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Death and the Human
Death gave her a second chance. But some bargains come with eternal consequences.
While investigating a seemingly routine case in Salem, Oregon, private investigator Molly Coyle makes a mistake that ends her life. Before she knows it, the local angel of death does her a favor and brings her back from the dead.
Now forced to spend the remainder of her days working as her benefactor's newest reaper, Molly goes back to work on the case that got her killed. With help from a sassy ghost cat named Fuzzy, she explores the darker parts of town while searching for a missing man who last saw her when she was a corpse.
As Molly gets used to being a reaper, she learns that the worlds around her (even the regular one she thought she had all figured out) are filled with secrets. And if she can't get to the bottom of them all, she might just wind up permanently dead.
In this thrilling prequel, discover how Molly became death's reluctant servant. If you crave snarky heroines, supernatural intrigue, and reluctant partnerships with a dash of dark humor, you'll devour J.K. Venter's witty adventure. Buy Death and the Human to experience the rebellious side of the afterlife today!
While investigating a seemingly routine case in Salem, Oregon, private investigator Molly Coyle makes a mistake that ends her life. Before she knows it, the local angel of death does her a favor and brings her back from the dead.
Now forced to spend the remainder of her days working as her benefactor's newest reaper, Molly goes back to work on the case that got her killed. With help from a sassy ghost cat named Fuzzy, she explores the darker parts of town while searching for a missing man who last saw her when she was a corpse.
As Molly gets used to being a reaper, she learns that the worlds around her (even the regular one she thought she had all figured out) are filled with secrets. And if she can't get to the bottom of them all, she might just wind up permanently dead.
In this thrilling prequel, discover how Molly became death's reluctant servant. If you crave snarky heroines, supernatural intrigue, and reluctant partnerships with a dash of dark humor, you'll devour J.K. Venter's witty adventure. Buy Death and the Human to experience the rebellious side of the afterlife today!
287 pages, Kindle Edition
Published June 9, 2025
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
March 27, 2026
This book sounded promising, but I soon realized that it strongly reminded me of a television series I enjoyed once. Whether this author was inspired by "Dead Like Me" or not, there are a handful of apparent connections, and the blurb will tell you most of them. That made me want to read this, but I had to stop about halfway through this volume, because the protagonist is too unrelatable to read for very long.
It’s no spoiler to mention one of the problems, since the first sentence mentions the day the MC dies for the first time. It was a clever hook, and I did enjoy a good bit of the writing in this book early on, but a few problems arose even before the forewarned “first death”. Primarily, this character refuses to accept what is happening to her, even in the face of ridiculous amounts of evidence, including the blood on the ground where she remembers being struck and obviously killed (that’s the non-spoiler mention), which of course begins her next phase. For a private investigator who’s apparently pretty good at her job, ignoring massive evidence to snark off to the reader (and at least one supporting character) makes the MC look both foolish and obnoxious.
Even worse, the protagonist comes from money but somehow seems mad about that fact. While she understandably wants to make her own way, driving an old car and living in a modest apartment in a not-great part of town, we soon discover that her parents live on a once-giant estate, with a massive library that I expect will keep coming into play (even if the MC disbelieves what she reads if it doesn’t fit into her tidy, annoyed, preexisting worldview). And her investigative mentor has plenty of money himself and an impossibly-smooth web of contacts who I expect will be the deus ex machina whenever the main character needs information that she cannot be bothered to earn for herself.
There were a few really cute moments in the first half of this book, but they’re not enough to make me want to read this ever-more-irritating character who wants to defy the universe even if it (literally) kills her and her closest ally, and who has no idea what a second chance at (some kind of) life she’s been given. Like the rich kid we learn she was before “striking out on her own” (sort of), she seems personally offended that the universe didn’t hand her exactly what she expected, and she scoffs at far too much to learn almost anything from her circumstances. Whatever message the author is trying to convey with this protagonist, that’s not a character to whom I can relate.
Did not finish; disappointed. Might be good for people who like sarcasm above all or who enjoy seeing anyone get a strong comeuppance, but I like my characters to appreciate something or someone in their lives, and to learn from their mistakes and discoveries at some point. Neither of those things happened by the time I called it quits on this one.
It’s no spoiler to mention one of the problems, since the first sentence mentions the day the MC dies for the first time. It was a clever hook, and I did enjoy a good bit of the writing in this book early on, but a few problems arose even before the forewarned “first death”. Primarily, this character refuses to accept what is happening to her, even in the face of ridiculous amounts of evidence, including the blood on the ground where she remembers being struck and obviously killed (that’s the non-spoiler mention), which of course begins her next phase. For a private investigator who’s apparently pretty good at her job, ignoring massive evidence to snark off to the reader (and at least one supporting character) makes the MC look both foolish and obnoxious.
Even worse, the protagonist comes from money but somehow seems mad about that fact. While she understandably wants to make her own way, driving an old car and living in a modest apartment in a not-great part of town, we soon discover that her parents live on a once-giant estate, with a massive library that I expect will keep coming into play (even if the MC disbelieves what she reads if it doesn’t fit into her tidy, annoyed, preexisting worldview). And her investigative mentor has plenty of money himself and an impossibly-smooth web of contacts who I expect will be the deus ex machina whenever the main character needs information that she cannot be bothered to earn for herself.
There were a few really cute moments in the first half of this book, but they’re not enough to make me want to read this ever-more-irritating character who wants to defy the universe even if it (literally) kills her and her closest ally, and who has no idea what a second chance at (some kind of) life she’s been given. Like the rich kid we learn she was before “striking out on her own” (sort of), she seems personally offended that the universe didn’t hand her exactly what she expected, and she scoffs at far too much to learn almost anything from her circumstances. Whatever message the author is trying to convey with this protagonist, that’s not a character to whom I can relate.
Did not finish; disappointed. Might be good for people who like sarcasm above all or who enjoy seeing anyone get a strong comeuppance, but I like my characters to appreciate something or someone in their lives, and to learn from their mistakes and discoveries at some point. Neither of those things happened by the time I called it quits on this one.
Displaying 1 of 1 review