#12AngryRobotsOfChristmas ‘The Damned Busters’ by Matthew Hughes

About the book…

After accidentally summoning a demon, Chesney Anstruther refuses to sell his soul, which leads through various confusions to, well, Hell going on strike.

Which means that nothing bad ever happens in the world… with disastrous consequences.

The first in the To Hell And Back series, ‘The Damned Busters’ was published in 2011 in e-book and paperback by Angry Robot Books!

Things can go spectacularly awry when blood is unintentionally spilt-just ask Sleeping Beauty-but this demon summoning is something else altogether.

Harmless and, frankly, boring, Chesney has 2 loves in his life, comix and numbers. The one allows him to explore fantasy worlds far beyond his tiny imagination and the other deals in absolutes. Numbers are factual and work within a regulated framework, they very, very rarely go wrong. His one reckless action is a monthly poker game with his 4 friends and at this point, he does not play with anything other than pure abandonment and no formula whatsoever. As it his turn to host the game, he is keenly aware of his apartment’s limitations, so sets to making a 5 sided gaming table.

And then, he hits his thumb with a nail, bleeds onto the wood and summons a toad faced demon from hell who was, at the time, pouring gold down the throats of misers.

Chesney unwittingly summoning the demon does not phase him, laying the odds of retaining his soul out on the balance of probability, he declines the demon’s request to sign a contract condemning him to hell. And in so doing, his refusal means the demon goes back to hell empty handed, forms a union and the underworld goes on strike. They are fed up with their lack of representation, of being over worked and stressed from an unacceptable demon to minion ratio.

But what does this mean for our day to day existence?

Well, without that little devil on your shoulder, apathy quickly sets in.

The stock market crashes as no one can be bothered to turn up to work.

Gluttony becomes a thing of the past as no one really wants to eat.

Vanity has disappeared, plunging the fashion world into disarray.

Bad things simply stop happening. So in order to do the right thing, Chesney has to become the superhero he has spent his life reading about, and Satan (bearing a startling resemblance to Old Saint Nick) become the most unlikely duo to save the planet that you can imagine.

This is funny, poignant and thoughtful as you begin to examine the theological argument that evil should exist. The state of free will means that without having a choice on what is, or is not, morally, socially and culturally acceptable and correct, everyone will behave in a way which is acceptable. However, without there being a system of checks and balances, what actually happens when evil is wiped out, is that the concept of right and wrong is suddenly no longer valid or sustainable.

Mixing a great concept about personal and societal culpability with a bone dry wit, this book is just a fun ride through an alternative world where it turns out, the devil really does have  the best tunes!

About the author…

Born in Liverpool, his family moved to Canada when he was five years old. Married since late 1960s, he has three grown sons. He is currently relocated to Britain. He is a former director of the Federation of British Columbia Writers.

A university drop-out from a working poor background, he worked in a factory that made school desks, drove a grocery delivery truck, was night janitor in a GM dealership, and did a short stint as an orderly in a private mental hospital. As a teenager, he served a year as a volunteer with the Company of Young Canadians.

He has made his living as a writer all of his adult life, first as a journalist in newspapers, then as a staff speechwriter to the Canadian Ministers of Justice and Environment, and, since 1979, as a freelance corporate and political speechwriter in British Columbia.

His short fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s, Asimov’s, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Postscripts, Interzone, and a number of “Year’s Best” anthologies. Night Shade Books published his short story collection, The Gist Hunter and Other Stories, in 2005.

He has won the Arthur Ellis Award from the Crime Writers of Canada. His novels and stories regularly make the Locus Magazine annual recommended reading list.

Links-http://www.matthewhughes.org/

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