2023-30. A Dirty Job

This book is a cross between Under The Whispering Door and Let's Pretend This Never Happened.  It is a very hyper read, with a high energy, scattered, neurotic narrator whose prose reflects their whirlwind existence.  Filled with demons and death hounds and the grim reaper, who haplessly and unknowingly kills people and animals by just pointing to them, the storyline itself is just weird, with even weirder characters.  I love quirky, but this is a quirky beyond what I could keep up with, as the storyline gets more bizarre and harder to follow.  Some parts are admittedly clever--like the whole concept of the "beta male" who is definitely not the alpha male, but who is doing all right in the wake of the alpha males.  I was never quite sure if the main character was really experiencing becoming a "death merchant" or if the whole story was goin to end up being a grief induced hallucination.  I'm actually still not sure, but since there is apparently an entire series, I suppose if this question haunts you after the first book, you could keep reading.  I, however, could barely tolerate the disjointed hyper-ness of volume one, so this is one series I will not be getting sucked into. I do know one Jennifer Lawson fan I will be recommending this to.

Side note: While there is a short-lived subplot that makes reference to a trans woman one of the characters is romantically corresponding with, there is some transphobic content that I thought was unnecessary and crass.
​
​If this book is for you, you can click here to purchase this book and support My 50 Bookish Friends blog project.  For Under Whispering Door, click here and Let's Present This Never Happened, click here.

---