Carlos Delacruz is one of the New York Council of the Dead’s most unusual agents—an inbetweener, partially resurrected from a death he barely recalls suffering, after a life that’s missing from his memory. He thinks he is one of a kind—until he encounters other entities walking the fine line between life and death.

One inbetweener is a sorcerer. He’s summoned a horde of implike ngks capable of eliminating spirits, and they’re spreading through the city like a plague. They’ve already taken out some of NYCOD’s finest, leaving Carlos desperate to stop their master before he opens up the entrada to the Underworld—which would destroy the balance between the living and the dead.

But in uncovering this man’s identity, Carlos confronts the truth of his own life—and death…

My first exposure to Daniel José Older’s writing (outside of his Twitter feed) was with his Star Wars short story, “Born in the Storm”, part of the 2018 collection, From a Certain Point of view. It was just so fucking brilliant, and my favorite of the 40 stories in that book. After reading his full-length Star Wars novel, Last Shot, I decided to finally get reading his Bone Street Rumba series. I’ve had these books for quite awhile now, and I’m going to make an effort to read more urban fantasy in 2019! This seemed like a good place to start!

This is the story of Carlos Delacruz. He’s neither living nor dead…he’s an inbetweener. He’s an agent with the New York Council of the Dead, and a good one at that. Because he isn’t really dead or really alive, he can work both in the human world, and the spirit world. Carlos also has no real memory of his life before he was resurrected. Up until very recently, Carlos thought he was one-of-a-kind. But after a violent encounter with another inbetweener who is fucking around with a portal to the underworld, Carlos learns there are at least a couple more like him.

Additionally, Brooklyn (where this takes place) is all of a sudden teeming with ngks (basically pronounced just like it looks…I think?), these weird little goblin kinda dudes who ride stationary bikes & are basically like kryptonite to spirits, some of whom (spirits, not ngks) are Carlos’s friends & coworkers.

Oh, and also Carlos falls in love with someone he really shouldn’t. It’s messy.

There’s a colorfulness to Older’s writing here…moments where the narration (first-person) almost slips into a kind of poetry. His version of Brooklyn really comes alive in this…the bodegas, the bars, the stoops in front of the buildings, good cups of coffee, shitty cups of coffee…Older really takes you there, and when the spooky stuff goes down, it feels so real & atmospheric.

It’s hard to say Carlos is a terribly likable main character, but I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that…he’s kinda making it up as he goes. With no memory of who he was, he’s going to have to figure out who he wants to be.

Some of the minor characters are great in this one…Carlos has a pretty solid support system. Mama Esther and her endless library! Riley (Carlos’s supervisor and friend, a spirit) and his & Carlos’s hilarious banter. Kia and her unwillingness to put up with a single moment of Carlos’s shit. It’s a solid cast of characters.

All in all, I dug this one & am really looking forward to carrying on with Bone Street Rumba!