Charlie Asher is a pretty normal guy. A little hapless,
somewhat neurotic, sort of a hypochondriac. He's what's
known as a Beta Male: the kind of fellow who makes his way
through life by being careful and constant -- you know, the
one who's always there to pick up the pieces when the girl
gets dumped by the bigger/taller/stronger Alpha Male.
But Charlie's been lucky. He owns a building in the heart of
San Francisco, and runs a secondhand store with the help of
a couple of loyal, if marginally insane, employees. He's
married to a bright and pretty woman who actually loves him
for his normalcy. And she, Rachel, is about to have their
first child.
Yes, Charlie's doing okay for a Beta. That is, until the day
his daughter, Sophie, is born. Just as Charlie -- exhausted
from the birth -- turns to go home, he sees a strange man in
mint-green golf wear at Rachel's hospital bedside, a man who
claims that no one should be able to see him. But see him
Charlie does, and from here on out, things get really weird.
. . .
People start dropping dead around him, giant ravens perch on
his building, and it seems that everywhere he goes, a dark
presence whispers to him from under the streets. Strange
names start appearing on his nightstand notepad, and before
he knows it, those people end up dead, too. Yup, it seems
that Charlie Asher has been recruited for a new job, an
unpleasant but utterly necessary one: Death. It's a dirty
job. But hey, somebody's gotta do it.
Christopher Moore, the man whose Lamb served up Jesus'
"missing years" (with the funny parts left in), and whose
Fluke found the deep humor in whale researchers' lives, now
shines his comic light on the undiscovered country we all
eventually explore -- death and dying -- and the results are
hilarious, heartwarming, and a hell of a lot of fun.
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