A. M. Dellamonica: HIDDEN SEA TALES TRILOGY

Author:  A.M. (Alyx) Dellamonica 
Series:  HIDDEN SEA TALES 
Plot Type: Alternate World Fantasy 
Ratings:  Violence—3; Sensuality—3; Humor—3 

Publisher:  Tor 
     Novel 1: Child of a Hidden Sea (6/2014)

     Novel 2: A Daughter of No Nation (12/2015)

     Novel 3: The Nature of a Pirate (12/2016)

Dellamonica has also published three prequel stories set much earlier in this world in a series she calls THE GALES. The protagonist of those stories is Gale Feliachild, aunt of the heroine of HIDDEN SEA TALES:

    "Among the Silvering Herd" (free on-line or e-story)

    "The Ugly woman of Castello di Putti" (free on-line or e-story)

    "The Glass Galago" (e-story)

This ongoing post was revised and updated on 1/7/2017 to include my review of The Nature of a Pirate, the third novel in this trilogy. That review appears first, followed by an overview of the world-building and reviews of the first two novels.

                       NOVEL 3:  The Nature of a Pirate                    
PUBLISHER'S BLURB: 

     Marine videographer and biologist Sophie Hansa has spent the past few months putting her knowledge of science to use on the strange world of Stormwrack, solving seemingly impossible cases where no solution had been found before.

     When a series of ships within the Fleet of Nations, the main governing body that rules a loose alliance of island nation states, are sunk by magical sabotage, Sophie is called on to find out why. While surveying the damage of the most recent wreck, she discovers a strange-looking creature―a fright, a wooden oddity born from a banished spell―causing chaos within the ship. The question is who would put this creature aboard and why?

     The quest for answers finds Sophie magically bound to an abolitionist from Sylvanna, her father’s homeland. Now Sophie and the crew of the Nightjar must discover what makes this man so unique while outrunning magical assassins and villainous pirates, and stopping the people responsible for the attacks on the Fleet before they strike again

MY REVIEW:

      As the story opens, Sophie has received official approval to set up her Forensic Institute, so now she needs to begin assembling the necessary equipment, personnel, and―most important―scientific knowledge that she will need to make the Institute a success. She is excited about this new project because her new job is the perfect cover for her habit of constantly asking questions―a character trait that is frowned on in Stormwrack culture. At one point a government official scolds Sophie about her most grievous cultural flaw―curiosity: "As far as I can tell, you can find a reason to want access to every piece of information, true or false, ever recorded."

     The novel's plot has several prongs, all involving Sophie in some type of danger, both physical and emotional. Here are the primary story lines:

> Can Sophie and her brother Bram prove to Stormwrack officials that her new Forensic Institute has value and should be fully funded? This entails the transport of specialized scientific equipment and huge quantities of textbook information from Earth to Stormwrack so that Sophie can train her new Forensic assistants in the science of fingerprinting and crime scene analysis.

> Can Sophie and Bram figure out a way to prove exactly what Stormwrack's relationship is to Earth? Is Stormwrack a parallel realm? Or is Stormwrack the result of some type of cataclysmic occurrence on Earth that stripped it of its technological and scientific advances (as well as most of its land masses)?

> Can Sophie make peace with the fact that her biological mother (Beatrice) loaded her up with magical intents before she gave her up for adoption? At her lowest point, Sophie complains to Bram, "I'm barely a real person. I'm a made thing. A windup doll... I'm the image of what Beatrice wanted. A designer baby." (Mostly, she's afraid that Garland wouldn't have fallen for her if she didn't have the beauty, intelligence, and luck that come from Beatrice's intents.) But have faith in our intrepid heroine, who has a history of overcoming challenges and coming out on top.

> Who was the Stormwracker who traveled to Earth (Erstwhile) back in book one and brought back the weapons that killed Sophie's aunt, Gale Feliachild? Who was behind the planning of that murder, and why?

> Who is trying to destroy the Fleet of Nations by using forbidden magic to sink one ship after another? And why?

> How can Sophie extricate herself from a situation into which her father, Cly, has maneuvered her: namely, that she now owns a slave and doesn't know how to free him without exposing him to future harm, or even death? In a related story thread, is there any truth to the Stormwrack myth about a distant island that is populated by escaped slaves?

> What is going to happen next in Sophie's complicated relationship with her (apparent) soul mate, Captain Garland Parrish?

    Each plot line twists and turns its way through the book, occasionally brushing up against one another and sometimes weaving together. Dellamonica once again has created a tightly knit plot that careens along at a dizzying pace, carrying us deeper and deeper into the many-layered political intrigues of Stormwrack. Each story line has its own cast of characters, and you really can't trust any of them based on what they say and how they behave. Dellamonica keeps you guessing all the way to the end as to the identities of the bad guys and gals. Even though I found some to be more obvious than others, I wasn't able to figure out why some of them had turned to the dark side.

     Sophie spends some time (separately) with her parents, Beatrice and Cly, and she gets to know both of them better, thus enriching the story of her birth and her familial history. Watching Sophie and Cly play a cat-and-mouse game of one-upmanship throughout the novel is one of the high points. Sophie also comes to an understanding with her adoptive parents in San Francisco―a sad scene because she knows that her destiny now lies in Stormwrack, not on Earth. And now to the romance: Sophie and Garland are together throughout much of the novel, mostly on board his ship, and their relationship swerves all over the place. Garland consistently maintains his polite, conservative, monosyllabic demeanor, while Sophie seethes with sexual desire for his manly charms. Will Garland ever break down and make a move, or will Sophie have to take the first step?

     Since this series has been marketed as a trilogy, this must be the final novel, but Dellamonica does not completely resolve all of the issues, thus leaving a lot of room for further adventures for Sophie and her friends. I have enjoyed reading all three novels and immersing myself in the Stormwrack world. Dellamonica is a terrific story teller, and she has created a fresh and exciting mythology with wonderfully well-developed characters who are all originals―not stereotypes. Even the villains are complex―definitely not the one-note bad guys that seem to be the norm in fantasy fiction these days. The best thing about the series is Sophie―a confident, courageous, intelligent heroine who is not afraid to stand up and face the dangers and disappointments in her life. I'm not saying that she never asks for help on her many and varied projects and problems, but I am saying that she doesn't allow any big, well-muscled men to fight her battles for her. Sophie is a woman with a mind of her own, and she's not shy about letting everyone know where she stands on any (every) issue, even when she is forced to suffer some negative consequences. On of the funniest examples of Sophie's outspokenness comes when she interrupts a class on "the basics of physical intimacy" being held for soon-to-be-wed citizens of Sylvanna, her father's country. After explaining to the instructor that "I don't need a bunch of half-baked information on sex. I've had sex," the instructor accuses her of lewdness and kicks her out of the class.

     If you are looking for an engaging fantasy series that breaks new ground, you can't do any better than HIDDEN SEA TALES. Click HERE to go to the novel's Amazon.com page where you can click on the cover art to read an excerpt. 

                        WORLD-BUILDING                        

     The series is set in Stormwrack, an alternate realm that is parallel to Earth. The two realms share many of the same physical characteristics e.g., moon and stars, geological structure, salty seas) but also have many differences (e.g., languages, time measurement, plant and animal species, absence of large land masses). Entry to the Stormwrack portal involves the use of a special time piece and a ritual completed at a specific time of day. 

     Stormwrack is a world of island nations, each with its own dialectal take on the main Stormwrack language. Although each island nation has its own governing body, the primary government for the entirety of Stormwrack is the Convene, which comprises representatives from each nation. The inhabitants of Stormwrack are human, but magic can be used to mutate the human form, so we do see a few monstrous creations.

    Law enforcement and defense are handled mostly by the Fleet, a huge flotilla of ships representing all of the island nations. The captain of the Fleet's lead ship—Temperance—has access to a powerful magical object that allows him to sink another ship just by speaking its name. Names have great power in Stormwrack. 

     Stormwrack has been without war for 109 years, ever since the signing of the Cessation agreement, which settled a war between the Isle of Gold—a pirate nation—and the rest of Stormwrack. Because the Cessation ended all warfare, the only way to settle disputes in Stormwrack is through litigation or dueling. When the series heroine complains, "Loopholes and paperwork…You guys seem to have an excess of legal maneuvering and a shortage of common sense," a Stormwracker responds, "It's…the price of the peace…Bureaucratic warfare. Less bloody than the real thing." If someone does something to you that you object to, you can either sue him or her, or you can elect to settle the dispute through a duel. The duels are handled by the Duelist-Adjudicator, who sails around on a ship fitted with fighting decks and manned by lawyers who excel at dueling sports like wrestling and swordplay.

     Magic is an everyday occurrence in Stormwrack and is called "intent." On a large scale, for example, a huge active volcano is completely safe because of a magical inscription with the intent that it be dormant. On a smaller scale, people with enough money can pay for a beautification intent that works like plastic surgery without the slice-and-dice. One character's sea-captain father "had his teeth scripped to shine as the sun. The intention survived his death," so his daughter uses his skull as a lantern. On the dark side, if someone knows your complete name (first, middle, last), they can kill you from afar. As the series heroine says, "You sink a ship by saying its name, and you ensorcel someone by writing their name. Names mean a lot here."

    Stormwrack has no modern technology—no electricity, engines, or computers—so it feels as if it exists in the 17th or 18th century during the Age of Sail. The shipboard scenes are terrific, with much attention paid to sensory details: the creak of the boards, the smells from the galley, the sting of the salt spray, the rush of the wind, the rolling and slapping of the waves, and the cries of the seabirds.

                      NOVEL 1:  Child of a Hidden Sea                      

     Don't be put off by the cover art; this is not a YA novel. Sophie Opal Hansa is 24 years old—the adopted daughter in a family that values intelligence, curiosity, and excellence. She is a marine videographer and has traveled the world, often living and working in harsh environments. Her gay brother, Bramwell (Bram), is a technological genius who can master just about any intellectual task in record time. Sophie has always felt like the black sheep of the family. She has the curiosity, but she lacks the follow through. Here, she succumbs to her usual jitters: "The old sense that her idea would fall apart when she explained it, that they'd poke holes in her theory and tell her she'd been silly, guilty of shallow thinking, of not really examining her hypothesis." Another time she babbles: "Don't you think it's possible—I mean, maybe I'm wrong, oh, I guess perhaps this is stupid." She flusters like this again and again—showing absolutely no confidence in her own intelligence. Sophie is most happy when she is investigating and least happy when she is called upon to present the findings of her investigations. 

     As the story opens, Sophie and Bram's parents are away on a lengthy trip, so Sophie searches their office and finds the identity of her biological mother, Beatrice, who happens to live just a few miles away. When Sophie knocks on Beatrice's door and reveals her identity, Beatrice reacts violently, calling Sophie a viper and demanding that she go away and not come back. Shortly after this bitter encounter, Sophie watches Gale Feliachild, her mother's sister, leave Beatrice's house and follows her, hoping that she will provide more information. Almost immediately, two men attack Gale, and Sophie jumps into the fray, slamming her camera bag into one man's face and grabbing hold of Gale. 

     All of a sudden Sophie finds herself flying through the air and landing in the middle of the sea, still holding on to Gale, who is unconscious with a knife in her chest. Soon, they are rescued by people who seem to be living in Medieval times in spindly wooden huts with very little food, clothing made from homespun fabrics, and no access to technology. Even more confusing is the fact that all of the plants and animals (mostly fish) that Sophie sees are completely unfamiliar to her (and she has a vast knowledge of wildlife). One of the most bewildering aspects of this place is that the sea and the beaches contain no trash and garbage; they are completely clean and free of litter. Each time Sophie sees something unfamiliar, she pulls out her camera and takes a photograph, but she is bewildered by almost everything she sees. The people speak a language that Sophie doesn't understand until one man—a spell-scripter—asks her to write her full name on a slate and then painstakingly carves it into a conch shell. As soon as he completes a brief ritual with the shell, Sophie can magically understand their language. 

     Even though Sophie sees the familiar moon and stars in the sky, she realizes that she is in a different world, and she sets about investigating it with the full force of her scientific curiosity. Within a few days, the Stormwrackers send Sophie back through the portal, where she tries to explain her adventure to Bram. Almost immediately, Sophie's teen-age half-sister, Verena, pounds on her door, furious that Sophie has stolen her heritage. Apparently, Beatrice was supposed to inherit the position and authority of being a courier between Stormwrack and Earth (which the Stormwrackers call "Erstwhile"), but due to mysterious circumstances, she vested her courier post over to Gale. During the rescue, Sophie took possession of Gale's courier pouch, a purse whose zipper opens if Sophie just brushes her finger across it. Inside the purse is Gale's badge of office. Verena claims that Gale meant for her to be the heir to her badge and position and insists that Sophie come back to Stormwrack to straighten out the whole messy situation. Sophie doesn't want to go alone, so she insists that Bram accompany her. 

     From this point on (about a third of the way into the book), Sophie and Bram get dragged into a major political firestorm in Stormwrack, one that finds them right in the middle of the uproar and the danger. In the midst of this main plot, there are also a few more story threads: Sophie's search for her biological father, her attempts to restore Verena's inheritance, and her burgeoning love for Stormwrack (and for a certain shy and handsome sea captain). The adventures play out mostly at sea—both on board and under the water. The twisty plot is complex, but fast paced, particularly the second half, where it accelerates at super-page-turning speeds. By the end, the plot elements include a secret political alliance, a kidnapping, spider web technology, and the theft of a powerful relic. Although the villains' identities are obvious early on, not all of them are one-note evil-doers. 

Besides Sophie, Bram, Beatrice, Gale, and Verena, the cast of supporting characters includes the following:

> Garland Parrish: captain of Gale's ship, the Nightjar, and a possible love interest for Sophie (although Verena has had a major crush on him for years)

> Lais Dariach: a tall, blond, promiscuous, bisexual scientist and inventor (think Fabio with a big brain) who lives in the nation of Tiladene; he and Sophie have a brief fling early in the book and remain friends through the end

> John Coine: one of the villains; a citizen of the pirate nation, Isle of Gold

> Tonio: Parrish's gay first mate, who comes to Sophie's aid more than once 

     Dellamonica does a great job of interweaving her gay and straight characters into the story without overemphasizing their sexual preferences. For the most part, sexual predilection in this world is a private and personal matter that holds little interest for anyone but the citizens of Ualtar, an ultra-conservative religious island whose philosophy bears a strong resemblance to some far-right conservative religions in our own world.

     As in most opening novels, many of the early chapters include expositional material that introduces the mythology of the series. The world-building is terrific. Sophie soon learns that she can't make sweeping generalizations about Stormwrack because in this world there is just as much diversity in religious beliefs, cultural idiosyncrasies, languages, and political philosophies as there is back on Earth. Dellamonica handles the world-building well because she makes her main character a smart and curious young woman and then almost immediately pops her into this strange new world—a world so different that Sophie spends a lot of time just asking questions. And don't forget the magic—a system in which a spell-scripter inscribes "intents"—magical words—on items, or even on people, to imbue them with various magical qualities.

     The author also does a great job with Sophie's first-person narration, always a plus, because writing in the first-person voice can sometimes be awkward. Sophie is such an honest and delightfully inquisitive young woman that her constant investigating comes across as perfectly normal. I must admit, though, that I enjoyed Bram's character more than Sophie's. Bram has a dry sense of humor that livens up every scene in which he appears, always using his genius-level abilities to work out problems in a geeky kind of way and never losing his cool. When things go wrong, he doesn't get hysterical, he merely understates the situation as "sub-optimal." Although I can empathize with Sophie's insecurities, she gets a bit too dithery for my taste, reacting more like an adolescent than a mid-twenties woman. I had to agree with Bram when he told her, "…you like gathering information more than you do presenting results...You can climb a rock face with your fingertips, but you've never been able to deal with having your conclusions questioned…You're afraid of coming up short. Of being told you did it wrong, or you don't belong, or it doesn't count…Try to can the stage fright. Just give them the facts." Many times I wanted to reach in to give Sophie a little shake and tell her to pull herself together and show some backbone. The aspect of Sophie's personality that I did like is her natural curiosity. In fact, her investigations of the unfamiliar flora and fauna of Stormwrack are, at times, more important to Sophie and more interesting to the reader than her inquiry into her aunt's death. The otter scene near the end is particularly engaging.

     I enjoyed this novel very much and am looking forward to its sequel. Dellamonica has plenty of room for story development in this rich world. Sophie isn't finished with her friends and family in Stormwrack, and I'm sure that she's not finished with her enemies there either. Since she has at least two ways that she can get through the portal, I'm sure that we'll see more seaworthy adventures in the next book—and probably some romance. Yes, I'm talking about you, Parrish. 

                      NOVEL 2:  A Daughter of No Nation                      
PUBLISHER'S BLURB: 

    As Child of a Hidden Sea drew to a close, Sophie Hansa found herself effectively deported from Stormwrack, the magical world where her birth parents met and, disastrously, married. Sworn to secrecy, she has been biding her time, studying the few relics she was able to bring back to San Francisco from the Fleet of Nations, and preparing in case a chance arises for her to return and investigate the link between our world–which the Wrackers call Erstwhile–and Stormwrack. 

  When Captain Garland Parrish of the sailing vessel Nightjar turns up on her doorstep, it is with a straightforward proposition. Her mother, Beatrice, is caught up in a legal tangle related to Sophie’s birth, and if she returns to Stormwrack and goes on a short sail with her father, the notorious Duelist-Advocate of the Fleet, he will see to it that the red tape is conveniently cleared away. Sophie wants to return, of course, and she wants to know both of her birth parents better. She agrees immediately. 

     But what does Clydon (Cly) Banning really want with his new-found daughter? Is he truly interested in a relationship with his only child, or is there a darker agenda at work? On Stormwrack, even simple issues of marriage, divorce and paternity are bound up in bureaucracy, and the divorce between Cly and Beatrice, citizens of two very different nations, is more an international incident than a domestic matter between two consenting adults. 

     Sophie just wants to study Stormwrack, to learn whether it is a future version of her own world. If it is, she needs to find clues about what destroyed most of Erstwhile’s land mass and raised the level of the oceans, and how magic came to exist in Earth’s far future. But on the sail to her father’s homeland an encounter with bandits, followed by a disturbing revelation about Cly’s home nation, Sylvanna, threatens to alienate father and daughter completely. This complicates Cly’s divorce…and triggers a scandal that could possibly set the port and starboard sides of the Fleet at each other’s throats.

MY REVIEW:

     At this point, having made it through an extended visit to Stormwrack (in book 1), Sophie is torn between her love for her adoptive parents on Earth (aka Erstwhile) and her scientific and cultural curiosity about Stormwrack. She and her brother, Bram, want to know how and when Stormwrack began its existence and why it has such a highly developed system of magic. They are also creating a map that compares the global location of the islands of Stormwrack to the geological features of Earth. Of course, there is another force that pulls Sophie toward Stormwrack: her biological family, especially her half-sister, Verena. And let’s not forget the handsome sea captain, Garland Parrish, to whom Sophie is quite attracted (and vice versa). 

     As the story opens, it has been six months since Sophie’s return home to San Francisco, and she can’t wait to go back to Stormwrack. Her bags are packed and ready when Parrish turns up one day with an offer that will help her biological mother, Beatrice, get out of jail. To review: When Sophie made her first visit to Stormwrack, she caused a lot of trouble for Beatrice, who had kept Sophie’s birth a secret from her estranged husband, Clydon Banning. After giving Sophie away to her adoptive parents on Earth, Beatrice left Cly, married another man, and gave birth to another daughter, Verena. When Cly found out about Sophie, he sued Beatrice for bigamy and other damages, resulting in Beatrice’s imprisonment. Now, Cly has agreed to allow Beatrice to be released on bail if Sophie promises to come with him for a visit to his homeland, Sylvanna. Sophie has been curious about her father, so she agrees to his terms, boards his ship, and sails away to Sylvanna. Sophie’s dreadful Sylvanna relatives (Cly’s cousin and her family) complicate Sophie’s introduction to Sylvanna. They are a greedy lot who want Cly to go back to sea and Sophie to get out of Stormwrack for good. Unfortunately, there is one part of Sylvanna culture that everyone has kept secret from Sophie, and when she learns about it, she is devastated. Based on all of the negative information about Cly that she has gotten from Beatrice’s relatives, Sophie was already wary and distrustful of Clay’s motives, and those feelings escalate when she gets a dose of life in Sylvanna. 

     As Cly and Sophie get to know one another, Cly suggests that Sophie should develop a new branch of study for Stormwrack: forensics. He explains that if she writes a proper handbook, forensics could become “a sanctioned branch of knowledge within the Judiciary.” Not only would this boost Cly’s reputation, but also it would allow Sophie to bypass the restrictions that have been placed on her scientific information gathering by her cousin Annela—a highly positioned bureaucrat. As part of Sophie’s forensics work, Cly wants her to take a look at three cold cases related to Sylvanna and try to solve them using her outlander science techniques. Sophie’s investigations of these cases make up one of the story lines. 

     All the way through the book, Sophie’s scenes with Cly are quite poignant as he tries his best to be a father while Sophie walks a tightrope between her desire to trust him and her fear that he has some dark purpose for wanting her to be a part of his life. In fact, through much of the book, she fears that Cly might be a sociopath, based on his behavior when they capture a pirate ship. Dellamonica does a fine job portraying this shaky father-daughter relationship through the characters’ walking-on-eggs actions and cautious dialogue. 

     I thought that Dellamonica had pretty much completed her world-building in book 1, but in this book she polishes it up and adds a few more bells and whistles. For example, Cly assigns Sophia a memorician, who “was essentially a searchable text archive.” He constantly reads and memorizes and is able to call up any fact that he has read. As Sophie requests more and more scientific information from her memorician, she discovers the unfortunate state of science on Stormwrack—a mishmash of superstition, magical thinking, religious beliefs, common sense, and a smattering of true scientific observations. 

     In a subplot that weaves through the Sophie/Cly/Beatrice plot line, Parrish’s ship, Nightjar, comes across a deserted, wrecked ship soon after Sophie arrives in Stormwrack. They find two survivors: a wily young girl and a gray cat, both of whom play roles in the resolution of the conflicts that surface regarding how the ship was wrecked, who the girl really is, and why she keeps lying to them. In another new bit of Stormwrack mythology, Sophie learns that cats who leave the protection of their homeland must forever after live aboard a ship. “No cat who leaves the protection of a seacraft may live.” Citizens of one Stormwrack isle actually worship cats. 

     Once again, Dellamonica creates a fast-paced, well-constructed plot that allows us to look even deeper into the souls of the main characters. By the end of the book, Sophie has become the titular daughter of no nation, having cut her connections with the countries of all of her parents, both biological and adoptive. At one point she muses about Stormwrack: “Neither here nor there, she thought. I don’t belong here, but I can’t just live in the real world now.” 

     As the plot plays out, Sophie feels more and more drawn to Stormwrack and begins to find a place for herself, not on the land, but on Parrish’s Nightjar. This means that she and Verena have to deal with the friction between them regarding Parrish. Verena has been crushing on Parrish for years, and she views Sophie as an interloper who has usurped her position with him. The scenes between Sophie and Verena are entertaining—if tense—as Verena tries to succeed in her new duties as Gale’s replacement, all the while dealing with her jealousy of Sophie’s burgeoning relationship with Parrish. Adding to the drama are some prophecies regarding Gale’s death (in book 1) that involve Parrish and Sophie. Verena’s words and behavior are completely natural at all times. She is a heart-broken teenager trying to succeed at a job in which she is over her head, and Dellamonica beautifully conveys her angst, her fears, and—eventually—her pride at a job well done. 

     The best parts of this book are the scenes in which Sophie manages to gather scientific information and biological samples from Stormwrack’s lands and seas even though everyone is under orders to keep her from doing so. Verena and Parrish are constantly shocked as Sophie keeps succeeding in her Holmesian analyses of situations—keenly observing and analyzing everything she sees and hears and deriving conclusions that she shouldn’t have been able to discern. It’s great to have such an intelligent, likable, and curious heroine who manages to avoid TSTL moments almost entirely. Sophie is much more calm and collected in this book, with none of the dithery moments that she had in the first book. 

     Dellamonica continues to excel in presenting a fresh and inventive mythology with well-developed characters, engrossing story lines, and a fascinating examination of human nature, which doesn’t seem to change, no matter what kind of a world we live in. This book is even better than the first one, and I am definitely looking forward to the next episode in Sophie’s Stormwrack life. 

     Click HERE to go to the novel's Amazon.com page where you can click on the cover art to read all of chapter 1 and part of chapter 2. Click HERE to go to the publisher's web site where you can scroll down a bit to read chapter 3

J.C. Nelson: GRIMM AGENCY SERIES

Author:  J. C. Nelson (pen name for Jason Nelson)
Series:  GRIMM AGENCY
Plot Type:  Urban Fantasy (UF)     
Ratings:  Violence—4; Sensuality—2; Humor—3 

Publisher:  Ace     

      1      Free Agent (8/2014)
      1.2   "Special Delivery" (free on-line short story, 11/2015)
      1.5   "Soul Ink" (e-novella, 1/2015)

      2      Armageddon Rules (2/2015)
      3      Wish Bound (8/2015) (FINAL) 

This ongoing post was revised and updated on 10/2/15 to include a review of Wish Bound, the third and FINAL novel in the series. That review appears first, followed by an overview of the series world-building, a review of the first two novels, and the publisher's blurb for the novella "Soul Ink."

                     NOVEL 3:  Wish Bound                     

PUBLISHER'S BLURB:

     As a partner at Grimm’s magical Agency, Marissa Locks is used to working odd jobs. But when an evil queen reappears in Kingdom, life becomes too strange to handle. Even when she’s not starting it, trouble follows Marissa everywhere. First there was the incident with the homicidal Fairy Godmother. Then there was the time she accidentally started Armageddon. But the problems that always seem to arise on Marissa’s birthday take the cake.

     This year, her annual bad-luck presents include an army of invading goblins, the resurrection of two vengeful enemies from hell, and the return of the Black Queen, the evil sorceress whose reign of terror still haunts Kingdom and who happens to have claimed Marissa as her servant.

     As Marissa’s friends try to save her from the Black Queen’s clutches, Marissa fights to end a bitter war that started before her birth. But her quest for peace is about to bring up some inconvenient truths about her own past—ones that might cost her the happily ever after she’s always dreamed of.

     Click HERE to read or listen to an excerpt from Wish Bound on the book's Amazon.com page. To see the excerpt, click either on the cover art or the "Listen" icon.

MY REVIEW:
     This appears to be the final novel in this series, with all of the loose ends tied up and all of the long-standing questions answered in the frenzied final chapters. If you haven't read the first two books, you should read those first because Nelson doesn't provide much of a review of past events. Although the previous novel was published just six months prior to this one, I have read a lot of urban fantasy books in the meantime, and I like it when authors include some type of summary of the high points of the series in the early chapters just to jog my memory.

     As the story begins, Marissa is confronted with some huge problems. Somehow, the souls of the wicked Queen Mihail and her princely son have been stolen from the Adversary's Vault of Souls, and he wants Marissa to get them back. Then another villain from the past shows up: the Black Queen. All three of them want Marissa dead and will go to any lengths to achieve that goal. The plot focuses mostly on Marissa's ongoing confrontations with the Black Queen, who is determined to take down Grimm and his Kingdoms if he doesn't give her what she wants—and he definitely refuses to acquiesce to her demands. The story goes from one crisis to another as the Black Queen tries to bind Marissa up in her dark world of bitter hatred and horrifying evil.

     In this book, all of the supporting characters from the previous books get to take part in the action: 

    > Various species groups: the post office gnomes, Beth and her demonic poodles, and the New Jersey wolves. (At one point, Marissa even dons a Red Riding Hood cape just like the one that got her into so much trouble in book 1.)

     > Marissa's friends and Agency allies: her fiancé—Liam; her best friend—Ari; Ari's fiancé—Wyatt; Wyatt's mother; and Mikey—the Agency intern (one of the New Jersey werewolves)

     > All of the supernatural good and evil characters: the Adversary (aka the Devil), Death, Eli the angel, and the Authority (aka God) 

     Of course, Grimm does his behind-the-mirror thing all the way through the book, helping and/or hindering each of the main characters in some way or other. 

     The pace of this book is frenetically fast, and in the absence of any reminders of past events, I'll admit that sometimes I got a bit lost. But I just kept reading past the "blurry" parts until I got back on track. After a LOT of scenes portraying strategizing sessions, verbal jousting, and physical altercations, the big finale goes by so quickly that it's almost anticlimactic. Unfortunately, Nelson drops in some deus ex machina elements to get Marissa through the final battle in one piece. 

     The truth about who and what Marissa really is comes out of nowhere, but then when you think back on events in the previous books, it does make some sort of sense. When Marissa's true identity is revealed, we get the answers to some questions—both big and small—like these: Why do all of Marissa's attempts to celebrate happy occasions end in disaster? Why did the Adversary turn down Marissa's attempt to bargain her soul for the end of the apocalypse (in the previous book)? Why has Rose (the Agency's gun-toting receptionist) always hated Marissa? Why can't Marissa have children? What's the deal with that deadly wheel of evil cheese that has been stored in the Agency refrigerator for the past nine years? (Trust me, the mysterious cheese plays a vital role in the plot, although the sudden appearance of the refrigerator that holds it is one of the deus ex machina moments that I mentioned earlier.) 

     I have mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, it does bring the series to a mostly satisfying conclusion, but on the other hand, the plot is messy and over-the-top frantic. The story has a fast—faster—fastest pace and never slows down at all until the very end—an exhausting book to read, especially when I had to keep trying to recall events from earlier books to which the characters constantly kept referring. If you have been a faithful reader of the series, you'll definitely want to see how it all ends. If you are a new reader, this is not the book to read first. 

                     WORLD-BUILDING                     

     In this very entertaining new series, Nelson takes the whole range of Grimm's fairy tales and adds a dash of The Wizard of Oz—mostly the wizard-behind-the-curtain part, although the heroine does have the same gumption and fearlessness that Dorothy displays as she tries desperately to find her way home. Instead of a curtain, Grimm, the "wizard" in this series, dwells within mirrors and other reflective surfaces, like shiny metal door handles, window glass, and water puddles. This talent allows Grimm to keep an eye on just about everything that is going on in the city. He also has additional magical abilities, like foretelling future events by doing auguries, a process that involves using rabbits in a way that would horrify PETA. 

     Grimm is the Fairy Godfather of an alternate New York City, and he spends much of his time granting wishes (for the right price) and keeping the city free of magical crimes and catastrophes. To handle the tough street work, Grimm has an all-female team of agents. When the series heroine, Marissa Locks (formerly Marissa Lambert, aka Goldilocks), asks him why he doesn't have any male agents, Grimm replies, "If you need something broken or burned or bashed, a man will do just fine…If you need a problem handled, you need a woman." (p. 183) Yay, Grimm!

     All of Grimm's agents are actually indentured servants—working for him in order to pay off their wish debts. Most of them are paying for their own wishes, but Marissa is paying off a wish debt owed by her parents, who sacrificed Marissa's freedom for a wish that saved the life of her younger sister. Marissa has been under Grimm's direct control for six years—ever since her eighteenth birthday. First, Grimm sent her to community college, and then she became one of his hardest-working agents. Here's a description of a typical morning for Marissa: "I dealt with twelve dancing princesses with blisters on their feet (you would be surprised what wonders a gel insole can work). I put yet another frog in the aquarium until Grimm could deal with him. Before ten thirty I sent two kids who ate a gingerbread house to the hospital to have their stomachs pumped." (p. 65) As the series opens, all Marissa wants is to earn her freedom so that she can go home to her family. When she looks at Grimm's other agents, she realizes that they have all been working for Grimm for decades and have not yet paid off their debts, so she fears that she may never be free again. 

     Marissa is a lonely young woman with no real friends and no real life—except for her job. One other thing about Marissa: she attracts trouble like a metal pole attracts lightning. Even when she tries her best, something always seems to go wrong. Many times though, her troubles can be traced to the fact that she can't seem to stop herself from making inappropriate—frequently sarcastic—comments to the wrong people at the wrong time and in the wrong places.

     The series mythology is totally based on fairy tales, so we have trolls, wicked witches, fairies, imps, and many more magical creatures. Grimm's agency is situated in the human realm, but just adjacent to the humans' Earthbound city is Kingdom, a realm in which people with magical talents make their homes. Kingdom has three levels: Upper Kingdom, for humans who are members of royalty and the nobility; Middle Kingdom, for elves, dwarfs, and other less humanoid creatures; and Lower Kingdom, for the more monstrous and evil creatures. Only people with magic can enter Kingdom. Since Marissa has no magic, she can enter Kingdom only because she wears one of Grimm's magical bracelets and carries a vial of Glitter on a chain around her neck. A few fairy-tale creatures live in the mortal realm, like the werewolves, who live in New Jersey. 

     If you have ever read any fairy tales, you won't have any trouble understanding this world. The author's take on princes and princesses is hilarious and not in a very complimentary way. All of the members of royalty are pompous, over-bearing twits who are accustomed to getting their own way, and they don't react well when their wishes are foiled by Grimm and his agents. If you are familiar with the original Grimm's Fairy Tales, you know that they are not at all like the Disney movies—in fact, some of them are kind of scary. Those original fairy tales were meant to teach life lessons—to scare children into being good—so Nelson includes some loathsome villains for the heroine to defeat. 

     Nelson has a quirky sense of humor, and the book is full of one-liners and snide asides that kept me constantly chuckling. The heroine is a feisty, smart, take-no-prisoners kind of girl whose snarky perspective is a major asset to the story. Nelson handles Marissa's tricky first-person voice perfectly, with absolutely no awkwardness whatsoever. This is not broad, slapstick humor; rather, it is wry, dry, witty drollery that turns up even in some of the more dangerous scenes. 

     Here's an interchange between Marissa and Grimm: 

      "I can read lips in sixteen languages, you know," said Grimm.

       I looked through the window. "Fifteen. Pig Latin is not a language."

      "Tell that to the Three Little Pigs." (p. 97)

     Click HERE to go to the Grimm Agency's web page where you can learn all about how to purchase a wish and complete an aptitude test to see if you qualify to be a member of Grimm's team.

                     NOVEL 1:  Free Agent                     

     In an on-line interview, Nelson provides a Twitter-esque summary of the plot: "In modern day New York, where wishes are bought and sold, a young woman enslaved to the Fairy Godfather fights for her happily ever after." The center of the plot of this opening novel is Marissa's assignment to help Grimm bring together a prince and a princess for their HEA. Arianna (Ari), the princess, is a plump young woman with no fashion sense who has paid plenty of Glitter (magical currency) to Grimm to find her a prince so that she can escape from her evil step-mother. Marissa's job is to meet the prince, have two dates with him during which she gets him to fall for her, and then have a third and final date during which she heartlessly dumps him. At the moment of the dumping, Ari will just happen to be walking by—happy to lend a royal shoulder to cry on. At least that's how the process has worked many times before. This time, however, everything goes wrong. First, Marissa picks up Liam, who is not a prince at all, but no one realizes the mistake until way too late. By that time, Marissa has allowed herself to fall for Liam and is miserable after she breaks his heart. Then, when Grimm tries to correct matters with the right prince, more bad things happen, most of them involving Marissa.

     Eventually, Marissa and Grimm learn that outside forces are involved in the failure of this assignment, but it takes them most of the book to figure out exactly what's going on. Meanwhile, Marissa has to fulfill other assignments, including one that involves heading to New Jersey to exchange a truckload of pigs for a truckload of human children, only to find a fae child mixed in with the humans. Marissa saves the child's life, and his mother rewards her with a double blessing. Unfortunately a fae blessing can also be a curse, so Marissa's life gets even more complicated. 

     Several running jokes are woven through the story. One involves Marissa's hostile relationship with the gnomes that staff Kingdom's post office. They refuse to deliver any packages to her apartment because she accidentally ran over one of their cousins one dark night while he was curled up in one of NYC's enormous potholes. Another story thread deals with an equally hostile relationship between Marissa and the wolves out in Jersey. She loves to agitate them, so when she is assigned to go out there on a pick-up run, she wears a red, hooded outfit (you know, "Little Red…."), which drives the wolves absolutely nuts.

     Marissa is a marvelous heroine. No matter how bad things get, she never ever gives up, even when she is in way over her head—which she usually is, because she is a non-magical woman living in a fairy-tale world. Each and every day, Marissa copes with whatever comes her way in her own make-it-up-as-you-go-along manner—and believe me, lots of really bad stuff comes her way. (Although they live in entirely different worlds, Marissa reminds me of Angel Crawford in Diana Rowland's WHITE TRASH ZOMBIE series because both characters exhibit the same tough resiliency and prickly facade.) By the end of the book, Marissa has dealt with an evil step-mother, a malevolent Fairy Godmother, a slime-bag Prince, a fire-breathing dragon, untold numbers of ferocious werewolves, and a heavy dose of the truth about her parents' motives for selling her off to Grimm. Marissa and Grimm also have some major upheavals in their relationship. In the end, Marissa learns that she can be deeply hurt by the fulfillment of her deepest desires and that seemingly mundane choices can result in wildly unpredictable consequences. Don't worry, though, this is not by any means a depressing book. Every dark moment is perfectly balanced by a hilariously snarky one.

     This novel is a wonderful foundation for the new series—funny and tragic at the same time. This is Nelson's debut print novel, and he proves himself to be an extremely talented storyteller, seasoning every scene with just enough adventure, drama, suspense, and humor. The modern-day fair-tale mythology is fresh and inventive—a welcome respite from fang-flashing vampires, vicious demons, and heroines in black leather bustiers. Click HERE to read an excerpt from Free Agent.

     Here's the opening sentence for book 2, due in February 2015: "In my defense, I didn't mean to start the Apocalypse." This one is already on my order list!

                     NOVELLA 1.5:  "Soul Ink"                    

PUBLISHER'S BLURB: As the right hand woman at the Fairy Godfather’s Grimm Agency, Marissa Locks has a grip on all things magical. If only she could get control of her own not-so-charmed life. 

     For most people, waking up after a night of partying next to a dragon, sporting a tattoo with a mind of its own, would be a new low. For Marissa, only the tattoo is new—and, unfortunately, it’s not the weirdest part of her day. The Agency has been called in to stop a string of messy murders, a problem that’s turning into a disaster of biblical proportions, and Marissa’s been assigned to the case. 

     One of the archangels from Paradisia is attempting to switch teams, and he’s willing to use as many souls as it takes to pay his way. With Grimm contractually bound to clean up the chaos, Marissa must find a way to keep the former cherub from completing his rampage. But between fighting an angel gone bad and battling the magical compulsions of her new Fae tattoo, Marissa’s definitely facing the worst hangover in history. Click HERE and then click on the cover art to read an excerpt on the "Soul Ink" Amazon.com page. 

                      NOVEL 2:  Armageddon Rules                     
Introduction: Two years have passed since Marissa became Grimm's partner at the Agency and since she and Liam, her dragon-shifting boyfriend, got together. Marissa and Ari are now BFFs, and Ari is taking magic lessons from Grimm in an attempt to control the wild magic that was set loose within her in the opening novel. In the very first sentence, Marissa gives us an "I didn't mean to…" apology for starting the apocalypse, so we know in advance that deep trouble lies ahead. In the early chapters, though, all we get are lots of incidental scenes that play up the eccentricities of Marissa's world—various weird creatures doing various strange things, all of which Marissa and her team must deal with.

Note to the author: In a world based on characters from myths and fairy tales, the reader already expects lots of weirdness, so you don't need to pad the book by inserting lots of unnecessary extra bits that have absolutely no connection with the overall plot. The heavy sprinkling of disjointed, meaningless (and not very funny) scenes describing Marissa's waiting room clients definitely weakens the early chapters. We get it. This is a wild and crazy world, but please try to keep the weirdness closely connected to the plot. 

The Plot: The story draws on events that took place during the first novel, so if you haven't read that book, you might want to do so before reading this one. The primary villain is Queen Mihail, mother of the prince whom Marissa killed two years ago (in book 1). Mihail vowed to get revenge against Marissa and Ari, and in this book she sets in motion a plan that involves attempted assassinations, demon contracts, and an apocalypse like none you ever imagined. As Marissa and Ari fight off various bad guys, they are aided by Mikey, Grimm's werewolf intern, and Beth, a pierced and tattooed piper who specializes in poodles (although her kazoo "music" can also glamour other animals and even humans). Marissa is on her own through much of the story because Grimm disappears without a trace (more about that later in this review). Liam is out of the country on a vampire protection assignment, and Ari goes into one of those infamous princess comas (like Sleeping Beauty and Snow White).

New Characters: the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse; Maloden (a sly demon who traps Marissa into a contract); Wyatt Pendlebrook (Ari's new boyfriend) and his mother (big surprise for Marissa here); Nickolas Scratch (aka the Devil); and Eli (an angel who owns a junkyard because his "job" is to clean up after people).

Important Revelations: Ari and Marissa learn the true identity of Wyatt and his mom. Ari and Marissa discover that Grimm has lied to both of them about important aspects of their lives. More information about the Black Queen's family history is revealed.

Most Interesting Characters: Each of the Four Horsemen (Pestilence, War, Famine, Death) is presented as a fully drawn, easy-going character with a dry sense of humor. Marissa's scenes with them are the most entertaining in the book. In particular, Famine's physical and life-style metamorphosis is unexpected and very funny. Their gifts to Marissa will certainly be integral to future plot lines.

Least Interesting Character: Wyatt—a prim and prissy, germophobic, politically correct mommy's boy. Here's an example of his wussiness: While Marissa and Wyatt are being pursued by a horde of demons, Marissa tries to explain how to shoot a gun. She says, "Pull the trigger. Like Cowboys and Indians." Wyatt responds, "Native American history is not a game." Wyatt carries a backpack full of anti-bacterial wipes and brand-new toothbrushes so that he can wipe/scrub down every time he touches another person (including his girlfriend). This gets old very quickly. Every time he shows up in a scene, it takes a downward slide.

Funniest Bits: Grimm debunks vampire myths. For example, a stake through the heart won't kill a vampire, but a steak in the mouth will turn him to ash. "Today's vampires are more enlightened. More evolved They are vegans. If they consume meat products, the fire of their own hypocrisy burns them to a crisp." Also, the first two plagues that Marissa sets on the world are completely unpredictable and quite funny, especially the first one. And one more amusing bit: Marissa's choice of "mounts" for the horsemen. 

How to Play a Kazoo

Least Funny Bit: Beth, her kazoo, and the monstrous poodles. 

Most Blatant Continuity Error: On page 88, Marissa can't call for help because her cell phone was stolen, but on page 89 (in the very same scene), she uses her cell phone to call Grimm. 

Most Bogus Element: Grimm's "Echo" self, who is supposed to be a "recording of the Fairy Godfather's thoughts during the recording process [two years ago]…a complete record of [his] thoughts" at the moment of the recording. So that would mean that Echo should work kind of like a sentient database, pulling together facts and details to provide Marissa with information that is limited to that which was recorded in a single transference two years ago. In point of fact, Echo is a deus ex machina who behaves and spouts information exactly like Grimm. Although the author makes a big point of getting rid of Grimm, he actually gives us two identical Grimms. So, don't be fooled into thinking that Marissa doesn't have Grimm's support. 

Conclusions: All in all, this book isn't nearly as entertaining as the first one—often the case in new series. I think that's because the author puts much more time and effort into the first book, and then is forced into a tight time line for writing the succeeding books. There are a few funny scenes and dramatic moments, but there are also a slew of failed attempts at humor and drama that do nothing but annoy the reader and slow down the action. Click HERE to read an excerpt from Armageddon Rules.

UPDATE! Jennifer Estep's ELEMENTAL ASSASSIN SERIES

UPDATE!

I have just updated a previous post for Jennifer Estep with a review of Poison Promise, the eleventh novel in her ELEMENTAL ASSASSIN SERIES. 

Click on the pink-link series title above to go directly to the updated review. 

UPDATE! Rochelle Staab: MIND FOR MURDER MYSTERIES

UPDATE!

I have just updated a previous post for Rochelle Staab with a review of Hex on the Ex, the third book in her MIND FOR MURDER MYSTERIES.

Click on the pink-link series title above to go directly to the updated review.