“Splendid…an edgy dark fantasy touched with just the right amount of humour.”

 

NO MAJOR SPOILERS

Hello bibliophiles, Quintin Fortune here, and I, like just about everyone else on the planet, have one or two fictional/literary heroes. Characters we can identify with. Ancient ones such as Gilgamesh or Heracles, timeless ones like Elizabeth Bennet or Tom Sawyer, to even modern day ones like Spider-Man or Wonder Woman.

A new hero to add to my list is Kate Daniels, main hero of the book ‘Magic Bites’ by Ilona Andrews. Kate is a mercenary in a weird future version of Atlanta where everything switches between magic and technology.

Our story opens with Kate getting drunk (always a good way to introduce your hero) and receiving a message about the death of her Guardian, Greg. She ended up being stuck on the case by the Order, because plot convenience.

She’s soon having to deal with the two main magical groups, the Pack (a group of shapeshifters led by a werelion names Currin) and the People (a group of necromancers that control mindless vampires led by Nataraja). No, it’s never really explained why they’re called ‘The People’, although I could have missed it under Kate’s layers of snark.

What follows is a battle of wits (and sometimes testosterone) and a race against time as Kate tries to get to the bottom of this murder mystery.
Characters in these types of books either fall into two categories: the ‘life is dark and I’m so serious because of all this darkness’ mentality, or the ‘hey, this is dark and brooding, so let’s see how many one-liners we can throw out’. Kate, and most of the other main characters in this book, are neither.

Yes, Kate has a sarcastic comment for just about everyone and everything, but it’s not forced. She reacts like anyone who’s been in this line of work for some time would react to these situation; she knows about them and isn’t really phased by them anymore.

This is a really great read. It’s full of action, mystery, and a good dose of humor. I would highly recommend it if you ever run across it. Plus, this is the first in a series, so there’s more entertainment to be had (which I may be doing reviews for down the road).

I’m Quintin Fortune, and, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got books to hunt down.

 

Reviewed by:

Quintin Fortune

Added 16th November 2015

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Quintin Fortune