Charley, the zany, reckless grim reaper is hurting. After
being kidnapped and tortured last book, she is not doing well and the trauma
has prevented her leaving her apartment in weeks. She has ongoing conflicts
with both Reyes and her father for the terrible way they’ve both treated her –
she’s at one of her lowest points
She still has good friends to help and support her but
what really drags her out of her secure home is a new case; a young woman has
been stalked and tormented for years and Charley cannot sit back and let it
continue, forcing her to confront her own issues in the process
And issues inevitably lead to Reyes, the son of Satan
whose plots led to Charley being tortured in the first place.
In the last book, Charley was badly traumatised after
being captured and tortured. One of the things that had characterised Charlie
until this point is that she’s pretty much fearless to the point of reckless.
She plunges her way into any situation with the merry confidence that she will get
out the other side unscathed (which makes sense given her Reaper nature) all
the while making witticisms and snark.
And now that little bubble is gone. She isn’t fearless
any more. She has night terrors, she has agoraphobia, she panics easily and she
is hording things, filling her apartment with things she’s buying trying to
reassert control. She covers the stain caused by her torture with boxes and
cannot stand to have it touched. It’s a really good depiction and also
contrasts well with another character also suffering PTSD as part of the case
Charley is investigating. What I really like there is that their symptoms are
quite different which really shows how two people with the same condition can
manifest them in very different ways
It is difficult to have a character deal with something
as severe as Charley did and still respectfully deal with the aftermath of that
while at the same time maintain the hallmark lightness and fun that really
makes this series a joy to read. And I have to say it does actually manage it
without clashing. We have a lot of light and fun depictions of the underlying
pain in Charley’s life. So Cookie will snark about all of the ridiculous things
Charley has bought and it will be hilarious, but underneath she and Charlie’s
sister will recognise there’s a problem and Charley’s hurting. Or Charley will
be unable to sleep because of a horrifying nightmare and do one of her classic
dropping in at 3:00am visits to poor Garrett. It mixes together surprisingly
well though at times it does feel like Charley can turn off her symptoms when
they’re in the way.
Despite saying that, I also have to say this book tried
too hard to be funny and silly and I felt the effort. Like she always named her
breasts – Danger and Will Robinson, but now she’s naming random furniture, her
head, her kidneys and just about anything else around her? Stop – this is
trying too hard, don’t force the zaniness. Forced zaniness isn’t funny. There’s
still plenty of fun there but now and then we just cross the line and it feels
tiresome.
There’s also the blight of Reyes. Oh how I hate Reyes, oh
how I have always hated Reyes. I don’t care how epicly epicly epicly
legendarily hot he is (and oh how we are told how hot he is over and over and
over again) and I don’t care how many times he’s saved Charley’s life and I don’t
care how much he loves her – he still regularly threatens her and her loved
ones, has kidnapped her, has used her as bait and is generally a terrible
person that Charlie should shun. She gets mad with him – just as she gets angry
with her father (and I love that she doesn’t instantly forgive her father for
the crap he’s pulled on her but even then, her father’s forgiveness comes not
because he earned it but from a completely-predictable cancer scare) but she
continually melts and forgives him time after time. I’ll accept that she may
have to work with him because of the meta-plot of demons wanting to take over
the world etc; but enough with the forgiveness and the he’s-so-hot relationship.
Honestly I completely loathe this character and it’s largely because of Charley’s
endless forgiveness of him.
I did like that she billed him though. That was awesome.
There was also a plot twist at the end of the book
concerning the main case Charley was working. Looking back I can see how it
worked but it was still more confusing than surprising and I’m not sure it
appreciably added much to the plot itself except as a last minute dash of
tragedy. There’s also a side plot that has been pushed into the book involving
bank robbery and another involving arson (linked to Reyes’s over the top and
unnecessarily tragic past) which just feel completely out of place and kind of
rammed in. Like the book was finished and the author realised she was way below
her word count.
The book continues to have some excellent female
friendships – Charley and Cookie are the stuff of legends, I love them, every
word they exchange. I like that Charley’s sister has also been added to the mix
as a supportive, loving addition and the fact she’s a therapist as well also
helps. I also kind of love dead Aunt Lil.
There’s also some added diversity in minor roles. We have
a Deaf character appearing at the beginning of the book, he remains in the
background but it’s a nice touch that Charley’s Reaper ability to understand
any language also applies to sign language. Pari, a minor character we’ve seen
before who can see the dead (albeit not as well as Charley) is revealed to be
bisexual in a rather bemusing (and classically Charley Davidson) date scene
though her relationship with another woman lasts less than half a book. They’re not major characters but they’re there
(I’ll give it a nod but not much more).
There are multiple POC – Reyes is a major character and
latino. Angel is a more minor character and also latino and with some cultural
markers to go along with him. Garrett, who she loves to bother at 3:00am and
generally be a complete nuisance to is Black (there’s also a minor, nameless
Black bar tender working for her father but she’s not exactly a character).
This book has a lot of the elements of this series I love
– all the fun and zaniness. It has the awesome characters (except Reyes, who I
hate), it has the fascinating and weird world, it has the powerful friendships.
It’s added some minor characters to improve it’s very lacking diversity (of
course, minor characters don’t make it perfect but it’s a step in the right
direction) and it has explored some of the major issues in Charley’s life in a
respectful way… and I really really really want to give it a high fang rating.
I really do. But the plot itself, the actual investigation in this book, is
just a bit lacking, with a twist that isn’t all that twisty and a lot of time
spent not actually investigating it and getting side tracked. The meta-pursuit
itself seems more involved in Charlie developing new super powers and her being
forced together with Reyes yet again. I’m disappointed because I want to love
the book as much as I love the characters in it.
