Review by Ian Keogh

Jenna Harrow is a Reaper, one of a multitude serving to collect the souls of people when they die and shepherd them to the underworld. The Reapers died at different times themselves, and while individuality of dress seems encouraged, red and black are the colours they wear. In other ways, though, the afterlife is considerably regulated, with processes not too different from the local employment office. It’s known that what differentiates Jenna from the remainder is being the only Reaper unable to remember her death, yet as is discovered early in Grim, she can also manifest as a person on Earth, an ability previously believed restricted to Death himself, and no-one’s seen him for a long time.

For that last plot element Stephanie Phillips inverts the driving force of Preacher, in which God went missing, but that’s not her primary mystery, and answers are provided in a volume eventually explaining much and compactly setting up the conflict to come.

Given she carries much of Don’t Fear the Reaper, it’s as well Jenna is appealing, seemingly aged in her late teens or early twenties despite her trade. The friends she associates with are similarly not beset by ennui and cynicism, and Phillips ensures it’s easy to become wrapped up in the circumstances that develop.

So does artist Flaviano, who creates an assortment of different realities, and ensures they’re visually interesting, sometimes via the details he supplies, and sometimes enlivened by the colours provided by Rico Renzi. The character designs are adaptable, and as seen on the sample art, cope with the transformative abilities they have. While befuddlement and mystery are the opening states, conflict develops, and Flaviano delivers it with the necessary power.

Unusually, Phillips doesn’t perpetuate Grim by stringing readers along volume by volume. Pretty well all questions raised are answered by the final chapter, and much has changed in the meantime. There is a fearsome creature called the End either too greatly built up or too easily swatted aside, but their threat remains to be seen again as Grim continues into Devils & Dust. This is a page-turning introduction of considerable promise, so you might want the hardcover Grim Book One combining both volumes.