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A review by chrismarnone
Dying Is Easy by Joe Hill
2.0
People see what they want to see.
That seems to be the central theme of Joe Hill's "Dying is Easy," but it's a theme that doesn't make itself apparent until near the end of the story. The characters are vivid and dynamic, very much coming alive and taking up their own spaces, making their own decisions in this story. For me, the solution to the whodunnit mystery came very easy and early merely based on their reactions and the answer to the old question: Who benefits?
My biggest issue here was transitions. Moving from place to place, character to character, or theme to theme was often awkward, making me flip back to see if I'd somehow missed a page. Perhaps this story needed a couple extra issues to flesh out these moments, because it seemed like Hill was cutting transition points to hit his page counts.
Not a bad whodunnit, but not a great one, either. Very skippable.
That seems to be the central theme of Joe Hill's "Dying is Easy," but it's a theme that doesn't make itself apparent until near the end of the story. The characters are vivid and dynamic, very much coming alive and taking up their own spaces, making their own decisions in this story. For me, the solution to the whodunnit mystery came very easy and early merely based on their reactions and the answer to the old question: Who benefits?
My biggest issue here was transitions. Moving from place to place, character to character, or theme to theme was often awkward, making me flip back to see if I'd somehow missed a page. Perhaps this story needed a couple extra issues to flesh out these moments, because it seemed like Hill was cutting transition points to hit his page counts.
Not a bad whodunnit, but not a great one, either. Very skippable.