Magic Burns, Ilona Andrews

I continue to really like this series. Sure, the writing isn’t sparkling deathless prose, but it’s functional and brings across the voice of the narrator — very no-nonsense, down to earth, tough-talking woman. What continues to intrigue and please me is the characterisation of Kate: stubborn, pig-headed, yes, but also willing to admit when she’s wrong, picking her battles, not afraid to admit when she needs help… Not afraid, even, to admit that she’s vulnerable, alone, that she’s not entirely happy to be without a partner. At the same time, she isn’t overly sentimental about it — though nor is she rushing into the bed of every guy who smiles at her.

Overall, it’s a good balance, to my mind. There’s also interesting world building — the circumstances of the magic waves in Atlanta, the history behind Kate that we don’t really get to know yet, the words of power, the different groups of supernaturals… And it’s pretty well paced: there were a couple of points where it seemed to stick a bit, but I pretty much read it in one go.

I keep coming to this expecting total bubblegum, but I come away happier than I expected because they dodge so many of my pet peeves and annoyances.

Rating: 4/5; review of the first book

Magic Bites, Ilona Andrews

I wasn’t expecting very much of this one, despite hearing some good things about it. I mean, it’s always been hanging around on the shelves with the urban fantasy books, which mostly I enjoy in a brain candy sort of way. This was still very easy to read, but it had more world-building than I expected, and required the reader to do more work. It’s got interesting shapeshifter and vampire lore, most of which I haven’t seen anywhere else, and it’s a semi post-apocalyptic setting that’s been caused by magic. I was reminded a bit of Robin McKinley’s Sunshine with some of the world-building, although the vampires are not at all the same.

Kate Daniels, the lead, doesn’t seem particularly special as a character — there’s plenty of tough-talking mercenaries out there, male and female. There were quite a few points, though, where I was very pleased with her characterisation: she knew when to back down, she didn’t go into everything with all her strength but tried to hold back what she didn’t need to use, and despite being a tough-talking mercenary, she was decent towards other people.

Some parts of it didn’t come together for me very well — her motivation seemed to lose its focus halfway through, for example, and the bit about her being special in some way teases for more in later books, but makes some parts of this book a bit deus ex machina-like. The writing isn’t super, but I’m definitely intrigued by the world, and Kate has a lot of promise.

Curran, however, eh. No boundaries, despite all the stuff about shapeshifter control he loses his temper more than I’m comfy with, typical macho posturing crap a lot of the time. I really hope I wasn’t meant to like him, but I rather suspect I was. I wasn’t a huge fan of Dr. Crest, either; he honestly seemed tacked on to be a red herring.