VEILED EXISTENCE

After Thunderstone (2013), Jeni and Ice find themselves up against hostile supernatural forces again, this time from Celtic legend.

Jeni, a white teen, has tried to research her heritage and learn about her spiritual abilities, but her debilitating nightmares have caused her to put the project on hold. Jeni’s strange experience with a rock near an old church sends up all kinds of red flags for her boyfriend, Ojibwe apprentice medicine man Ice, and his mentor, Nik. Then Ice vanishes just before he’s supposed to join Jeni and her family on a riverboat cruise. With the help of her skeptic cousin Tyler and Dale, another spiritually gifted contact of Nik’s (though of Irish rather than Native heritage), Jeni investigates the church and stone, stumbling right into the old Irish story Deirdre of the Sorrows. But physically rescuing Ice won’t be enough to counteract the powerful geis that’s been laid on him. There’s plenty of Midwestern local flavor from the settings—including an encounter with real-life urban explorers—that give a realistic weight, especially needed as Jeni rapidly gains huge abilities in a hurry for the final showdown once her enemy’s identified (after a predictable twist). Pietron takes care to correct some of the flaws of the earlier book, giving Ice a specific tribal affiliation, though the authenticity of the book’s mythos is still suspect.

Fast-paced and plot-focused.