Title: Kill the Dead
Author: Richard Kadrey
Publisher: HarperCollins Eos
Release Date: October 2010
Genre: Supernatural Horror/Noir Urban Fantasy
Pages: 448
Review Copy Received Courtesy of HarperCollins Canada.

Plot Synopsis:
James Stark, antihero of 2009′s Sandman Slim, returns in this gritty, over-the-top tale of supernatural mayhem. Having taken his revenge on Mason, the rival magician who got him sent to Hell, Stark settles in sorcery-infested Los Angeles and gets a part-time gig with the Golden Vigil, an angelic hit squad of dubious morality that’s somehow allied with Homeland Security. He spends the rest of his time as a freelance slayer of monsters. When Lucifer comes to Earth, supposedly to oversee a Hollywood biopic of his life, he hires Stark to be his bodyguard, but something isn’t quite right and soon the city is awash in murderous zombies. Stark has to get to the bottom of the mystery or risk being sent back to Hell, along with everyone he cares about. Profane, intensely metaphoric language somehow makes self-tortured monster Stark sympathetic and turns a simple story into a powerful noir thriller.

Review:
When I first read the Remy Chandler books by Thomas Sniegoski, I found that I genuinely liked the former fallen angel turned human PI. And even though he has shown that he can unleash his former seraph self, I always found myself wishing that he would be just a little less of a goody goody in general. Even the formerly wussy Castiel was forced to grow a set on Season 5 of Supernatural.

The main character of Richard Kadrey’s sequel to 2009’s Sandman Slim, James Stark, doesn’t have that problem. As a nephel (pl. nephilim), Stark reminds me of a cross between Humphrey Bogart and Hellboy. He has the same crass sarcasm and snideness of the red demon but even more hilarious comic timing than Bogart. Don’t believe me? I dare you to read the first page of “Kill the Dead” and tell me you don’t find that absolutely hilarious — and compelling.

Kadrey’s combination of dark, twisted humour mingled with high-octane action scenes is only one of the reasons why you should plunk yourself down and read “Kill the Dead.” (If you haven’t read the first novel in the series, “Sandman Slim,” you can read the e-book for free for a limited time on the Eos website).

One of the best — if not the best element — of the novel is the characterization of James Stark. He’s a simple fellow at heart — all he wants is revenge on the demons and sorcerers who (literally) dragged him to Hell and left him there for eleven years. Suffice it to say it wasn’t exactly a trip to Bermuda.

As entertaining as Stark is, this time around he has real problems. For those of you who have read “Sandman Slim,” even though Mason is safely tucked away in Hell (for the moment), he’s apt to return at any moment. But right now, Stark has to worry about hordes of Drifters (or zombies in local parlance) who have decided to permanently crash in Los Angeles. Oh, and did I mention that they’re the Resident Evil kind? For those of you who haven’t seen the films/played the games, that means these zombies can turn you into one of them even with a slight scratch. Even worse, the only way to kill them is by severing their nervous system via their spinal cord. Translation? Cutting their heads off and their hearts out doesn’t do the trick.

And the biggest whammy of them all? Lucifer, in one of his more exciting roles, has landed in Los Angeles because he’s shooting a biopic and he’s overseeing the production. Also, he wants Stark as his bodyguard in case the other supernatural creepy crawlies that populate the town decide to try anything funny with the Ruler of Hell.

I don’t like to exaggerate, and I will say that the best depictions of Lucifer I’ve encountered are very few. Kadrey’s is among that stable (Neil Gaiman/Mike Carey’s Vertigo Lucifer, John Milton’s Lucifer, and William Hjortsberg’s Louis Cyphre are the others who have impressed me the most. (What about Supernatural, you might ask? To make a long story short, I thought Kripke’s interpretation was a bit too casual, which Lucifer is supposed to be, but I wasn’t as thrilled by that Devil as I was by Carey’s). Kadrey’s Lucifer is dangerous when he has to be, but not over-the-top or campy. Make no mistake — Kadrey’s Lucifer isn’t a run of the mill, half-assed attempt at a super-villain. He’s actually a pretty funny guy — a funny guy who’s a master at keeping his secrets, and boy are they huge. The most poignant thing about Kadrey’s interpretation is that his Lucifer conveys a startling pain that comes across vividly.

Kadrey has become the poster boy for dark noir fantasy with huge horror and supernatural elements. “Kill the Dead” is a delicious fusion of everything from the brute but comic violence of Tarantino’s films to the introspection in Neil Gaiman’s works.

Did I mention that there are honest to goodness cigarettes from Hell named Maledictions and that Lucifer smokes them like a chimney?

If you’re any sort of a fan of urban fantasy with noir elements, or if you’re a fan of hard-boiled crime fiction that hearkens to Dashiel Hammett and Mickey Spillane, you are not going to be able to put “Kill the Dead” down.

“Kill the Dead” is easily my Top Book of 2010, a riveting, fast-paced, entertaining read, and something that appeals to my inner gangster film fanatic. I remember watching James Cagney movies when I was younger and wishing that there would be a cool mixture of something supernatural going on — that would be the ultimate fusion. Could you imagine James Cagney going up against Max Von Schreck in Nosferatu?

“Don’t make me smack ya, ya pointy-toothed long-nailed bald freak — and get away from the dame, see?”

Ahem. Next time I’ll just leave the humour to Kadrey, who does it very well with such choice phrases as Kentucky fried blonde and black beef jerky Barbie. And that’s just in the first chapter.

To read an excerpt from “Kill the Dead,” click here. To buy the book, click here. To find Richard Kadrey on Facebook or Twitter or his website, click on the links provided.

Other reviews of “Kill the Dead”:
Cory Doctorow’s review
North County Times (California)
i09 review

Disagree? Agree? Let me know your thoughts!

Happy Reading!