Anne's Reviews > A Dirty Job

The Grim Rreaper?
Charlie Asher (Beta Male) suddenly finds himself widowed after the birth of his daughter, Sophie. He also finds himself the newest recruit of Death. No, he is not The Death, he is simply to collect the souls of the recently departed and store them until they are ready to be placed with a new body. He is a Death Merchant, or at least that is the name coined by Mr. Fresh, the record store owner who collected his wife's soul.



As if all of this wasn't enough, poor Charlie has to figure out how to keep his little girl from pointing at people and saying, kitty, as they seem to drop dead after she does it. There is also the issue of the Hellhounds. Yes, he is grateful Sophie has some pets that can finally survive her special talent, but they are a little hard to explain to the neighbors.



Death is a hard subject to wrap your mind around, much less find humorous, but somehow Moore does it. He manages to make it touching and funny at the same time. Very cute story.
I will say that upon relistening to this 14 years later, all that beta male stuff was just dorky. Not sure if it just didn't age well as a joke, or if I just didn't notice how stupid it was the first time around. It's still a mostly fun book, though, and I plan on reading the sequel at some point.