We’re between holidays, and you’re probably ready for relaxation. So today we offer a god-filled novel from a bestselling author plus a look back at some of the most intriguing Minnesota fiction we reviewed this year. Have a good New Year’s celebration and thanks for reading our coverage. We’re looking forward to a great year for books.

“The Reluctant Reaper:” by MaryJanice Davidson (Blackstone Publishing, ($16-$25)

(Courtesy of Blackstone Publishing)

There’s no better way to end the year than with a snarky, sort-of-tender rom-com, based on mythology and death gods, from the prolific St. Paul author of the wildly popular Undead series about Betsy the Vampire Queen as well as other series and stand-alone novels.

Amara Morrigan is living in a crummy Minneapolis apartment and working temp jobs. She spends her spare time with Gray, her loyal best friend who always has her back. One of her many secrets is that she intuits when people will die, including Gray. Nobody knows her dyed brown hair is really bright red and so are her eyes, which she hides behind colored contact lenses.

Then she gets an annoying message from the death god Baron La Croix, who’s come from New Orleans to tell her that her father, Death, seems to be dying in Minot, N.D., the center of the Midwest territory where he “reaps” souls to make the transition from life to death.

Amara knows she’s Death’s heir but she’s sure he isn’t dying. Besides, she’s never wanted his job. Until she figures out why her father is in a coma, she needs to fill in for him. So she heads to Minot with eager, intelligent Gray.

This opens the story to a zany cast of death gods including Hilly, Amara’s gentle mother, who is Freya/Brunhilde/Godul, goddess of fertility and the hearth; Penny and Hank, contemporary names for Persephone and Hades; Welsh warrior Arawan, whose Labrador Hellhounds died, replaced by three longhaired wiener dogs; Chernoberg, who only shows up at night, and Scottish warrior woman Scathach, guide to death on the Isle of Skye and Amara’s best friend.

These are not the “real” old gods but rather human avatars who preside over different territories to reap the dead.

While Death lies wasting away in the family’s vast mansion, Amara and Gray visit hospitals, nursing homes and private residences helping people die, guided by a list sent to their fax machine. Since Amara is a death god heir, she is seen by the dying. But why do they also speak to Gray, a mortal?

While Amara’s mother plies the gathered gods with lefse and mountains of other foods, Amara suspects someone is keeping her father sick so she will take on his job, but who’d want it?

The twisty plot, in which Amara finds herself attracted to Gray beyond friendship (much to their embarrassment and bewilderment), is both contemporary and in the mists of mythology. Amara is a smart mouth but she shows her powers when she threatens Gray’s mother, who tortured her son as a boy.

Will Death really … die? What about Amara and Gray’s relationship? How many lefse treats can the little Hellhounds eat?

Davidson gives us so much fun with this romp that we couldn’t ask for a better year-end laugh-and-uplift story.

Davidson is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author whose books also include the Fosterwere trilogy and “Road Queen,” a stand-alone novel.

Teaser quote: ” ‘I look so… frail,’ she said softly, gazing down at her wasted body, the puffy, waxy  face, the sunken eyes. ‘And a little gross, to be frank.’ She bent and sniffed. ‘And I do stink, apparently.’ Then, to Amara, ‘I know who you are now. I can’t think why I didn’t recognize you earlier.’

‘It happens that way sometimes,’ she replied.

‘I, ah, didn’t know you worked in pairs.’

‘She doesn’t. I’m just shadowing her this weekend,’ Gray said. ‘Part of the Death Lite Internship program.’ ”

A quick look back

There have been so many good books from Minnesota authors and publishers this year it’s impossible to do a Top Ten. Here are a few of the most intriguing.

“Apostle’s Cove”: by William Kent Krueger — Cork O’Connor confronts a complex case from his past that connects to mysterious deaths in the present.

“The Butcher and the Liar”: by S.L. Woeppel — A woman whose father is a serial killer and butcher keeps his secret and owns a butcher shop as an adult.

“Broken Fields”: by Marcie Rendon — In her fourth crime investigation, Ojibwe Cash Blackbear discovers two dead men and a frightened little girl in a farmhouse.

(Courtesy of the author)

“Escapes and Other Stories”: by Susan Koefod — The collection that introduces Arvo Thorson, a detective who later became the protagonist of the author’s mystery series.

“The Flip Side:” by Jason Walz — Graphic novel about a teen, grieving the death of his best friend, who flips into an alternate reality in an embodiment of his depression.

(Courtesy of the University of Minnesota Press)

“The House on Rondo”: by Debra J. Stone — A 13-year-old girl reckons with the demolition of homes and businesses in St. Paul’s Rondo neighborhood to make way for the I-94 freeway.

“Last One Seen”: by Rebecca Kanner — A grad school student thinks she has a new friend until she finds herself in a car’s passenger seat, speeding away from the city, without knowing how she got there.

“A Lesser Light”: by Peter Geye — The new wife of a lighthouse keeper on Lake Superior finds love outside her loveless marriage.

(Courtesy of the author)

“Lone Dog Road”: by Kent Nerburn — Two young Lakota boys journey from their reservation on the high plains to Pipestone, Minn., to get clay for their great-grandfather’s pipe, meeting Native Americas and non-Natives along the way.

‘The Probable Son”: by Cindy Jiban — A teacher believes one of her students is her son who was mixed up with another baby in the hospital 14 years earlier.

“Ring of Lions”: by Cass Daglish — Director of the Alhambra Moorish castle-fortress in Spain partners with a American former FBI agent to investigate murders connected to the famous Lion fountain and the treaty signed by the last emir before Christians displaced the Moors.

(Courtesy of the author)

“Scattergood”: by H.M. Bouwman — A girl in a small Iowa town discovers a new way of looking at the world beyond the farm when Jewish refugees arrive at a local hostel. Named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews.

“A Season on the Drink”: by Pat Harris — Fictionalized version of the true story about a team of alcoholics living in a St. Paul “wet house” who won a softball championship, to everyone’s astonishment.

Postscripts 2025

Exhibitors and attendees at the Twin Cities Book Festival were happy with the annual event’s new home at the St. Paul Union Depot after more than 30 years at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds.

Kao Kalia Yang became the first writer in the 37-year history of the Minnesota Bool Awards to win in three categories at one time for her books in children’s literature, middle-grade literature and memoir.

Poet/bread maker Danny Klecko completed 100 hours of viewing a painting at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, celebrating with a visit from a New York Times reporter.

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