Open for Business

Open for Business (2016) Angel Martinez (Brandywine Investigations)

This is three interrelated stories, of gods and men and angels and monsters.

The first book is about Hades, who has been surprised by divorce papers from Persephone. He comes to the world (things aren’t that busy for him after all) and opens a private investigation business. Being independently wealthy, one of the first cases he decides to take on, is who is killing homeless men in the area.

The second story involves Hades’ son and his fallen angel lover, who are trying to determine why fallen angels are seemingly going mad.

The third story is about Hermes, who wants to know who has been stealing from him, and why.

Upfront, the second story is not at all enjoyable for me, so I skimmed it. It technically has a HEA, but that comes more in the third story, as Michael slowly recovers.

The first story I utterly adore.

Of course the gods are almost all bisexual. That’s basically written into the original stories. There are lots of Hades and Persephone stories, but this one is set after Persephone decides that she’s tired of being dependent upon either her husband or mother, and wants to become her own person. Which is totally understandable. But Hades doesn’t take it well. Also understandable.

So the story is about him learning to deal with the modern world, becoming a private investigator, and falling in love.

To be clear, these stories may focus on the more familiar Greek gods, but plenty of other pantheons make an appearance.

The domains ruled by Osiris and Yama, by Ereshkigal and Tuoni— Heaven, Valhalla, all of these places are where human souls go until they’re ready for the next stage of existence. Eventually, regardless of whether the soul has been punished or blessed, when they’re ready, every soul vanishes from its chosen resting place and moves on.”

The idea of a conference of death gods is made, and I kinda want to see that.

But also:

“So these are all chaos gods?” Fafnir asked when he’d gotten his fire under control.

“More or less,” Hermes answered. “Eris does discord, which is a kind of chaos. Kisin is a god of death, but he’s one of destruction and plague. Pikuolis, likewise, though he tends toward darkness, torture, rage, those sorts of things. Apesh the turtle is a god of evil. Amatsu Mikaboshi is an ancient being of stars and night, so yes, born of chaos. The goat headed person Michael described is probably Aka Manah, who is a lord of deceit and evil intent. Pretty chaos-driven. The being that resembled a cow is most likely Gaueko, who simply hates everyone. And Set, of course, is Set, the Lord of Chaos himself.”

That is a FANTASTIC list.

And there are so many little bits dropped throughout the book.

Hermes kept his hands clasped between his knees, his earnest and guileless expression one he’d perfected over the years starting with his theft as a toddler of Apollo’s cows.

Think of having to listen to the most annoying person you know.”

Charon returned to snickering. “That’s either Narcissus, who could only talk about himself, or Ulysses, who just couldn’t stop talking.”

It’s just delightful–despite the darkness of the second story.

Publisher: Mischief Corner Books, LLC
Rating: 8/10

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