Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet - Review

Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet

By: Darynda Jones

Publication: October 30th 2012 by St. Martin's Press

308 pages

Genre: Fantasy, Paranormal, Urban Fantasy, Mystery

Source: Publisher via NetGalley (Thank you!!)

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Goodreads description--Welcome to the world of grim reaper extraordinaire Charley Davidson. Try as she might, there’s no avoiding her destiny. Sometimes being the grim reaper really is, well, grim. And since Charley’s last case went so awry, she has taken a couple of months off to wallow in the wonders of self-pity. But when a woman shows up on her doorstep convinced someone is trying to kill her, Charley has to force herself to rise above...or at least get dressed. It becomes clear something is amiss when everyone the woman knows swears she’s insane. But the more they refute the woman’s story, the more Charley believes it.

In the meantime, the sexy, sultry son of Satan, Reyes Farrow, is out of prison and out of Charley’s life, as per her wishes and several perfectly timed death threats. But his absence has put a serious crimp in her sex life. While there are other things to consider, like the fact that the city of Albuquerque has been taken hostage by an arsonist, Charley is having a difficult time staying away. Especially when it looks like Reyes may be involved.

Just when life was returning to normal, Charley is thrust back into the world of crime, punishment, and the devil in blue jeans in this hilarious fourth installment in the New York Times bestselling series.

***Spoilers for prior books included below!***

So let's just recap. Reyes's earthly father (the man who raised him) tortured Charley at the end of Third Grave Dead Ahead because Reyes used her as bait. This mimics the exact same situation her father put her in from Second Grave on the Left and Charley is feeling the betrayal deeply. In both situations, Charley would have liked to have been told she was being used as bait. Based on her prior decisions, I don't think she would have minded so much. Charley is now suffering from PTSD. I do wish some of this was explained better as Charley's neck was broken in book 1 and she healed quite quickly, but a few cut tendons (from the description of events) at the hands of Earl Walker and she's in the hospital for weeks. I wish we were give a more detailed explanation. Also, Reyes makes the comment in this book that he didn't really think Walker would come after her, but that's not consistent with what he tells her from the previous book where he knew Walker would come but he had expected to be there to intercept him when he did. Not huge things, but little inconsistencies that bug me.

Reyes was released from prison because the man he was accused of murdering proved himself to be alive when he tortured Charley. So now he's a free man. Yet he hasn't even seen Charley for two months. Reyes is in a position of knowledge and this is one of those situations where he rarely tells Charley what she could really stand to know. He does finally have a moment of opening up to Charley, but these two always seem to be moving forward and apart constantly. It drives me mad in the right kind of way. And I will say that these two made progress in the relationship and appear to be headed in a good direction, but knowing them it would easily swing in the other direction at any moment.

The war that has been hinted at seems to have kicked up a notch. Demons are now possessing people and Reyes it's trying to systematically hunt them down to keep them from getting to Charley. Charley makes one step forward in finding out what she's capable of as far as her abilities go, but we've yet to see how this will affect her mentally, especially considering she has PTSD.

Despite her father's attempts to get her out of the PI business, Charley takes a new case which actually does her good in getting her to take the first steps in her healing and at least leave the house. Again this is one place where Darynda Jones lets me guess correctly on the twists. She does a great job of letting me think I'm figuring things out while completely surprising me in other areas.

I do kind of wish that Charley had done more of the therapy work that Gemma suggested for her like writing the letters. Perhaps this will play a role in future books.

Favorite quotes:

-"They're liars, Dutch. Each and every one. They would lie when the truth would sound better."

I devoured Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet. I couldn't put it down. I mean truly I've read the first four books in this series within two weeks which for me lately is unheard of. I like the direction we're headed. I don't know if I'll read all twelve books in a row or if I'll need a break... Right now I'm picking up book 5 next. Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet gets 4 stars. Have you read Fourth Grave Beneath My Feet? What did you think? Let me know!