A fine addition to the series.
Carey’s latest supernatural urban fantasy, a sequel to Dark Currents (2012).
A small town on the shores of Lake Michigan, Pemkowet caters to summer tourists, who flock in to goggle at Pemkowet’s eldritch inhabitants—fairies, ghouls, vampires, naiads and so forth—whose benevolent supervisor is Hel, the Norse goddess of the underworld. Daisy Johanssen, daughter of a demon and a single mother, is Hel’s enforcer and designated liaison to the Pemkowet Police Department. Her personal life is complicated enough. She lusts after her partner, werewolf Officer Cody Fairfax; the feeling’s mutual, but Cody wants a traditional family and must mate with another werewolf. She finds Stefan Ludovic, the leader of the ghouls, or Outcasts—rejected by both heaven and hell, they’re immortal and feed on emotions—dangerously alluring. And she’s dating Sinclair Palmer, a seemingly normal human who organizes bus tours for the tourists. Neither is her caseload simple, what with a rutting satyr who kicks off a serious orgy, a hell-spawn lawyer sniffing around, hobgoblins swindling tourists with shell games and a teenager abducted by vampires. And then Sinclair’s twin sister and mother show up. What he didn’t tell Daisy is that both his sister and mother are powerful Obeah sorcerers, and if he doesn’t return to Jamaica with them to take up his familial role, they’ll release his grandfather’s duppy, or ghost—with disastrous consequences. Daisy has moxie to spare and refuses to be intimidated. But she’ll need all the help she can get. In Carey’s capable hands, all this seems not just convincing, but enchantingly normal thanks to the flawless backdrop, skillfully articulated plotting and splendid characters.
A fine addition to the series.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-451-46518-4
Page Count: 432
Publisher: ROC/Penguin
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2013
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.
Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in this frightful medieval epic about an orphan girl with visionary powers in plague-devastated France.
The year is 1348. The conflict between France and England is nothing compared to the all-out war building between good angels and fallen ones for control of heaven (though a scene in which soldiers are massacred by a rainbow of arrows is pretty horrific). Among mortals, only the girl, Delphine, knows of the cataclysm to come. Angels speak to her, issuing warnings—and a command to run. A pack of thieves is about to carry her off and rape her when she is saved by a disgraced knight, Thomas, with whom she teams on a march across the parched landscape. Survivors desperate for food have made donkey a delicacy and don't mind eating human flesh. The few healthy people left lock themselves in, not wanting to risk contact with strangers, no matter how dire the strangers' needs. To venture out at night is suicidal: Horrific forces swirl about, ravaging living forms. Lethal black clouds, tentacled water creatures and assorted monsters are comfortable in the daylight hours as well. The knight and a third fellow journeyer, a priest, have difficulty believing Delphine's visions are real, but with oblivion lurking in every shadow, they don't have any choice but to trust her. The question becomes, can she trust herself? Buehlman, who drew upon his love of Fitzgerald and Hemingway in his acclaimed Southern horror novel, Those Across the River (2011), slips effortlessly into a different kind of literary sensibility, one that doesn't scrimp on earthy humor and lyrical writing in the face of unspeakable horrors. The power of suggestion is the author's strong suit, along with first-rate storytelling talent.
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937007-86-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
At Buckkeep in the Six Duchies, young Fitz, the bastard son of Prince Chivalry, is raised as a stablehand by old warrior Burrich. But when Chivalry dies without legitimate issue—murdered, it's rumored—Fitz, at the orders of King Shrewd, is brought into the palace and trained in the knightly and courtly arts. Meanwhile, secretly at night, he receives instruction from another bastard, Chade, in the assassin's craft. Now, King Shrewd's subjects are imperiled by the visits of the Red-Ship Raiders—formidable warriors who pillage the seacoasts and turn their human victims into vicious, destructive zombies. Since rehabilitating the zombies proves impossible, it's Fitz's task to go abroad covertly and kill them as quickly and humanely as possible. Shrewd orders that Fitz be taught the Skill—mental powers of telepathy and coercion possessed by all those of the royal line; his teacher is Galen, a sadistic ally of the popinjay Prince Regal, who hates Fitz all the more for his loyalty to Shrewd's other son, the stalwart soldier Verity. Galen brutalizes Fitz and, unknown to anyone, implants a mental block that prevents Fitz from using the Skill. Later, Shrewd decrees that, to cement an alliance, Verity shall wed the Princess Kettricken, heir to a remote yet rich mountain kingdom. Verity, occupied with Skillfully keeping the Red-Ship Raiders at bay, can't go to collect his bride, so Regal and Fitz are sent. Finally, Fitz must discover the depths of Regal's perfidy, recapture his true Skill, win Kettricken's heart for Verity, and help Verity defeat the Raiders. An intriguing, controlled, and remarkably assured debut, at once satisfyingly self-contained yet leaving plenty of scope for future extensions and embellishments.
Pub Date: April 17, 1995
ISBN: 0-553-37445-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Spectra/Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1995
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