Oddjobs by Heide Goody and Iain Grant

Bizarrely, I came across Oddjobs by Heide Goody & Iain Grant at random and bought it purely because it had a bit of a crap cover yet loads of good reviews. A bit like I did with Space Team and that experiment worked out brilliantly.

The book revolves around a secretive government agency who is tasked with helping to organise the end of the world. Alien gods have taken over and they are pretty much Lovecraftian creatures and their minions. There is no question that they will wipe out all life on Earth any minute now, it is just a question of how soon and how can the public be kept calm about it.

Oddjobs is a funny and surprisingly dark book. I thought it would be more slapstick given the cover but it is quite violent and full of action. Which are all things I like. The characterisation was ok. The main character Morag was pretty fleshed out but the others were a little thin. It doesn’t matter too much, the characters were still great and this is book one of a series.

The pace is superb with a lot of stuff going on in a world hidden from normal people. Oddjobs is a bit like The Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch or Kraken by China Mieville or Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. If you haven’t read of them, add them to your list. If I had to pick a favourite, it would be Neverwhere but they are all worth reading.

I liked Oddjobs enough to buy the next book. A slight downside is that it does feel like the first book of a series but then it is fairly short and it is a world I’d like to explore further and they are up to book four already, so it is worth checking out.

You can get Oddjobs here. Enjoy.