This is a primer for reading Kathy and the Empty Nest without having read the preceding one million plus words in the series.
The World
Okay, so a bit about the world should come first. The story takes place in the year 2035 or 2036 (I think I established in the story which one, but I can’t recall). In the world in which the story takes place, magic and ancient gods and creatures are real, but had been missing from the world for thousands of years, so the history of that world and the real world lines up until 2022, when the story begins.
In 2027, the main character, Kathy, was kidnapped at the age of 16 by the cult of a recently-awakened evil god, Astoram. She was brutalized at the hands of his high priest, Nick (a former homeless man with multiple personalities who had been manipulated into becoming Astoram’s priest) and the cult. Hours later, she was rescued by a retired green beret named Gary, accompanied by Inanna, goddess of love, sex and war. She joined Gary and Inanna, along with a nerdy man named Jerry Williams (the main character of the overall series) and Sarisa, goddess of knowledge and learning, on their quest to stop Astoram.
They finally did so, though during the process, Kathy was manipulated herself by Astoram, and then possessed by a demon, briefly filling the role of the Arbiter of Astoram, a bloodthirsty, brutal enforcer of his will on his own cult. Also during this process, Inanna gave her divinity to Yarm, a resurrected neanderthal who had joined them, and Kathy, Jerry and Gary all gained great magical powers from the two goddesses.
Sarisa turned out to be behind Astoram’s awakening and was, herself, killed in the final battle. A few years later (about year before this story), she returned, setting off a series of events that almost resulted in the extinction of humanity before being stopped by Jerry. However, in stopping her, Jerry discovered that her plan had centered around saving the inhabitants of an alternate world who had been wiped out mysteriously, many thousands of years ago. He finished her plan, saving that world in the process, and revealing the truth that Sarisa had been laboring in the service of good the whole time. As can be imagined, those who knew her have very mixed feelings about her.
Finally, the last effect of the group’s battle with Astoram was the beginning of the awakening of the rest of the gods and the return of magic to the world. In the years since, magic has been more or less embraced by humanity, and ‘Wizard’ has become a well-known job title.
The Characters
Kathy Evenson
Kathy is a PhD student of history, who also works for the Divine Crisis Management Group (see below). She is one of three extremely powerful ‘demigods’, or humans who have been granted wells of divine magic by the gods, along with Jerry and Gary. She has a French girlfriend, Lya, who lives with her. Her best friend is Nick, though a (literal) spirit of terror who goes by the name of Spectre is a close second. Kathy is an extremely well-balanced person, having been given a full and complete knowledge of psychology and trauma-coping skills by Sarisa early on, to help deal with the trauma she suffered. She is known as one of the best listeners, and a brilliant giver of advice on emotional and relationship matters. She is also a skilled fighter, having been granted similarly perfect skills in all varieties of combat by Sarisa and Inanna.
Nick Beaufort
Nick is the villain of the first book, who has since reformed and seeks to make amends for his past misdeeds. He was rendered helpless, and then forced to live for a while as a disembodied head under Kathy’s care. With her help, he learned how to come to grips with his guilt and work to make up for his crimes. Nick is what is known as an ‘oracle’, a kind of magic-user whose abilities in the real world consists mainly of the ability to track down obscure knowledge through magical means, but who is insanely powerful in the spirit world. Her mentor is Jerry Williams.
Zelda
Zelda is Nick’s short-term girlfriend. She is an akkorokamui; a type of monster that resembles a woman from the waist up and an octopus below. Their normal lifecycle is to seduce men into the water, mate with them, then drown and eat them, but Zelda has become disillusioned with her lot in life, and is seeking a change. She had sixteen spawn (baby akkorokamui) with Nick about six months prior, and they are just reaching adulthood.
Spectre
Spectre is a spirit of terror, an angelic being known as a ‘deva’ who has a mysterious connection to the divine concept of fear. She had been held captive and abused by many wizards prior to the gods going to sleep and taking magic from the world with them, and she has devoted herself to rescuing other spirits who are living in captivity. With magic returning to the world, many amoral wizards are capturing spirits and abusing them, giving her a lot of work to do. She and Kathy are close friends.
Lya
Lya is Kathy’s girlfriend. She had been a retail worker, living in Paris, when she met Jerry during a period in which he had lost all of his memories and run off to found what amounted to a sex cult. She joined, and then met Kathy when Jerry’s wife, Inanna, finally tracked him down. Her and Kathy hit it off very well, though Kathy understood that their relationship began on lustful notes. Over the past few years, they have fallen in love and become devoted to each other, however.
Jerry Williams
Jerry is the main character of the series (though not this story). He is a nerdy, awkward man in his late 30s, with a wife and children. He is also the most powerful demigod by a significant margin, the world’s leading expert on magic, and the head of Research and Development for the Divine Crisis Management Group. Jerry is very easily embarrassed when discussing any matters of a personal nature, but it is widely believed by those who know him that he is a prolific and otherworldly talented lover, known for inviting a revolving door of women (and men) into his marriage bed, a habit which his wife thoroughly approves of.
Inanna Williams
Inanna is the former goddess of love, sex and war. She gave up her divinity to be with the man she loved, Jerry. She is still incredibly powerful, being functionally a demigod herself. She and Jerry have had one natural-born child together and adopted two more, one of whom was Jerry’s child with another woman from one of their earliest dalliances. She is fiercely protective of her children, a group that includes essentially anyone younger than her whom she is fond of, and may be the only person other than Jerry who could challenge the current god of war in a fight and hold their own.
Sookie
Sookie is the name currently used by Ohma, former goddess of sex. She is a red-skinned, scaled, horned and bat-winged demon who has lived openly among humanity for hundreds of years. In recent years, she made a living as a cam-girl, winning numerous adult entertainment awards for her dedication to her her ‘cosplay’. After connecting with the series cast, she became the showrunner for The Legend of Jerry, an HBO series that fictionalized the exploits of Jerry and became a runaway hit. She is currently one of the most in-demand screenwriters and producers in the entertainment industry, though she usually wears a disguise that makes her appear as a human woman, these days. She is possibly the most frequent visitor to Jerry and Inanna’s bedroom.
Yarm
Yarm is a resurrected neanderthal who took on the mantle of being the god of love, sex and war when Inanna abandoned it. He is a large, extremely muscular, extremely hairy and extremely handsome man. He is married to his wife, Brekka, and has two children, Yarm Jr. and Eddis. His family is mortal. He is, as he says, “a nine-to-five god. Monday through Friday, I do my godly duties, but on the evenings and weekends, I’m with my family.” Yarm and his wife are both joyfully polyamorous and polysexual. Even before taking up his divinity, Yarm was a consummate warrior, a loving husband and father, and a gifted lover. He was the perfect match for Inanna’s unwanted divinity.
Mot
Mot is the goddess of death. She is a very laid back and easy-going person who is, in her own words “Half goth, half hippy, aaaaaaaaallllll pothead.” She is kind and caring of the souls that come to her for redistribution to an afterlife. She is also one of the ‘regular customers’ of Jerry and Inanna’s bedroom.
Chris Wallace
Chris is an Einherjar, a dead soul whose afterlife was Valhalla. He is the husband of Gary, the retired green beret. The only magic at his command is the ability to come back to life when killed, but in his life, he was a highly competent green beret. He has model-good looks, and in Gary’s words, “If he weren’t so durned scary in a firefight, I’d say he was too purty to be a soldier.” Natalie is his and Gary’s adopted daughter.
Final Notes
The Divine Crisis Management Group is a company founded by the cast of the series. It is a multi-billion dollar, international non-profit that works in security, consulting, investigations and magical research. It exists to give municipal law enforcement the ability to deal with crimes of a magical nature, and to provide recourse to those who have suffered at the hands of monsters and other magical or magic-wielding beings.
Finally, the series is a heavily comedic one, though it is also dramatic. The humor runs heavily in the scatological direction, with a particular emphasis on sex jokes. Sex is also a dramatic theme in the series, along with found family, morality and the ethics of heroism. There are a lot of sex jokes, and a few scattered sex scenes. Characters mostly talk openly about such things, though some (like Jerry) find this very embarrassing. The series features a lot of gay, pan, trans and bisexual characters, and mostly portrays them in a positive light.
And (truly) finally, here’s the link to the full story: Kathy and the Empty Nest