ARC REVIEW City of Light by Keri Arthur

First in the new series by Keri Arthur, City of Light, it gave me that same feeling I had when I first picked up a Kate Daniels book; the feeling of daaammmnnn this is gonna be good. I am very happy with this book. I am very picky when it comes to first person urban fantasy, especially when the series revolves around one person, after a while the series gets repetitive. So I generally like series that focus on new people every book. There are few I make exception for, this is going to be one of them. Okay now for the reasons I liked this... tortured strong heroine with a hubris of saving children and can talk to ghosts, sexy angry alpha cat shifter who as much as he doesn't want to feels strongly protective toward the heroine, vampires that are more like zombies and wild animals put together, mysterious killer magical entities with an agenda of their own. And not to leave out the awesome writing style of Keri Arthur who ended the book with a conclusion but just enough to have you begging for more.

The story starts a hundred years after the end of the race wars. A war started by the shifters and one that the shifters ended by dropping bombs. The bombs unfortunately were strong enough to rip a holes to another place a magical place where ethereal beings can cross over and kill. This is what stopped the war the shifters and humans finally had to set aside their problems and protect each other from the vampires who come out at night and the wraiths who are the only ones who can cross the rifts and kill whoever they pass, or are they?

Tiger is the only left of her kind, she is a genetically engineered dechet; a humanoid crossed with shifter and vampire DNA created to defeat the shifters. She lives alone in the underground bunker where she lived and where she should have died. Her only companions are her little ones, the ghosts of the children who did die the day the shifters gassed the bunker. Tig's life is about to be turned upside down. Finding a child and a half dead shifter in the outskirts of town at dusk wasn't her idea of fun, she would have left the shifter if it had not been for the little girl's insistence. In doing so she sets off a series of events she can't stop she can only plow forward and hope she survives. The little girl, Penny, is a survivor of a wraith attack, it killed bother her parents leaving only her and her Uncle Jonas. Penny however was taken by the wraiths and changes somehow when Jonas finally found and saved her. Penny isn't the first she is only one of twelve children taken by the wraiths. An earth witch, Nuri has told Tig that she is the only one who can save these children. But Tig is a dechet, the most hated species to shifters and Tig has a hard time trusting this band of mercenary shifters. But agreeing to help because it's children, and she vowed never to let any more children die if she can help it. The only shifter half willing to help her is Jonas, but his hatred of her kind keeps her quiet about who and what she really is. Which only confuses her more because in all her years she has never felt this way about a shifter before. But things only get worse when she discovers she is not the only dechet still alive and that her old friend and lover may have a hand in the disappearance of the children.

Overall, I loved this book, action packed, emotional turmoil, sex. I can't wait for more.          

REVIEW Penumbra by Keri Arthur

Penumbra: Book Three in the Spook Squad. I would be so happy if their was more of these in the future. As always it is action packed with plenty of stuff going on. The ending was satisfying but leaves you wanting more.  Sam Ryan and Gabriel Stern are back and this time no longer partners. Sam reassigned to guard the clone government minister Dan Wetherton. Gabriel happy about having Sam reassigned but pissed that she was put on protection duty of a man who will put her in direct line of the people who want her. Sam has been having dreams filling in the blanks on her past and the man who is the missing link between her future potential and her past. Gabe is working trying to find out  who has been killing more people and protecting Sam at the same time. Sam has had enough with hiding and is putting herself in plain site daring the scientist to come and get her. Sam still thinking Gabe wants nothing to do with her is trying to move past her feelings but things keep happening showing her just what Gabe wants. The ominous Joe Black keeps inserting himself in Sam's life and more Sam learns about her past the more questions it raises. Just who is Dan Wetherton? Who is Joe Black? Who keeps killing people associated with the failed and closed down experiment called Penumbra?

Gabe and Sam finally work together to make sure that Penumbra stays closed and with Sam's past fully recovered and her powers fully back as well can mean so much more than anyone ever thought.


  

Review Reprise:  the first two Books in the Spook Squad series previously posted on my old blog.

Memory Zero: by Keri Arthur book one in the Spook Squad series originally published ten years ago. A futuristic, scif-fi, paranormal, mystery, urban fantasy really everything I love in one book. A well written story by Keri Arthur, I have seen her books around but never had the opportunity to read on until now and I'm glad I read this one. Sam is my favorite kind of character she is strong, snarky, doesn't know her own beauty and when the shit hits the fan she does what she does best and improvises. The story is an enigma wrapped in a mystery when one thing leads you down one path you end up somewhere completely different. Sam loves her job but when her partner goes missing her life turns upside down. Two week after his disappearance he calls her up to meet but what she finds is a man who says he is but isn't her partner and a strange monster that's starts to hunt her and a strange, large, handsome man who saves her. To make matters worse the not partner is a vampire bend on turning her she has no choice but to kill him before he kills her. Now because nobody believes that he was a vampire and his wife spilling lies about them having an affair she is suspended from duty. The spook squad has had their eye on her for some time so they bring her in for an "evaluation" but really they are testing her abilities and how it is she can do that groovy thing she does so well. Sam's life began at age fourteen nothing before then existed not even her memory. Gabriel Stern, the mysterious handsome large man who saved her from the flying monster is the one of the top men of the Special Investigations Unit, the "Spook Squad" , and he is determined to find out why Sam is different why she can tell the difference between the paranormal species and why the criminal mastermind is out for her. Gabriel is trying to protect Sam from those who want her but she just keeps going off on her own trying to solve what happened to her partner and her past slowly starts to reveal itself. It is revealed about just what Sam is but her past is still a mystery. Even after they thwarted the criminal mastermind and Sam's evil ex-partner Sam's still suspended and transferred permanently transferred to the spook squad and partnered with Gabriel. To be Continued in Generation 18.


Generation 18: by Keri Arthur A beautiful new cover for the re-release of Generation 18, book two of Keri Arthur's Spook Squad series. It picks up a little bit after the conclusion of Memory Zero where Gabriel and Sam have been partners for enough time to drive each other crazy. Gabriel pushing Sam away and keeping her at the office doing paper work and research trying to get her mad enough to ask for a transfer. The start up of a serial killer and kite monster attacks draws Sam out of the office and in to the playing field and into the line of fire. Gabriel is pushing her away because he has lost two partners in the past and he likes Sam way to much to risk losing her, but he has played the bastard to many times and risks losing her as more than just a partner. The evidence leads Sam and Gabriel to the Medical Military base knows as Hopewell. Hopewell has continually had medical experiments in the past and there are ties that might lead Sam to finding out her past. She has been having dreams about a boy named Joshua and is able to talk to the mysterious "Joe Black", the hobo looking hairy guy who helped her in the past, in dreams and he points her in the right direction for her own past and the rejects from Hopewell. The growing connection between Gabe and Sam is growing stronger, Gabe knows this and uses it to his advantage but only when Gabe is in trouble does Sam face that fact and use it to help find Gabe when he is kidnapped by the rejects. Sam whose body has been stunted at the age of sixteen has just started changing and has had her first period she is also experiencing newer and stronger powers. I really have been torturing myself with this series I have had all three books and I have been waiting until closer to review to read each one, at least it is only a months wait between each books. I am really enjoying this series with the yo-yoing between Sam and Gabe relationship and Sam always getting beat down and getting right back up to help and save the day. These are really enjoyable reads I can't wait to dig my claws in to Penumbra, which comes out next month.