Congratulations, you have been chosen to act as Death.  It's a dirty job, but someone has to do it.  It is your duty to retrieve soul vessels from the dead and dying and see them on to their next body. If you fail, Darkness will cover the world and Chaos will reign.

Welcome to Charlie Asher's new job, but life is never as easy as it sounds.  For Charlie Asher, Beta Male, nothing can go right after the birth of his daughter.  Despite his best efforts to collect souls before the sewer harpies can get their claws into them, running his secondhand clothing store, and raising his daughter, Darkness is apparently coming.

Some days you just need to read a book that makes you ugly laugh, the king of laughter people stare at your for.  Christopher Moore , at least for me, writes those kinds of books and A Dirty Job didn't disappoint.  Several times I had people either looking up at my patio as cracked up, or stared as they walked by where I eat lunch. Not that I spared them much of a glance.  I was more concerned about what was going to happen next.

There wasn't much need for world building in A Dirty Job because it is set in San Francisco, but Christopher Moore did a wonderful job of transporting me there.  It wasn't with great detail that entire city was explained, but Moore picks certain things that stuck with me: like the random bits of animals pieces sold in Chinetown and the fact the best ally for combating sewer harpies is in the Financial District.  The entire books he describes the neighborhoods Charlie (our main character and resident Death Merchant) goes to collect his souls, but these descriptions are short as not to bog down the story with too much detail.  Which seeing as it's set into the now and not some distant future or made world, was great.  I do sort of know what San Francisco looks like.

As for the characters that were brought into the book throughout the story I honestly loved each one.  Charlie Asher is easy to root for because he doesn't try to be a hero that he isn't.  He's trying to raise his daughter, run his father's shop, and not bring about the end of days.  There are a lot of characters that came in and go throughout the entire story.  Some for brief moments, some pop in and out.  Alvin and Mohammed are probably the two most adorable hellhounds I've seen, only trumped toward the end when you meet the zombie squirrel people. One of my favorite things is the Emperor of San Francisco has a camo (he's a real dude).  I was super excited to see Christopher Moore included him into the cast of characters.

The story itself was super fun and true to the style I've come to know and love from Christopher Moore.  Which means its not suitable for kids in any shape or form.  It is most definitely for mature audiences only.  I felt like the pacing of the book was great and the timeline jumps years as it progresses, but I didn't get lost with the jump.  Moore uses Sophie's (Charlie's daughter) age to show the passage of time. I liked that the book spanned years, not months, and gave our main character a chance to get the hang of being a Death Merchant.  Time for the Darkness and Chaos to start to rise.  Not just BOOM here's the end of the world, sorry you're the new guy.

Now, all of the being said there were a few parts, maybe just things, I wasn't overly fond of.  The first is more of a personal preference thing for me, Charlie's sister Jane, I wasn't really fond of her throughout any part of the story.  In fact, outside of babysitting I'm not really sure what point she served.  I don't know, I personally didn't like her.  She felt like a nag who was more concerned about getting her brother laid than wondering why to very large black dogs that literally eat anything are standing guard over her niece.  But, hey, that's just me.  The other thing was at times I got the Morigans confused as to which one was who and did what terrible thing.  But! I did enjoy them as the bad guys.  That had some of the best lines in the book.  I just kept confusing them and was never sure who was who.

In the end was this my favorite Christopher Moore book?  No, Lamb is still my number one, but A Dirty Job definitely came close.  

Is Charlie Asher my favorite MC?  Nope, because no one will ever hold my heart like Pocket.

Will I read another book by Christopher Moore?  Um, it's sitting right next to my elbow and as soon as I'm done editing this review me and my pop-tarts are going to bust into it.

A Dirty Job was a great book and is one of my top 5 favorites from Christopher Moore.  It is the first of two books in the Grim Reaper Series.  I'm pretty sure there is only going to be two, but I could be wrong.  The book was hilarious from start to finish, and it was fun watching Charlie Asher, Beta Male, grow a backbone and almost become and Alpha Male.  Almost.  So if you need something funny, with adult sized humor, pick it up, or any of Christopher Moore's books. You won't regret it!

A copy of this wonderful thing was given to me for my birthday by my Mim (or grandmother).  The story behind why goes a bit like this: another copy of this book had been removed from my former Elementary School Library because of the word used at the end.  Anyway, this peaked Mim's interested and she proceeded to get me a copy, and I am so very glad she did just that.

I adored this book so very much, and I cannot thank Mim and my Aunt (who told her about it) for adding this gem to my collection.   It's not really meant for kids, despite the look on the cover, but it had me laughing as a flipped through each page.  I have to say I've had a few conversations that go kind of just like the one in the book.  Personally I think it's a cute little book most book lovers will enjoy.