My 1 star review is for the file format alone.

The premise sounds amazing, and I do want to read this book. I will certainly go out and buy it. But I must leave a review on NetGalley in order to keep my percentage up.

So I have to say that the file I received did not have good formatting. It's like the align left setting was used for the document, making everything quite difficult to read. It hurt my eyes. So I deleted the file in favor of getting a library copy in the future. When I read it then, I will post my full review on Amazon and other services.

Dead Jack is the best zombie detective in ShadowShade, possibly all of Pandemonium. It doesn’t hurt that he’s the only one around. It also doesn’t hurt that he’ll do anything for fairy dust. No job is too big as long as the price is right, possibly right up to saving all of Pandemonium. That is, if he can survive leprechauns with a grudge, a mad bat-god, and his own ideas.

So, James Aquilone’s Dead Jack and the Pandemonium Device is kind of an odd critter of a book. I’m left feeling simultaneously like I have very little to say about it and just wanting to throw all the words possible at it. It’s a detective story with very little detective work. The protagonist is terrible but still likeable. The side characters don’t show up much but they work so well when they do. It’s pretty great.

Our protagonist, Dead Jack, is the embodiment of everything I tend to dislike about noir detective style protagonists. He’s a jerk, he can’t function without his addiction of choice, he stubbornly refuses to believe that his companions could accomplish anything without him around, he should be the worst. But it’s all played in this sort of humorous subversion of tropes way. He’s addicted to fairy dust, both for the high and as a means of suppressing his zombie hunger, and thinks about it pretty regularly. It is in fact the entire reason he takes the case, but it doesn’t become something he waxes on about for pages at a time. We’re given mentions of him wanting fairy dust or of noticing the effects of it on other characters, but it’s for the purpose of telling us about the scene or the world. Jack is terrible to his homunculus partner, Oswald, but Oswald gives as good as he gets and the story never tries to convince the reader that Jack is in the right when he’s being a jerk. That wins both the character and the writing a lot of points from me.

Tied into that, Jack seems to be the least competent character in the book. But we are seeing things from his ridiculous self-aggrandizing point of view in such a way that it’s funny rather than annoying. This is a character who actually thinks that he’s an amazing detective, but the story itself doesn’t agree so there’s a nice balance there.

There’s a lot of that actually. Dead Jack has a tragic back story somewhere along the lines, but he doesn’t seem to remember most of it. We get some bits of it that serve to rattle Jack and tease more, but nothing that takes pages at a time. The reader is sort of dropped into the middle of Pandemonium and expected to keep up. It’s a world very different from our own, but its Jack’s home so he doesn’t go much into the specific differences. That allows the reader to build their own conclusions on specifics while keeping the pace fairly quick.

Dead Jack and the Pandemonium Device is a very quick read but very tightly plotted for how short it is. There isn’t a ton of time taken to flesh out the world that isn’t also being used to move the story forward or introduce a near immediately important concept. It takes good advantage of slower scenes to set up ideas for later without grinding to a halt.

This was a really enjoyable read and I am definitely going to be looking for the next one when it comes out. Dead Jack and the Pandemonium Device gets a five out of five from me. If you enjoy off beat detective stories or just need a way to spend a couple days, it’s worth giving a shot.

Dead Jack and the Pandemonium Device (Dead Jack #1) by James Aquilone was received direct from the publisher. This was one of those books that was much better than I expected, with all sorts of monsters, a sidekick being and chapter endings that ended. They ended like the old radio shows where they want you to come back next week to see what happens. if you, or someone you know loves quirky, non politically correct "horror" with a side of side aching comedy, grab this book up.

5 Stars

I feel like this is a pretty fun read as long as you're not expecting a lot out of it ...which I wasn't, so it worked out fairly well. Jack is pretty much exactly as you'd expect him to be from the cover and description, your standard 'everyman' anti-hero detective type with a drug and/or drinking problem. It's not necessarily bad and I know it was done on purpose, but it's still very standard urban fantasy fare.

The part of the story that I thought stood out a bit more was the setting. Pandemonium is a kind of afterlife [or IS it ...dun dun dun] for supernatural creatures that it roughly divided up into five different sections that are supposed to correspond to NYC's different burroughs. It was definitely a neat idea and I like how he chose to blend a lot of the different supernatural/mythological elements together.

I was also pleasantly surprised that the sex-crazed shark woman [loud groaning] was not the only female character in this book [look, I told you I had low expectations]. There's a really awesome half-fairy witch that comes in around half way through and I absolutely loved her. Also the goblin queen was around for a half-second. However there WAS a rather unfortunate running gag where Jack tells Oswald to 'stop being such a woman' [even louder groaning].

When it happened in the main story our awesome witch lady was there to punch him and remind him that she had just saved his life [twice], but it also happened in the short story that was tacked on the end and there was absolutely no commentary about it in that. If I had read the short story by itself when it first came out I probably would have refused to continue reading the series based on that alone, so just something to consider.

I loved this book! Not only was it hilarious but it has some serious dresden file vibes

Mike Hammer and Sam Spade meet The Walking Dead and Hellboy! I know this will not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it was a hoot....a zombie Private Detective solving cases in another (Hell-like) realm. Entertaining story, loads of paranormal creatures, and plenty of undead humor. Fans of Chuck Palahniuk and Christopher Moore will enjoy themselves (minus the sex and profanity).