This book has been described as a sort of cross between Men in Black and Ghostbusters, and yeah, that's about right. Which means that Dead to Me is a lighthearted and very welcome antidote to a lot of the grim, gritty darkity-darkness that makes up so much of urban fantasy these days, with humor and a dash of romance driving the action rather than blatant sex and violence.
Simon Canderous is gifted with psychometry, the ability to read past incidents in a person's life by touching them or objects they've handled. He used to use his abilities for thievery, but now he's the newest recruit to the Department of Extraordinary Affairs--which, like any other government agency, is just as much about the bureaucracy and tight budgets as it is getting anything actually investigated. But when he and his partner stumble across a ghost who doesn't know she's dead, office worker zombies, and politically correct cultists out to take over the world through the power of legislation, Simon is thrown hard into the biggest case he's had to work on to date.
Dead to Me is not without issues; characterization and plot developments are both more simplistic than I'd like. On the other hand, that's kind of okay given the overall Ghostbusters-y feel of the thing, so I won't whinge about that too hard. Overall this was quite a bit of fun and I'm looking forward to the next one. Four stars.
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