Title: Graveyard Shift
Author: Angela Roquet
Published: January 2nd 2014
Hello my fellow Bookworms and page turners,
This one was an odd one. I stalled reading this one a few times, and in the end im not sure it was worth the effort to finish it.
The story follows its main protagonist Lana. Lana is a reaper employed by an organization owned and run by Grim (yeah that Grim). She’s sort of a slacker, doing her job but not much more, and just trying to stay off of the big guys’ radar. Instead she spends most of her time shopping (she does this a few times in the book) she does battle some demons and afterwards got irritated at demon guts in her hair. She attended a ball, and got an angel boyfriend. All in all it had a semi-decent plot but I was hoping/expecting alot more.
The setting of the Afterlife is a great base for a story. However, the world building left something to be desired, I would even go as far as to describe it as patchy at best. It really felt like the author just decided to toss everything she knew about different gods and religions into one big pot, stir it and see what floats to the top. This coupled with the methods employed to describe the beurocaracy that makes the world run made the story feel more like an urban fantasy. This is because in the end it was so much like our real world (other than some obvious differences) that it was hard to get immersed in a foriegn land.
Roquet was really pushing feminine power in this book. Female villains and heroines run this joint. A lot of females were in high positions of power, so I can see a lot of feminist readers truly enjoying this. Which would be fantastic if they were well written and had great characters, but as our MC has about as much Charisma as a wet paper bag, you can imagine how underplayed some of the supporting characters are in order to make the MC shine. Infact i believe there were only two character traits for any other female in the book at that was they were either a massive slut, or a massive bitch (with the exception of the MC’s best friend).
In short, this one definitley isnt in my favourites, ive definitley read worse books. But, it does have potential given its setting and some of the interesting story elements that have been introduced, it just needs to give some of the characters a slap and an attitude adjustment, and market itself as an Urban Fantasy.
Until next time, read more books!
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