Death's Daughter

Title: Death's Daughter
Author: Amber Benson
Series: Calliope Reaper Jones, book 1
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Published: 2009
Rating: 6.5/10

Review: I've gotta prefix this by the admission that I am a big Buffy fan. In fact, I liked the series enough to watch all seven seasons is something close to 3 weeks while preparing for exams in 3rd year university. That show is awesome and if you haven't given it a serious shot yet, go watch it now and reserve judgement until you see at least a few episodes. It starts out slow, but it's pretty amazing over time.

Now, Amber Benson played Tara on Buffy and though I've never been particularly fond of her in the show, I thought it would be interesting to check out the novel she published. This novel is her debut and since I've seen it talked about and reviewed around the blogosphere, I thought I'd check it out.

The main heroine in the book, Calliope, is Death's daughter. When Death himself is kidnapped, she is asked by her family to step into his shoes and rescue her father. In addition to Death, the book also features the Devil, God, Goddess Kali, and the Devil's Protege. Calliope mostly stumbles around, getting into various mis-adventures, and somehow still getting ahead despite being somewhat dense and prone to crying fits.

The pacing for the book was good. It was easy to read and the humourous situations came through quite well. I mostly liked Calliope as a protagonist despite her flightiness and constant emotional turmoil. However, at times the absurdity of the actions did get a bit much and I thought the writing of the book could use some work.

Altogether, not a bad airplane read and perhaps not bad at all for a first-time author, but I can't say I was deeply impressed either. I would consider picking up the next book in the series, but I am in no hurry to do so at the moment.