Everyone has a dotty old uncle, grandparent, or even spouse that cannot tell a linear story. They go shooting off in irrelevant tangents usually never returning to, or maybe even remembering, their original point. Nether Regions works exactly the same.
What starts as a witty take on Heaven circles so many drains that it is exhausting. Heaven is Detroit. Socrates is an assassin in Heaven. People in Heaven don’t remember their pre-death life. They also don’t realize their minds can mold Heaven as they wish. Then we meet the Church of O, who are questioning their very existence. One of the heads of the church, Elder Silence or The Tinkerer, aka Ben Franklin has a witty but over long debate with Socrates over nothing. All of that happens in the first two chapters.
While I concede the author is witty, what Nether Regions really needs is a harshly critical editor. It is all too much for me. 2 stars.
Thanks to ECW Press and NetGalley for a digital review copy of the book.