Agony (Debt Collector 2)

Agony by Susan Kaye Quinn

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Review: Minor Spoilers
I had decided to read the Debt Collector series some days ago. I'm familiar with Susan Kaye Quinn having read some of her Mindjack series, which I highly recommend. For some reason I thought the Debt Collector series would feature rather independent stories in the "Debt Collector" world, or may be about different "debt collectors", but like most series, this is a continuation of Lirium's adventures.

The trouble with a series that follows one character through many short books is that nearly anything shared here possibly spoils a previous or future book in the series. So I'll try to go with brief, vague, and ratings.

For the record, Susan Kaye Quinn is a very good writer. Her 30 page stories pack around 30 things to cringe about, hold your breath, or go for your own snack to let your body's adrenaline simmer down a little.


This is another three and a half star book, and again I'm glad I must give it four stars as it was a much more intense book than the last 3.5 star Debt Collector book.

We start in the hospital, again, heading to "collect" from 41 year old Mrs Riley who can be heard throughout the hospital screaming. Mrs. Riley had been an excellent credit risk. She had a great business plan and an MBA from a respectable college. She was an excellent candidate for her business loan. Due to world politics, her supplier half way around the world was failing to deliver. Mrs. Riley's sales were crumbling, then she was diagnosed with cancer. She obviously disagreed with the bean counter's and was not happy a debt collector was in the hospital heading to her room.

Lirium tried to be professional, but the nurses could not prevent Mrs Riley from giving Lirium a fat lip before he began his collection. Lirium had expected 2 weeks of life force, not a month, so he was pumped with all that extra life force in him.

Soon after Mrs Riley's collection we are introduced to Lirium's psych officer, Candy. She is a mental health worker and is assigned a number of debt collectors to monitor their mental health in a stressful job that takes life from those designated by bean counters and gives that life to "more deserving" characters.

We, as readers, also know that each collection leaves some dark mark upon the collector's soul. Not clear how that happens, but the ability to collect is not explained beyond there being a school one attends either. Reader's job is to suspend disbelief and the writer's job is to take advantage of that trust and deliver something that seems more true than reality itself. Knowing about this "soul" trouble helps us readers continue to suspend disbelief when debt collectors have an abundance of mental health issues. As readers we can easily understand the need for a mental health worker. Plus Lirium seems exceptionally low on life coping skills.

Because of the previous Apple Girl experience (Debt Collector 1 - Delirium), Lirium no longer uses sex workers in his "new apartment" to ward off the insanity and boredom of his debt collecting life style. His sexual restraint has left him with only alcohol to deal with the constant noise of battle going on between his ears.

Candy assures Lirium she always has his best interest in mind which is why she is assigning a mentor to work with Lirium. Lirium had asked for the meeting to see if he could get more work in the medical field. The Apple Girl experience had constantly been on his mind and he wanted to see if paying out to medical patients would have a similar effect vs always paying out to the extremely successful clients.

Waiting for his new mentor, Lirium clears out all the booze in his new apartment. Looking around for any other signs his life is falling apart he realizes there is no food in the apartment. Lirium panics, then realizes he doesn't know where a grocery store may be near his new apartment. He decides to find one and get some food before this new mentor shows up. Before he puts on his jacket the doorbell rings. Moments later Lirium is looking at an extremely beautiful woman who asks with a sultry voice if she is going to be invited inside.

The beautiful mentor, Ophelia quickly establishes that in this relationship she will be the shark, and Litium will be the guppy. After some intense character development Ophelia wanders into the kitchen searching for something to eat, discovering what Lirium had been worried about. To Lirium's pleasant surprise, the beautiful and dangerous "shark" Ophelia was hoping to find Rocky Road ice cream.

Lirium is soon in a store debating with himself if his stomach could handle Rocky Road, so he's looking back and forth from Vanilla to Rocky Road. When the clerk asks if he is ok, he decides on both. He also concludes that having Ophelia as a mentor will be a very good thing for him.

Upon leaving the store, our author Susan Kaye Quinn decides this galloping story needs a triple shot of Red Bull.

To leave you with some reason to read the book I'll just say, nothing you expect happens, but everything that does happen makes you feel like you are free falling out of an airplane.

Reading should always keep the reader interested, but in this marketplace with thousands of independent publishers, just keeping a reader interested may no longer be enough. The books from newer authors I've read over the last few years have been much more like hanging on for dear life and forgetting about sleeping altogether, or picking up a new writer's book in order to cure insomnia. The middle seems to have thinned out with the advancements in the publishing world.

Major Spoilers Galore… a new "test" feature stolen from Sarah, The Critiquing Chemist

• Who were Lirium's muggers? 
• Why didn't the muggers shoot Lirium in the back when they clearly could have done that? 
• Did Ophelia escape or was she killed? 
• Can the police determine if Ophelia is dead based on the amount of blood they found? 
• Why was Candy giving mission orders instead of Flitstrom? 
• When Candy scanned Lirium did she notice how much extra "life force" he had beyond the miscalculation of Mrs. Riley's life force? 
• Why hadn't Candy informed Lirium that his new apartment was in the middle of the Kolem mob's territory?

View all my Goodread reviews