The Devil You Know

Felix Castor is an exorcist who's fallen into some hard times after an attempt to remedy a friend's possession went horribly wrong. Out of the blue comes a simple ghost removal, which seems fairly simple. However, while attempting to get a feel for the ghost's nature, he runs afoul of a crooked pimp, a lycanthrope with an attitude, and an elder succubus who's been summoned just to kill him. Felix is forced to use his wits to not only bring peace to the mute ghost, but to save his own skin in the process.

Up until this novel, I was only familiar with Mike Carey's comic book work, primarily Lucifer and The Unwritten (both excellent titles, by the way). This is the first prose novel of his I've read, and coincidentally the first novel in the Felix Castor series.

While Felix comes off a bit like John Constantine (Carey also wrote some issues of Hellblazer), the uniqueness of Castor's universe allows you to look past a lot of the familiar occult detective tropes. Carey comes up with creative origins of the various supernatural types, some of which are refreshing takes on otherwise tired concepts. Combine that with some snappy dialog and excellent pacing, and you end up with a book that's an absolute blast to read.

If you're looking for something both fun and new, this is definitely a book to check out. Highly recommended.

Available at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, and Books-A-Million.

Title: The Devil You Know
Author: Mike Carey
Year: 2006
Pages: 501

DEAD(ish)

I loved B&N's description of the book:

Linda's had a bad day. First her boyfriend killed her. Then she woke up, still on this boring plane of existence, and with an odd obsession about her missing body.

It turns out Linda can't cross over until she gets reunited with her body. Because she doesn't know where it is, and her boyfriend Mike isn't telling, Linda starts playing cruel pranks on Mike while hiring a P.I. to track down her missing body.

Told from a rotating first-person point-of-view, the plot takes a few twists and turns, including an improbable love quadrangle(?) between Linda, Mike, and the gay couple next door.

The best part of this book is the mischief Linda commits against Mike. The plot itself takes some completely improbable turns, and the ending is completely forgettable. In addition, the dialog is entirely too expletive-laden and distracts from the message being conveyed.

If you've got a NOOK or the NOOK software, you can get this book for free from the Barnes & Noble link above. Amazon is charging only 99¢ for the Kindle version. I don't believe the book exists in hard-copy format. Frankly, that's about what this tale is worth.

Title: DEAD(ish)
Author: Naomi Kramer
Year: 2009
Pages: 100