Review - An Easy Death by Charlaine Harris

Available on Paperback & Kindle.

I became aware of author Charlaine Harris' novels after watching the first season of True Blood on DVD in 2009, and shortly later, I hunted down all of the Sookie Stackhouse titles that were out then. Those books are well-written supernatural tales with intriguing characters. I wasn't aware the author had a new series, Gunnie Rose, out until I received an ARC of A Longer Fall from NetGalley at the tail end of 2019. It turns out it's the second installment in the series. While I have no problem jumping in the middle of a series, I ended up buying the first book, An Easy Death, on Kindle when it was on sale for $1.99.

An Easy Death is set in a world where a flu epidemic and a depression during the 20th Century resulted in the collapse of the United States of America. Canada has taken over the northern states, the UK has taken over the eastern states, Mexico has taken over the southern states, California and Oregon have been claimed by Russia, and the rest are considered independent. 

The main character is a Lizabeth 'Gunnie' Rose, a young gunslinger who lives in the southern country known as Texoma (Oklahoma and Texas). She's hired to guide and protect a pair of Russian wizards who are searching for a low-level magic practitioner, Oleg Karkarov.

Final Thoughts

An Easy Death started out a little rough for me. When it comes to Charlaine Harris's stories, I'm usually glued to the plot by the second or third page. However, that wasn't the case with An Easy Death as I had trouble adjusting to this post-USA world the author has created. Basically, what I'm saying is it took me several chapters to figure what the hell was going on in this world. And it's a magical world!

Also, it took me a while to like the main character, Gunnie, though I eventually warmed up to her by the final sentence.

Overall, An Easy Death is easily the most disappointing book I have read in quite a lot of time. Due to my love for the Sookie Stackhouse series, my expectations were a bit high for this book and sadly it just wasn't a very good read.

FYI: I've already read book two, A Longer Fall, and my review for it is coming soon.