Hey,
another five-in-one, it’s almost like I’m not neglecting to post at all.
In an
(ultimately destined to fail) attempt to read fewer romance novels, I started
reading the Kate Daniels Urban Fantasy series. I borrowed the first 2 from the
library because I’ve been burned by UF before (ahem, The Hollows/Rachel Morgan
and obvs Anita
Blake) and didn’t want to waste my money.
Encapsulate This
Set in Atlanta (sometime
in the unspecified future), magic and technology co-exist uneasily. At any
given moment, one or the other takes precedence and you could find your car
stopping in the middle of street during a magic wave, or your wards failing
during a tech wave. Tall buildings tend to fall down, and horse-back is
probably the most dependable way to travel. Vampires, were-animals, fabled
heroes, and various other not-so-mythological and fantastic creatures walk the
streets.
Magic
Bites: Kate Daniels lives near-ish to the city, she’s got an awesome sword
and a bad attitude. Her former guardian has been murdered and she is out for
justice (revenge really, it’s always revenge) and to find the killer, she has
to cooperate with the Masters of the Dead (necromancers) and with the Pack (the
various weres). Kate’s a sometime-mercenary, an all-the-time loner, and has a
secret she must keep hidden at all costs.
Magic
Burns: Someone is stealing from the Pack and they have requested Kate’s
assistance with finding the thief. If that wasn’t enough, the magic waves have
been coming closer together and will culminate in what is known as a flare. At
the height of a flare, gods can walk the earth. If Kate can’t figure who out
how to stop them from manifesting, shit will get real.
Magic
Strikes: When Kate’s friend from the Pack gets himself nearly killed, she
has to finagle her way into the Midnight Games (hey, an underground death
match!) to find out who done it. What she discovers is a plot that could change
the Pack FOREVER (doom doom doom).
Magic
Bleeds: Someone is killing some other people, and Kate is called in to
figure out who/why/how (they know where). Turns out that her secret is coming
to bite her in the ass but it may also be the only reason she will survive the
encounter with a deadly member of her own family…
Magic
Slays: Kate is now running her own show and she hops on her first paying
gig. The vampires are escaping the control of the necromancers and the Masters
of the Dead want to know why. There is way more at stake than anyone realizes
(hah, I made a pun) and Kate must stop a nefarious plot before it’s too late.
Ruminate on That
When I first
finished Magic Bites, I wasn’t totally enthralled but I was certainly intrigued.
I thought the book was well written, had a pretty original take on magic in the
modern world, some solid world-building, and had an independent, sword-carrying
lady-protagonist that was like-able but not love-able. Kate’s smart but fallible,
really good at what she does but not perfect, and she is terrible at personal
relationships. She does sometimes take her independence to the point of idiocy,
but that’s fine, she has a sword (I
will forgive a lot of things if there are swords involved). Anyway, I liked it enough
to nab the second book and Magic Burns builds on all the promise of the first
book. While the story line is a bit confusing, it is more interesting because
it reveals more about Kate’s history and the world-building just keeps on
getting better. I liked book 2 so much that I immediately purchased books 3, 4, and 5 for my Kindle so I wouldn’t
have to wait for the library copies (seriously library, one copy of each?).
GUESS WHAT? I was not disappointed. Magic Strikes is AWESOME. I will go so far
as to say it is the best of the series. Magic Bleeds and Magic Slays are pretty
wicked but there is a bit more focus on romance and less on the total
bad-assery that is Kate Daniels. The romance doesn’t overtake the story and I happen
to like romance (no
doy) but I thought that the tension between Kate and Mystery Man (totally
not a mystery if you read the books, go read them) in book 3 was perfect. Also,
underground DEATH MATCH. Also, also, Kate loves The Princess Bride (the book
not the movie, since television doesn’t really work) which makes her a winner. Also,
also, also Kate is (occasionally) hysterically funny, I cannot tell you how
many weird looks I got from the boyfriend because I was laughing alone in the
dark (not actually in the dark, else how would I be reading?) (Okay, no more
also’s, I promise.)
I think
that the series, which is awesome in many, many ways, has most of its strength
in Kate’s character growth. She goes from “Meh, she’s aight” to “Whoa, that is
one awesome lady*” without her becoming so perfect that I want to gag.
*(Unlike Anita
Blake who became magic just because, Kate’s been training her whole
life both with a sword and with magic. She is a special snowflake, but there
are actual reasons for it. Also (hah, I lied), Kate’s extra-super-special-ness provides
the focus and the final conclusion for the series. A lot of UF tends not to
have an end-point and the stories are about whatever so they go on FOREVER and
lose any cohesion they might have begun with (much like this sentence…). I
don’t particularly care if it takes 10 books to get to the conclusion, I just
want there to be a purpose (I do love
a Great Quest). What I don’t want is to watch a character meander around doing
whatever until the author gets bored or the series stops making money.)
Final Reckoning
Should you
read these? HELL to the YES. Grab a snuggy and settle in for the weekend. The
series gets better and better (despite what I said about book 3, that one was
just my personal favorite). I would
hazard that there are at least 2 more books to come (the website lists that book
6 is in progress) but it’ll probably be awhile since the author/s have another
series being released more-or-less concurrently.
My library, like, can't get Books 1 - 3 of this. So they keep emailing me going "WE HAVE THESE BOOKS" only they are 4 & 5 and, useless.
ReplyDeleteSwords! Who doesn't like swords?
BOO! That sucks. They aren't lendable either else I would send you mine.
ReplyDelete