Book
Summary (From the book)
Bobby Dollar is an angel
-a real one. He knows a lot about sin, and not just in his professional
capacity as an advocate for souls caught between Heaven and Hell. Bobby's
wrestling with a few deadly sins of his own -pride, anger, even lust.
But his problems aren't all his fault. Bobby
can't entirely trust his heavenly superiors, and he's not too sure about any of
his fellow earthbound angels either, especially the new kid that Heaven has
dropped into their midst, a trainee angel who asks too many questions. And he
sure as hell doesn't trust the achingly gorgeous Countess of Cold Hands, a
mysterious she-demon who seems to be the only one willing to tell him the
truth.
When the souls of the
recently departed start disappearing, catching both Heaven and Hell by
surprise, things get bad very quickly for Bobby D. End-of-the-world bad. Beast
of Revelations bad. Caught between the angry forces of Hell, the dangerous
strategies of his own side, and a monstrous undead avenger that wants to rip
his head off and suck out his soul, Bobby's going to need all the friends he
can get -in Heaven, on Earth, or anywhere else can find them.
You've never met an angel
like Bobby Dollar. And you've never read anything like The Dirty Streets of Heaven.
Brace yourself -the
afterlife is weirder than you ever believed.
My
review
This is the second book
I've read from The Sword and Laser
book club. And this time, I finished on time!
I really liked this book,
at first I thought it was a YA, which I have nothing against, but I wasn't
planning on reading one any time soon. However, I think is safe to say that
this book is more to the adult type, not only for the content but the way
things develop.
Bobby Dollar, also known
as Angel Doloriel is an earthbound angel, and he is an advocate for
souls...simply put, he is a lawyer, and he is here to defend your soul from
going to hell.
I loved this part, the way
is not just being good or bad, but all you did during your life, how this can
be interpreted and argued against. At the end you can't even say anything to
defend yourself, you will be dependent on your actions alone.
As most of earthbound
angels, Bobby has developed a good taste for Earthly escapes, such as liquor and women, and he has
gotten some insight about the later:
Women, even female
angels, can be colder than men in some really scary ways.
Anyway, things are shaken
up when someone dies, but his soul is nowhere to be found. Off course the first
thought is that Hell is doing something to keep the souls for themselves, but
later we realize that actually they are as surprised by this turn of events
than we as readers. Bobby puts on his detective cap (not really, he doesn't
really wear caps, just in case you were wondering) and tries to find anything
suspicious about the recently departed, searching for this taste in literature,
music, etc, looking for a clue somewhere:
For instance, a bunch of Nickelback
albums would have indicated he never had a soul in the first place.
You will find a couple of
sentences like this that will make you at least smile if not chuckle. At the
same time Bobby starts being followed and almost killed by this nasty creature,
the ghallu, and I will agree with some of the comments in the Sword and Laser
forum that it did remind me of the Balrog from LOTR, although in my head it was
more like a smaller version of it. However, when Bobby turns to heaven for help
he barely gets any advice and finds himself being sort of investigated, no
matter what he says or argues.
[...] sometimes when things very wrong
and even the highest are frightened, innocence is not enough for salvation.
Was it a great book? I
don't know, it was certainly entertaining. It wasn't a book I knew was out
there. To be honest with you, this is the first Tad Williams book that I've
ever read. I think this is the first "real" urban fantasy book I've
read (I read The House of Night that according to Wikipedia falls into the
category, but I'm not sure how "urban" that is) and I did not dislike
the genre, but I'm not smitten by it. I guess I can give Williams another go.
The romance that sparkles
in the book was interesting, but no surprising if I'm honest. You kind off see
it coming. However I liked the perspective that we get for Casimira. I think a little
bit more of development for her character would've made me "fall" for
her.
As for the twist...I like
the premise (no giving anything away I promise). Is a really nice idea, and I
wish this would've been further developed. Maybe in the rest of the series,
since this is book 1.
I will leave you with a
very nice quote:
Life is eternal; and
love is immortal; and death is only a horizon; and a horizon is nothing save
the limit of our sight.
This review makes part of the weekly event Read and Review Hop
