up elegantly. Worries for this season? Season 1 was left with no plot hooks and a fairly weak overarching plot itself – I wonder where this season will go and whether the separate episodes can be interesting enough in their own right

We open in the Waffle House and George reading the Obituaries – the Reaper Sports pages – and feeling bitter when people live even to be 50; given her own very young death. At least it was very well reported – she asks Daisy and Mason if there’s was (Mason no – drug death in the 60s wasn’t newsworthy and Daisy’s death was buried since it happened on the set of Gone with the Wind). This leads, because of Daisy, to a conversation of the many men Daisy slept with and questioning of why George died a virgin (George’s reasons don’t impress Daisy). And Mason realises since he’s knocked off the booze & drugs he’s suddenly attracting more attention (aha, season 2 is jettisoning the bizarre fiction that Callum Blue is not hot).

Rube arrives with the assignment including multiple deaths at a farmer’s market (and a discussion about what constitutes a “disaster”. 7 deaths and under is a “crying shame”. I do love their banter). To the Farmer’s Market and the usual game of tracking down exactly who is going to die and putting the Reaper touch on them. Throw in some highly dubious but partially challenged racial banter, a discarded cigarette, a graveling and a gas leak and Booooom. George feels especially bad because she Reaped a flower seller who gave her a flower just before being Reaped. George flees the scene – especially since the disaster zone resembles her own death too much.

Back at the Waffle House, Mason is revelling in his newly awakened taste buds after being sober and drug free for the first time on 40 years. And Roxy has an insightfully cutting note about Daisy and her demeanour and why it doesn’t work on Roxy.

And at the Las household, family life is rocky and Joy continues to try and understand and bond with Reggie.  And a reminder from George that Rube hates her stalking her family – as she returns to the Waffle House, still disturbed and short tempered and guilty; leaving her flower and breakfast going to work (after Rube walks out from more tales of Daisy’s “star fucking” days).

George heads into work – actually relieved since it’s a job where she won’t be dealing with life and death. She has to deal with Delores – and bad news, training the bosses inept nephew Brennan. Well, apparently bad news but the consolation prize is that he’s easy on the eyes. Time for training and, yes, Brennan is not very intelligent. Also, George is pretty creepy when she finds a guy hot. She also gets jealous over other women paying attention to him (already claiming him as her boyfriend) and Delores advises her against office romance – that she’s young and has her whole life to meet someone. Ouch. As George says – she’s a virgin with a death certificate, what is she waiting for?

Dead Like Me: Season 1, Episode 12: Nighthawks

We open with George suffering from amnesia – the toll of taking the souls of the living and watching them die is bothering her and she can’t stop thinking about death. She does the insomnia work through the town, hating everyone who is maliciously sleeping while she can’t (oh I’ve done that a few times)

Everyone else was sleeping just fine – unfortunately – because Rube has called them in for a 1:00am meeting at the Waffle House. It’s time for their joyful self-assessment forms (which everyone complains about – Daisy tries to weasel out of it, Mason needs more drugs, Roxy glares at the waste of her time)

George’s wandering brings her to the Waffle House where everyone is grumbling through their exams and is bemused why she’s not involved and what people are actually doing. Rube grabs George and pulls her away and gives her a wonderfully cryptic non-answer about why she’s not taking the test in between talking about his desire to learn how to paint. George is almost offended that she isn’t taking the test.

For some reason art and George whining leads to lots of flashback clips about Rube and food. That’s the second lot of rather convoluted flashback clips that have been shoe-horned into this episode.

Which is when we switch to Roxy doing her test and get a series of clips of her as well.

Really? Really Dead Like Me? A clip show? You are actually having a clip show? A clip show on episode 12 of your first season? You don’t have enough material for a clip show!

On to Daisy – and her clips. Really? Daisy hasn’t even been in the show that long yet I get a clips recap? Mason’s recap follows before George and Rube discuss art and, seeing a picture that looks like Daisy, George corrects Rube’s opinion of her shallowness and tells him she thinks Daisy is sad. Oh, and Mason and Daisy torment the poor waitress Kiffany for test answers. She even offers to help Roxy. Rube also keeps focusing on a couple eating in the Waffle House.

And George learns Rube has a job – a soul to Reap, that morning, at her old house. George, naturally, freaks out a little while Rube lays down the law – she cannot interfere. Rube tells her it’s not about her and tells her she has a problem with rules (excuse me – one of her family could be potentially about to die and he brings it down to a “problem with rules”? That’s grossly off base for Rube). This convoluted segue leads us to a set of George flashback clips.

The Returned, Season 1, Episode 7: Adèle

One year ago, Thomas and Chloé return home to find Adèle passed out in the bathroom with her wrists cut.

In the present, Toni and Serge walk through the woods away from their house after Toni shot at the police; though Toni is struggling and also worries about their mother who he thinks they left behind (except, of course, she hasn’t returned from the dead and it was just Serge’s way of hiding Léna). In the woods they find a bonfire, with animal bodies in the ashes. In case there wasn’t enough creepy

They stagger through the woods for hours, walking in circles until Toni can’t go on. Serge looks for a way out while Toni rests – and he sees his mother, before she disappears in the woods. She may have Returned

They swim across the lake rather than going round – and half away across Toni struggles, but something drags Serge underwater. Toni makes it out of the lake, but Serge is still missing

Léna, meanwhile has found a shower – and is cowering in it. When she hears footsteps she hurriedly pulls on some clothes, locks the door and gasps in panic when someone pulls the handle – until she hears it’s Jérôme and she hugs him in relief.

Creepy Victor is till creepy and he wakes a sleeping Pierre at Helping hands and tells him to follow; to look at the pretty lake. While I was getting confused (Victor isn’t at Helping Hands), it turns out to be just Pierre’s dream, he wakes up to Claire worrying and fretting and seeking comfort. So she shows her his food bunker (not a euphemism – this guy stocks like the end of the world is happening tomorrow or there’s an epic sale in the local supermarket. Or like my grandmother). He rather ominously promises her they won’t have to leave (I think being evacuated because the dam is breaking and there’s no power makes leaving a pretty good idea) and shows her his big stash o’ guns. This was supposed to reassure Claire? She doesn’t look reassured, nor about him talking about protecting Camille. He also has a creepy looking medical room (looks like a badly decorated dentist’s office) and starts talking about the book of revelations.

Let it be said that Pierre is really really really bad at being reassuring.

At Laure’s house Julie wakes up and beckons Laure over as she walks past – they kiss, passionately until Laure starts to lift Julie’s nightshirt. Julie is self-conscious because of her scars, but Laure reassures her, lifts the shirt and kisses the scars – which is when Creepy Victor appears being creepy. Laure yells at him to get lost and stop creepily watching them make out like the creepy thing he is and he leaves. Laure then apologises to Julie but worries if Victor is safe; Julie sensibly points out Victor is actually a child. Julie tells Laure her worry that she is one of the returned but Laure points out all of the Returned have been dead and buried for years – not Julie who was clinically dead for a few seconds 7 years ago and stayed around since then. But being one of the Returned doesn’t bother Julie – because it would give her a reason why the last 7 years she hasn’t been able to live. Victor goes to stare creepily out of the window.

Adèle has another awkward discussion with Chloé – about Simon being an angel or just the returned dead and, therefore, able to stay. Adèle reassures her it’s impossible – hah! She’s in for a surprise.

Simon wakes up (yes he was actually asleep) with Lucy; he’s all moody while Lucy tries to convince him to stay away from Adèle, he can’t have anything to do with them – he’s dead. She wants him to come with her – apparently she knows where the dead should go, but he wants to understand something first

Him and me both.

At Helping Hands, Camille and Mrs. Costa talk dead people stuff – like her husband killing himself when she returned; Mrs. Costa gets defensive and doesn’t want to answer Camille’s many questions. Mrs. Costa tells her how she died – but it’s different from what she told Claire and different again from what she told Jérôme. Camille calls her out for lying and Mrs. Costa turns it back on her – the lies Pierre encouraged Camille to tell to give the parents of the other crash victims “hope”. Camille is sure it helped them – Mrs. Costa doesn’t think so and tells Camille to look in the storehouse. Camille goes with Claire – and finds the bodies. And the others realise that Camille is at least partly responsible, while Pierre continues to maintain his cult.

Dead Like Me, Season 1, Episode 9: Sunday Mornings

The theme this week is George and good memories she looks back on. And speaking of things we look back on - Roxy’s back! Thank you – and her first line is pointing out an annoying habit of Daisy’s! Is this why they got rid of her for a while? Because there’s no way Roxy would tolerate the newly arrived Daisy’s shenanigans? Anyway, Daisy accuses George of being “internal” which is why she has no friends. Roxy snarks more at Daisy (deservedly) I think Roxy is going to make Daisy far more tolerable.

In other things getting better, it looks like the Las household may be heading up with Reggie being much happier and brighter with JD the dog with even Joy and Clancy bonding. Things are looking up

Less so for George going to a college for her death appointment (accompanied by Mason for the usual skeevy reasons), reminiscing about their families and how George was so close to her dad as a child but they drifted apart. George goes all internal with the stress presence of the college while Mason, of course, finds some drugs (and declaims his theory that colleges are invented by bacteria). She finds her target – a ridiculously enthusiastic college student with big big hopes that are now very much dashed. And Mason’s peeping Tom ways let him see an attempted rape, to which he promptly clonks the guy on the head with a fire extinguisher.

Afterwards, George and the woman Mason rescued talk about reaction in crisis and how they think they’re ready but then have a brain freeze; and George bonds over how alike they are. Goerge sees a friend and actual friend – and Mason develops a crush. And more than just he-wants-to-have-sex-with-her crush. To which Daisy, seeing Mason with some vulnerable feelings, promptly stomps all over everything.

The problem with undead characters is you can’t wish them dead.

And Roxy is being given grief on her job, as usually – and then he touches her. Touches her when she told him not to. This is where we learn that a pissed off Reaper can rip the soul out of your body, hold it above their head and give dire warnings before putting it back.

At work, George tells Delores she has lunch plans – and Delores very kindly, very patiently tells George it’s fine to say no to her without having to lie. Which shows again how Delores is both kind and annoying – and how insular George normally is. Of course she does have lunch plans this time and she and Charlotte continue to enjoy each other’s company; Charlotte complains about how the guy trying to rape her also hit her joy of the sonnets she was reading at the time – joy George used to share because her dad (a university professor) used to read them to her. In fact, Charlotte invites her to a seminar about them lead by – yes, Clancy Lass, George’s dad. And she’s struck by how engaging and entertaining and clever he is in the lecture hall – completely different from how he was at home. George reflects on how Clancy changed and realised she changed and became a teenager and started avoiding him so stopped seeing Clancy as he was.

The Reluctant Reaper (Reluctant Reaper #1) by Gina X Grant

Kirsty D’Arc is happily living her life, doing her thing when her day is spoiled by being attacked by a stapler. A stapler. As if violent office supplies weren’t enough, she then finds her boss is actually trying to sell her soul – to get an extension on his old contract

A dizzying series of terrible accidents finds Kirsty down in Hell, the afterlife. And nothing is what she expected but nor is it easy to fix such a blatant mistake. She’s down there for some time – giving her chance to learn a little about herself, her family – and how little she had done with her life but also what she actually wants

Especially concerning attractive Reaper Dante.

You can tell this book was designed to be funny and light full of quips and wit and lots of giggly moments. It doesn’t take itself seriously, it often jumps into the ridiculous and positively wallows there. Everything is a little silly, a lot zany, a lot whacky and more than a little cartoony. And I can appreciate that – some of my favourite books have been those that are just loopy and out there and make me giggle all the time. It’s especially fun when you take something as serious and dark and mournful and, well, grim as a Grim Reaper and throw all this light, silly, funny joy on top. So it had a lot of potential

And completely missed the mark for me. I don’t think I laughed once, unfortunately, I’m not even sure if I cracked a smile. The humour is contrived, it doesn’t fit even in the zaniness. It relied a lot on convoluted mental monologues while Kirsty chased her own thoughts in circles until she could force out a quip (and setting up your own funny lines doesn’t work). There is an inordinate number of puns – puns on top of puns on top of puns that just don’t work for me even slightly.

It has the odd line like: “When life had handed me lemons, I’d gone online and purchased grapefruits. Victoria’s Secret was safe with me.” That wasn’t bad. But gee-nomes that sting you and alter your DNA? Lead by the streetsmart “metrognome”. She gets angry when it’s misty so becomes “misterical”. The mist that would not be missed?  I didn’t laugh – I did groan. I did look back and see if I had actually read that. Then I groaned again. And really, this is just the tip of the iceberg. It gets worse. It gets so much worse.

This is shaky ground to be on. You have a book whose prime selling point is its humour and, to me, it’s just not funny. That’s crashing and burning right there.

But, worse, humour is pretty much all the book has. The plot is really weak. She dies, she goes to Hell, she wanders around and random stuff happens. That’s about it – each random event is an excuse for some more zaniness and puns and maybe some world exploration – but there’s no actual plot. There’s a vague, background “oh I want to go back to my life” but she doesn’t actually do anything about that or about anything else. She just kind of exists. I think this is trying to set up her character as someone who has no karma – because that is exactly what she is in this setting, she has neither good karma nor bad karma (which is currency in this Hell) because she hasn’t actually lived; she never takes chances, she never does anything, she’s not an active participant in her own life. Which is an interesting thing to explore in both a character beginning to grow and over a series – but there’s nothing else in this book to provide a scaffolding around a deliberately blank protagonist.

Dead Like Me, Season 1, Episode 7: Reaper Madness

George – as Millie – is at work, musing sarcastically about brain cells and not doing a whole lot of anything when Delores drops in with a super new job for her! Fiona is a new employee and Millie/George gets to mentor her! (Which, as George notes, is like a promotion but without the pay raise). Still George takes to it well, despite Fiona’s eccentricity, telling her the various pointlessnesses of the job (filing paper no-one cares about into boxes no-one even bothers to label)  of the job and for a brief, horrible moment it looks like George may become responsible and Delores mark 2! Until she tells Fiona where the good pens to steal are.

Her snark reflects on how she did very little for the first 18 years of her life and her regrets  - not big hopes and dreams regrets, but little regrets: like Reggie and her toilet-seat tree who she barely even noticed when she was alive.

Which brings us to George’s reap – apparently a schizophrenic, Ronnie Dobbs, and right next to Mason’s reap – and she’s stopped just in time by a call from Rube calling her to the Waffle house; there’s been a clerical error and Ronnie’s not meant to die – not yet anyway. Oops. Daisy continues to be a headache to everyone (now freaking out about cottage cheese. We also get another order of “look we should hate her” slut-shaming). And George is slightly uncomfortable about Ronnie because she’s sure he was looking at her significantly

Cut to Ronnie in his psychiatrist’s office, scolding him for going off his meds  - and Ronnie can clearly see the graveling that causes the death of Mason’s reap, a window-washer. He goes downstairs where Mason plans to get high with the ghost (of course) and he, again, sees the gravelings, notices Mason – and focuses on George.

At work, George finds Millie has utterly failed to do the job she gave her, because George had inspired her not to care by describing how pointless it was. George is strangely proud of this – she had inspired someone! She was a role-model! This flashes some more memories of George’s – including regrets; her mother, Joy, didn’t give her money or treats when she lost her teeth as a child, she gave her little notes with inspiring messages like “you are loved.” Awww, of course being a child means she screwed it up and threw it away because it wasn’t money and Joy found it in the bin. Awwwww, now I definitely feel sorry for Joy. I’m not quite sure how inspiring the slack-assness of Fiona prompted the memory, but I’m willing to leap along. So began George’s disillusionment when Joy didn’t try next tooth – and so did George imagine the same for Reggie, and so George left her a gift basket tied to her toilet seat tree.

George goes on to her next reap in the park – and sits on the same bench as Ronnie. Who tries (awkwardly) to flirt with her – and she tries to responds (equally awfully) confirming that “undead” doesn’t mean “dead”. In between the flirting – Ronnie predicts a death, seeing the Gravelings (he predicts the wrong death, but still).

George reports this to Rube who just puts it down to him seeing George too many times; calls her sloppy and tells her to live on the fringe more. Which, as George snarks, is ironic because she spent her whole life living on the fringe.

Back at the Lass household, Reggie opens the box with lots of clippings from George of fun, inspiring activities to try including horse riding. While Joy and Clancy argue about what to do with Reggie, Joy is flailing around and suggests moving her to a private school. Joy’s frustrated by Clancy’s unwillingness to make a decision or confront the issue that Reggie may be different and may not get the best education suited to her individuality in a large public school. And Reggie comes in and says she wants to ride a horse.