Thomas Bess’ review of:
Written By: Amber Benson
Starring: Calliope Reaper-Jones and whole slew of Gods, Goddesses and other supernatural creatures
Page Count: 359 pages
While I’m relatively certain that no one on the interwebs has lost any sleep wondering as to my whereabouts the last month, I feel a certain obligation to explain my absence. See, a few weeks back, I wandered (innocently enough) into a little movie called Transformers 2. Surviving that film in the way a Lovecraftian hero ‘survives’ an encounter with one of the Great Old Ones, I’ve spent the following days nursing myself back to health on a steady diet of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives and The Mentalist. Suffice to say, I’m back and happy to bring you a quirky-good suggestion for your summer reading. Death’s Daughter isn’t something I’d normally pick up during my wanderings at Borders, but a couple buddies had been after me to read it for a while and seeing as how it was written by Buffy the Vampire Slayer alum Amber Benson, I figured why not. She gave the world Tara Maclay and Lenore the pacifist vampire, (in one of the best episodes of Supernatural ever) the price of a paperback seemed like a small price to pay to balance the karmic scales. That it turned out to be a darned fun read was just icing on the cake.
Plot’s pretty straight-forward — Calliope Reaper-Jones is an executive assistant for House and Yard Inc, a gadget corporation in New York. She’s good at what she does, but doesn’t particularly enjoy it, as she has dreams of making it in the world of high fashion. All is going fairly well in our heroine’s life when a faun by the name of Jarvis pops out of nowhere and informs CRJ that her father’s been kidnapped. Traumatizing enough for a normal person, but as you’ve probably garnered from the title, Calliope’s Pa is the man with the sickle, the head of the board of Death Incorporated. Dragged kicking and screaming back into the family business, Callie’s sent on a far ranging quest, first to prove herself as a worthy heir to her father’s mantle and then to track him down so she can hand it right back. If it sounds like I’m being intentionally vague, you’re not wrong. While it’s never too difficult to see where the story is going, HOW Benson gets you there is quite refreshing and to say anymore would do a disservice to both reader and narrative. Suffice to say, Calliope and assorted friends (including a hellhound puppy, the Goddess Kali and Jarvis, the aforementioned faun) visit some very interesting places before the story wraps up.
So what’s good? The first thing that popped out at me was the dialogue between Callie and the other characters, not to mention her interior asides, zingers and rejoinders. I found myself snickering (in a good way) every other page or so and laughing out loud several times as well. It’s hard to put a finger on exactly why it works so well, save maybe that it falls perfectly between dull-ass after school special and the ‘look how goddamned cool and funny I am!’ brand of Yargh that Diablo Cody has so recently unleashed upon the world. It’s also worth noting that while this is the first time we’ve been invited into Miz. Reaper-Jones’ world, it doesn’t feel like a work in progress at all. Progressing deeper into the story, I got the impression that this was a continuity Benson had been mulling / working on for quite some time and as such when you’re plopped down into the middle of it, you’re free to wander without running into any of those barriers that say ‘please turn around, this part’s not quite ready yet’. While we certainly haven’t seen everything there is to see in this one novel, we’re provided with enough glimpses to wanna keep coming back, in hopes that the next story will take us places only hinted at or mentioned in passing in Death’s Daughter.
So what’s not so good? Before I go any further, please keep in mind that I am a guy who does most of his clothes shopping at Target and the occasional comics convention, so anything I say in regard to fashion can and should be taken with several pounds of salt. That said, there were several times throughout the course of the narrative where Calliope waxes poetic about certain designers or fashion houses and I could feel my eyes start to glaze over. The writing was still top notch, I just couldn’t bring myself to care about what sort of shoes she might be sporting for her heroic journey. And at a couple points here and there Callie sits herself down for a good cry — now I understand being stranded in hell on some sort of metaphysical quest can be taxing, but c’mon, lives are at risk here. You can cry after you’ve saved the world. It was only the hope of a good zinger on the next page that kept me from muttering ‘stop being such a girl!’ when the waterworks came on. But that’s just me and I’ve been told I’m a caveman-browed clod, so again, bust out the salt.
Despite occasional bouts of crying from the heroine, I wholeheartedly recommend giving Death’s Daughter a shot. It’s a great combination of humor, action, supernatural craziness, mythology and theology all melded into handy paperback size. And if the ending is any indication we’ll be seeing more of Calliope somewhere down the line. If that’s the case, you certainly don’t need to (God forgive me, I’m weak) fear the Reaper.
Til next time, always remember the calls are coming from inside the house.
Tom Bess has sideburns that are so big they might be considered a beard shaving accident from afar. He blames his current mental state on Stephen King, Mike Nelson, Seth McFarlane and Vince McMahon but bears them no ill will. He passes his time writing movie reviews, but will flee the interwebs forever as soon as Allison Mack starts returning his calls.
A very sharp review that catches the right elements of the book and explains quite nicely just why they work. Good job, Mr. Bess.