![]() Sarah Von Faber – the barely there forensic expert – provides the final member of Blunt’s working crew. There are also hints that Ralph might have more to him than meets the eye…though I’m not sure he’d enjoy the realisation that it is in fact Blunt that brings out the best in him. Hey, I’m not saying that they’re happy, but it was so satisfying that Ralph had *something* in his life that left everyone around him speechless with envy and surprise, as he is portrayed as such a worm. Nevertheless, I was delighted to find that he had a spectacularly glorious looking wife. Initially I just loved him, but his meek manner did slightly irritate me in the middle. His right hand man – Ralph Mortimer I was a bit more up and down about. Though it’s not really alluded too in much detail I think that his demise felt a little too convenient and I wouldn’t be surprised if we find out there was some hanky-panky relating to the how’s and the when’s in future stories! It’s hard not to feel a certain degree of sympathy for someone who has had every negative assumption he’s ever made in life confirmed…and then has to do it all over again in death! Even better – he knows that he’s a jerk and takes his various snubs, beatings and general abuse as his due with a wry stoicism.īlunt finds himself in Gloomwood to solve a very particular crime. Though he is Obnoxious (capital O there) I really enjoyed his cynical and bleak view of the world. It’s also proof positive that death isn’t always the worst case scenario.īlunt is a joy! I kept waiting for him to grate on me as his rudeness, dissatisfaction with the world(s) in general and entitlement alienated him from everyone in the book…but it didn’t happen. ![]() Gloomwood is grey, unsatisfying and decidedly weird. His very visage stirs fear in the hearts of the newly dead and respect in those a little better acquainted, so it comes as a bit of a shock to the Office of the Dead when someone decapitates him and steals his head.Īugustan Blunt – an old school detective with a bad attitude, a nasty case of alcoholism** and a propensity to hate everything and everyone – is promptly recruited by Crispin Neat to find the Grim Reapers head and the culprit before any of the Gloomwood residents cotton on…about 12 hours after Blunt’s own untimely demise. The Grim Reaper is the de-facto ruler, key holder and all round nice guy. Gloomwood is a city for the dead – founded by no-less illustrious a personage than the Grim Reaper* himself – as the final resting places for dead people, gods, ideas and concepts. Who are the Gloomwood Youth Order? What do you call the murder of someone already dead? Why are people having their heads chopped off? And what is in the hot dogs? With time slipping away he needs to learn what makes the city tick before there’s no city left. With the aid of a woman who keeps turning involuntarily invisible a journalist who hasn’t written an article since she died and a bureaucrat who can’t say no to anyone – Blunt’s got to stop whoever is stealing the heads of the city’s elite.Īs he begins his investigations he finds things aren’t all they seem. In a new city where the rules of the living don’t apply Blunt’s up to his neck in the brown stuff and he’s never been much of a swimmer. Someone has stolen the Grim Reaper’s head and Blunt has been told to find it. ![]() ![]() Oh, he’s also dead but that’s okay – so is everyone else. As he is a chap with impeccable taste, I enthusiastically agreed and then forgot all about the book for a ~mere~ matter of months…because I’m awesome like that.ĭead Heads is the first in the Gloomwood series by Ross Young.Īugustan Blunt is a washed out cop with a bad attitude, a drinking problem and a troubled past. Actually, it’s a neighbour and friend – if we’re going to get nit-picky about it – who asked if I’d be interested in checking out this new novel. FULL DISCLOSURE – Ross Young is a friend of a friend, who happens to be a writer.
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