Jutta ProfijtCritiques

A really funny book.

The first chapters were hard to read. Pascha, the main character, was quite annoying, his slang seemed artificial to me. He was murdered? So what, he just got what he deserved, being a sexist, mean and arrogant criminal. Not a good starting point for a murder investigation story.

But I got used to him and his character improved as well. His friend Martin Gänsewein, the ME working on his case, was a much more likeable character and the combination of these two worked for me. It was hilarious to read how this annoying ghost almost ruined his life, causing both problems in his job and with the woman he is interested in.

I am looking forward to part two - Pascha meeting the ghost of a nun sounds like a lot of fun.

Uh oh. Gregor is in jail! Pasha seems to be the only one interested in getting him out, even Gregor isn't cooperating. Poor ghost can't catch a break. Another fun read.½

We learn a little more about Pasha, and he seems to be reluctantly maturing (a little) as well. This time he has helpers, although they are children and their actual state of being is a bit nebulous. Fast reading fun.½

Morgue Drawer: Do Not Enter! (Pascha #4) by Jutta Profijt takes the reader along as Pascha meets four kids ghost! Now he is the first to tell you he doesn't do well with kids! The problem is these kids aren't dead! The mystery gets deeper...The driver of their car was kidnapped too. Why was their car crashed into and the drive taken? Why are the kids ghosts?
Great adventure! Loads of fun! I really like Pascha and this series!

Morgue Drawer for Rent by Jutta Profijt narrated by MacLeod Andrews continues the crazy adventures of Pasha the snarky ghost and Martin the boring doctor. Full of mystery, intrigue, and body snatching in this book. Lots of interesting new characters and wild plot. I giggled and enjoyed this book too! Fun series!

Morgue Drawer Next Door (Pascha #2) by Jutta Profijt continues the craziness with the autopsy doctor and the ghost! In this book, Pasha gets Martin involved in finding out what happened when a nun died in a fire at the convent. The reason Pasha knows there was foul play because he can see and talk to the dead nun. This book gets really exciting. The nuns have a secret. Someone is trying to scare the nuns. Martin's boss thinks he is going crazy and there is tons of snarky comments to giggle about from Pasha! Great fun!

Morgue Drawer Four (Pascha #1) by Jutta Profijt, Erik J. Macki (Translator) is a clever and funny ghost story. Pasha is a street punk that is a professional car thief. Martin is a very quiet doctor that enjoys his job doing autopsies. They end up together. Martin can hear Pasha talking during Pasha's autopsy. Now Martin's life will never be the same! It ends in a semi- cliffhanger. You know what is going to happen, you hope, but you have to get book two to be sure. I planned to get book two anyway. I really thought this was a fresh take on ghosts because of the relationship between Martin and Pasha! 😁
The narration has a guy that sounds like a street punk! Perfect!

Another episode in this whimsical series. There is a heat wave in Cologne, and people are dying. More disturbing, bodies are being stolen from the Morgue and mutilated. Pasha, the spirit, is on the case, nudging Martin along.

Fun reading, although the language and Pasha's attitude towards women may be offensive to some. Since he is the spirit of a young man in his early twenties who lived as a car thief, it isn't unbelievable that he would be immature and crude. Martin is slowing having an effect on Pasha though. I like seeing the progress of this soul.½

Pascha is a spirit who for some reason has not "gone to the light" but remains here in the earthly realm. We first met him when he discovered that the medical examiner, Martin, who was performing his autopsy could hear and speak to him. Martin does not necessarily enjoy this privilege. Together, they were able to solve Pascha's murder, although it almost cost Martin his life.

Pascha was in his early twenties when he was killed, he was a car thief. His humor is juvenile and crude at times, but in this story his character is growing up a bit. It interests me to see where the author is taking the rest of the series.

Now Pascha meets another soul who has not moved on. Marlene, a nun who was murdered. Together they work to solve her murder. I enjoyed this story, it is light and fun. Perhaps not altogether consistent, it still makes for a quick and pleasant read, if you don't mind a bit of autopsy humor and descriptions.½

Der erste Teil hat mir eindeutig viel besser gefallen. Der Krimi ist nicht schlecht geschrieben, aber der Hauptcharakter fängt an zu nerven.

Have you ever read a book description and been intrigued but unsure? This was one of those books for me, but it was well worth the read.

We join our main character Corinna who has been fired from a job and finds out her boyfriend has been cheating on her. She decides that going into business for herself is the best option after many unsuccessful job interviews. Thus Dust Angels is born her butler service. One thing leads to another and Corinna is driving around with a dead body in her car.

I really liked this book way more than I thought I would. It was really fun and quirky. I felt like the characters could be real people not just in a book. We not only have Corinna, but her staff including Lisbeth a very spunky lady who leads the part of cleaning staff. You meet various clients that hire Dust Angels and get to see many different types of people. All while there is a dead body in her car and she doesn't know what to do about it! Finally we have a great romance twist at the end of the book that put the biggest grin on my face. I was beyond happy about it.

I honestly didn't dislike anything. A couple dry spots, but those were few and far between.

This book is worth the cash and a fun read. 4/5 stars! Go pick it up!

Germany, contemporary, ghosts, murder, murder-investigation, laugh-out-loud, situational-humor, verbal-humor

What a hoot! The story is told by Pascha, especially after his demise and acquaintance with the doctor who performed his autopsy. The two men are as different as chalk and cheese, and not just because one's dead. Pascha is a younger streetwise moocher who regularly gets into messes and the doctor is staid and rather wrapped too tight. The characters certainly are, and the publisher's blurb gives some idea of what's happening but there's no need for spoilers here, just go ahead and enjoy!
The translation from the original German is done by Erik J Macki and I expect that he knows just how to translate tricky idioms.
MacLeod Andrews is the narrator and his presentation is so in character, just listening makes you laugh and picture the characters clearly!

I've been enjoying this series. The voice of Pascha has been alternately hilarious, touching, and exasperating-- and the attempts of Martin to tune him out can be funny as well. I feel for both these men; I understand Pascha's loneliness, and I can certainly understand Martin's frustration at being the only person who can hear this restless ghost-- especially since they are polar opposites in temperament.

As the series progresses, Pascha has found that his boundaries have changed a bit, and he takes advantage of that in an attempt to keep boredom at bay. He's found that he enjoys the "company" of a police detective named Gregor since he likes helping out during investigations, but Gregor can't hear him, and Pascha has found it increasingly difficult to get Martin to cooperate.

Morgue Drawer: Do Not Enter! deals with the very real problems with the drug trade as well as within immigrant communities and the mystery is a strong element in the book, as it has been in all the others in the series. However, the tone has changed, and at first I found it extremely annoying. It wasn't the fact that one of the children's spirits was a racist (although it didn't help). What bothered me was how Pascha had changed. It was almost as if that one child's behavior had set him free to express other, nastier, parts of his personality. Pascha's attitude is much darker in this book, and when it dawned on me why, I smiled. Profijt really thought through the progression of Pascha's character.

If the only person you could talk to was someone who couldn't stand you and went through all sorts of machinations to avoid you, wouldn't that get to you after a while? If you couldn't do the things you really love in life-- like go out with pretty girls or drive fast cars-- wouldn't you find your attitude changing for the worse? That's what's happening here, and it sets up the last book of the series beautifully. I'm looking forward to reading it.½

I suspected after reading the first few paragraphs of this book that I wouldn't like but, but I had hope. I persisted. Silly me.

The premise is also silly – the soul of a small time thief who thinks he was murdered can talk to only one person after he found himself dead, his coroner. Nothing like this has ever happened to the coroner before. Silly, but it had potential, potential it did not live up to.

The criminal is crude and not very smart and not very likable. The coroner is sweet and naive and likable. But the story is pretty much single threaded, and I didn't like the writing or the translation. The characters didn't have much going for them as far as depth. I was bored.

This was a Kindle Unlimited book.

[Do Not Enter] is my least favorite in the series, but I still enjoyed it. The main character is Pasha, a former criminal. Former in that he was one when he was alive. Now that he is dead and a spirit, Pasha helps solve crimes, flitting about at ethereal speed, gathering clues and trying to pass them on to his friend the coroner and the only one who can hear him. There is usually another spirit hanging about, one who hasn't seen the light and crossed over yet, often the victim of the most recent crime. In this book, Pasha's spirit companions are four children who are in a medically induced coma after a car crash. The driver is missing. Public opinion says she ran off to avoid prosecution, but the kids say she was kidnapped. Pasha is crude and sexist on the surface, but underneath, not far underneath, he is kind, intelligent and very funny. I will keep reading the series.

Enjoyable, light read.
Third book in the series about a murdered con who can only be heard by the coroner who did his autopsy.
Martin, the coroner really wants nothing to do with someone who is continually intruding into his personal life. He and Pascha, the ghost, are total opposites in personality and outlook.
In the meantime, a new morgue manager arrives and decides that the morgue needs to operate more efficiently and make money to boot. Bits and pieces start disappearing, the staff are being overworked and are extremely disgruntled and Martin's personal and professional life is going down the drain.

This book follows the further adventures of a dead car thief and the forensic pathologist who want to get rid of this annoying, intrusive ghost.
There's another murder to investigate - if Pasha can just get his friend to get involved. Pasha even has a fellow ghost to interact with. It's a pity she's a plain, pious nun.
The interactions between the characters and Pasha's observations on life make this a light entertaining read--perhaps not as good as the first book, but still fun.

A small time, petty German criminal gets killed after stealing a fancy motor car that happens to have a body in the trunk.
He comes back as a ghost, but the only one who can hear him is the placid, conservative coroner in charge of his case.
It's a clash of social classes and a fun mystery.

This was a light, fast read, continuing in the story of a ghost who's caught here on earth with only one person, a coroner who can hear him.
This time he's after someone who may have kidnapped a teacher and caused an accident, which put four children into a coma--which gives four whiny, annoying children the chance to interact with Pasha as he tries to solve the multiple mysteries around this event, with very little help from his friend Martin, who has other things on his mind.
I didn't enjoy this story as much as the previous ones, as the children were rather annoying a great deal of the time and the interaction with Martin wasn't there as much. More like 2 1/2 stars.

This third book in the series takes up right where Morgue Drawer Next Door left off. Cologne is in the midst of a horrible heat wave, asbestos is being removed from the Institute building, and the icing on this cake of complete havoc is the new head of the department, a bean counter referred to as "Piggy Bank" by all those under his lunatic thumb of iron. I am amazed at how the author has kept me intrigued with the idea of teaming an intellectual man of science with the deceased spirit of a hormone-fueled young car thief. This is a very odd couple indeed, and it works because these two do not remain static.

Martin is the only human Pascha can talk to, but Martin has a girlfriend he'd like to move in with-- and not share her with "the voice in his head." As Martin frantically tries to come up with a solution to his problem, he's putting his relationship with his girlfriend in jeopardy. Pascha never sleeps, and there's only so many movies he can watch in Cologne's theaters. He's taken to writing his memoirs and trying to get them published-- with extremely interesting results. Although Pascha's grammar has improved gradually in the series, his descriptions are often crudely hilarious, and I've come to look froward to them.

This series is succeeding with me because Profijt has her characters grow and change as various relationships develop-- and because it's obvious that she's having fun writing these books. However, I did have one area of concern in Morgue Drawer for Rent. Profijt does admit in a section at the back of the book that she takes some artistic license with a couple of subjects, but she took a bit too much for me. Her bending of the facts of asbestos removal and one other subject kept throwing me out of the story, and I'm no expert on either subject. Be that as it may, I'm enjoying this series too much to stop just yet!½

This was a very enjoyable sequel to read!

I was a little suprised as some of the reviews expressing the opinion that this one wasn't as good as the first. A couple of points to consider about that:

First, most of the backstory about both Martin and Pascha was covered in the first book. This story picks up immediately after the end of the first.

Secondly, this book makes it clear that Pascha is the protagonist in this series, not Martin. (In the first book, it seemed 50-50.) I can see how that could be disappointing for some people if they expected the opposite. The next one sounds like it may feature Martin more....

Third, the main setting for this story is (of necessity from the ending of the Morgue Drawer Four) somewhat different.

Like the first book, this is beautifully translated by Erik J. Macki! I am looking forward to the next in the series, Morgue Drawer for Rent!

Quick, enjoyable read. I read this because I enjoyed the Morgue Drawer series by the author.

This was a very enjoyable sequel to read!

I was a little suprised as some of the reviews expressing the opinion that this one wasn't as good as the first. A couple of points to consider about that:

First, most of the backstory about both Martin and Pascha was covered in the first book. This story picks up immediately after the end of the first.

Secondly, this book makes it clear that Pascha is the protagonist in this series, not Martin. (In the first book, it seemed 50-50.) I can see how that could be disappointing for some people if they expected the opposite. The next one sounds like it may feature Martin more....

Third, the main setting for this story is (of necessity from the ending of the Morgue Drawer Four) somewhat different.

Like the first book, this is beautifully translated by Erik J. Macki! I am looking forward to the next in the series, Morgue Drawer for Rent!

Very enjoyable book. It was one of those mysteries that I didn't figure out who-done-it until it was revealed. The story really pulled me in.

A word about the tranlation: it was lovely! Very fluid and easy to read. One more book in this series is due in July; I hope the rest follow. I do hope the same translater works on the new ones.