Bewitching Bedlam (Bewitching Bedlam #1) by Yasmine Galenorn

Maddy is busy preparing for her grand opening of her bed and breakfast. She has a lot to do - and she does not need the spiteful machinations of Ralph Greyhoof - a local satyr and fellow hotelier - who is looking to sabotage the competition.

But no-one expected the rivalry to turn to actual murder - when a witch body turns up in Maddy’s back garden. Maddy doesn’t buy it, there is far more going on  here than a business rivalry - and hotel guests are not worth killing over

This book is a lot of fun - the characters are fun, the world is fun, the story is fun. But it’s not just fun, it has a lot of decent depth to it, especially in the characterisation and it all has a lot of substance to it which makes it fun, but definitely not fluff

Most of the other characters are excellent - Maddy’s history, her past relationships, her moments of running wild, her charging around as a vampire hunter - all of that is very present with Maddy and with Sandy who both shared this history. Franny, the frustrated ghost who cannot interact with the world but oh so badly wants to. Having someone who genuinely dislikes Maddy and is definitely a rival but having the characters recognise that  just being an enemy doesn’t make them completely evil. I like the levels there, the fact we don’t have enemy=completely irredeemably evil or that anyone who opposes the protagonist must be completely without any positive qualities. I like that

This applies to a fair amount of the plot - I like the whole complexity around the vampires, I like that the most obvious target gets questioned repeatedly. I like that we also have Linda, the head of their coven and mayor of the town who has also a lot of levels in her involvement of the plot which is hard to simply say good or bad. It’s not that everything is complex or elaborate - it isn’t convoluted at all. It’s not hard to follow, or difficult or following unnecessary twists for the sake of it. But more the characters simply are not simplistic, even enemies are multi-dimensional and as such so is the plot line, discerning actual motives and the investigation around that.

Panther Prowling (Otherworld #17) by Yasmine Galenorn

Delilah is ready to party – it’s her sister’s Camille’s birthday and Menolly has just managed to re-open her bar; in the lull in the war in the Otherworld they can have a break; a night off

Until their human cousin, Daniel, runs into their bar chased by an angry Viking ghost.

Unfortunately their professional thief relative has acquired a cursed and haunted sword – which comes with a family curse and a whole lot of dangerous haunting and consequences which only his magical cousins are equipped to deal with.

This series is huge. It has run for a huge number of books. It has an absolutely enormous cast of character. It has a huge world setting – several huge world settings. We have several metaplots all running alongside each other, all intertwining and related and touching on each other. And we have three protagonists all with their own lives and conflicts and relationships. We have a household that not only has the three D’Artigo sisters but has Camille’s three husbands, has Menolly’s wife, has Delilah’s husband. We have Hannah and Vanzir and Rozuriel and Iris and her husband and her twins and Chase and his daughter and then the gargoyle Maggie. And all of them have things going on. And this is without looking at Roman, Rozuriel’s ex-wife, Smoky and Shade’s extended families, the fae queens, Morgaine and the whole Arthurian legend group, the various powers of the Otherword and then loads of friends and neighbours dotted around the city…

We have a lot. We have so much. This world is huge and rich and full of lots of important characters each with their own stories and enough details to give each of them a realness and a presence that gives the whole story and world depth

But my gods there’s a lot. And when we were introduced to the sisters’ human family a couple of books ago part of me cringed because there was no need for this to add to this already very full world and these sisters’ already very full lives with very full missions. Especially when it turns out that dear brother Daniel is a master thief ex-special forces magical specialist – which means that’s a whole lot more complexity and storylines and distractions added to what I already a very full series.

Which is the feeling I had through this book – we had Daniel and the sword and Viking ghosts to try and deal with but it felt very peripheral to the sisters’ lives. And we had moderately high stakes to make sure they pay attention to it –but it felt like a distraction because there’s a lot of other things going on. In fact, the attack on their house almost felt like a way to drag them into the story again and make it all feel more relevant to them since we haven’t really built that much relationship with Daniel yet. With Camille’s new role with the Earthside Fae courts and Delilah’s issues with the Autumn Lord which also includes some expanding powers and possible consequences and we have love triangle issues with Hannah and Rozuriel with more looking at what it means to be an incubus since we’ve been mentioning it for a while but never really seen it developed. And there’s some sorcerer following Camille around which is important or worrisome but it’s mentioned at the beginning and we don’t really return to it. We add in a dose of

Souljacker (Lily Bound #1) by Yasmine Galenorn

Lily is a succubus, after centuries of dangerous wandering she has finally managed to settle down and set up business in her salon

But when a client is killed by a vampire in her place of business, the life she’s sought to preserve start falling apart. The vengeance driven widow determined to drive her out of business would be bad enough- but the murdering vampire wasn’t just a random act.

The vampire is a serial killer – and he’s targeting customers from his mortal life. Including Lily and her frinds.

And everyone knows the police don’t investigate vampire kills

We have a common Urban Fantasy everything-there world here which Yasmine Galenorn does so long. Honestly these are always my favourite kinds of worlds so long as the author has sufficient restraint not to throw all of it at us all the time, swamping us

I think this book treads a narrow line. Lily is a succubus, we have the fae courts which she’s also related to. We have a magic cat, a witch best friend, a human friend, a chaos demon, several wereanimals and some vampires. It’s a lot

But it works because they’re all tied into the plot in a relevant fashion. We have elements of world building like the politics, opinions and culture of the wereanimals, the vampires and their ongoing plot to gain more power and how different they are from the people they were before. The world building is huge but the focus manages not to get too distracted.

The plot itself has a lot of action, tension and many many dramatic scenes pulling in many characters as the seral killer is made very very personal. A lot of the time it’s very hard to justify why none police characters are actually going to chase a serial killer around – but here the combination of politics tying their hands and the personal nature of the attacks really bring the story home to the characters rather than having random amateur hour.

Lily is a succubus and, I admit, when I first read this I kind of cringed. There are some excellent succubus protagonists out there. And also a substantial amount of books where I have to skim past endless pages of humping to get near the actual plot. Thankfully, this book fell in the former category – Lily being a succubus – and a sex worker is not used as a gratuitous way to have lots of sex scenes. In fact her hunger is used both to create a burden she has to deal with and work around (especially in a society where wandering around in an evening is difficult and dangerous) as well as a tragic and difficult path. Being a succubus is no just about being super hot – far from it.

Priestess Dreaming (Otherworld #16) by Yasmine Galenorn

Otherworld is shaken by war and devastation. Thousands are dead and thousands more will die before the end.

But the war against the demons and their allies is not the only battle. Something ancient is awakening. Something from the depth of the world’s history – and something driven for revenge

To face such a power of old, only another ancient power will match it. But getting to him will be hard- and if they can awaken him from their long sleep, can they even guarantee he will help them?

I was reading this book, enjoying this book and waiting for the plot to get going. I saw the intro, was reintroduced to the characters again. I was reminded of the many adventures the team has been through, I was reminded of the terrible trials they’ve endured and also reminded of some of the allies they’ve made and powers they’ve gained over this huge series

I also remembered that in the last few books things got a lot more serious with outright devastating war tearing across the Otherworld

All laid out, with sufficient ominous foreshadowing and visions of something big and terrifying beginning to arise – time to enter an epic… what the hell we’re nearly half way through?

No, really, after covering all of that which was really more of a giant recap more than anything else, with a random encounter tucked in there as well, and half the book is gone. A huge chunk of the book has just passed and not a great deal of things has actually happened.

It’s not awful, because the world, these characters, this meta plot is all really fascinating and great fun to explore and roll around in. It’s one thing I’ve always loved about this entire series. I love this world. I love this series. I love this raising, shining metaplot. But half a book on recap and reiteration with a random encounter tucked in is a huge, vast amount of space to give without actually advancing anything.

That random encounter is a winter portal that opens up for random reasons, has a random witch involves and then we have yetis and pixies and… whyyyyy whyyy is this here? It’s not even a particularly epic fight. They shoo off some pixies… whyyyy? Why have this in here when we’ve already got so much padding going on?

When we finally get to the plot it’s more interesting – it greatly expands the story of three of the more intriguing characters: the Arthurian legend part of the storyline. They’ve always interested me, I’ve always wanted to see how much of the Arthurian legend actually affects these characters and how that fits the overall meta. I also really like the idea of old powers rising. I think there’s a risk of distracting from the main conflict, but I think it gives us an excellent opportunity to examine these ancient beings, the history of this amazing world and expanded outwards into the hard choices that those ancients made and how things were far less simple than the sisters originally thought. This meta is definitely meta I want to grow – bring it on

Blood Music (Bewitching Bedlam #0.5) by Yasmine Galenorn

  

This book is an introduction to an entirely new world by Yasmine Galenorn which makes me very very eager

I’ve followed Yasmine Galenorn’s Sister of the Moon/Otherworld series (the name seems to change depending on who you ask) for a long time and I’ve always enjoyed her world setting, her characters and her stories. I haven’t enjoyed the massive massive bloat that besieges the series because there are so many ideas that it’s heard to fit them all in

So a new series entirely? That is promising.

And it is – promising pretty much sums up this book because it is an excellent introduction book. There isn’t so much a plot to this book as there is a general laying out the land. We meet Maudlin (Maddy) and learn a bit about who she is, what she does,

One thing I really like from the offset here I that we’re introduced to Maddy, he recent past and experiences, the fact she’s a witch, her friends and some nice world building around her but there’s no sense of specialness. That doesn’t mean she’s not an interesting character – far from it – she’s intriguing and strong and determined and has a really good relationship with her friends. And she can definitely become special and awesome – but because of what she does in the books, not because she’s come in to this book with the special heritage/magic/woo-woo of specialness. Neither tragic nor ordained for greatness.

She does have a past- but it’s a very mundane bad past. The simple but powerful story of a woman leaving an abusive and soul destroying relationship and beginning to find herself again. And that’s an excellent story – because having someone with a compelling history that doesn’t have to be epic, soul-shattering or so extreme is a wonderful thing to see. I want to see Maddy leave her ex in her dust and build herself an awesome future

Crimson Veil (Otherworld #15) by Yasmine Galenorn

The war continues to rage in Otherworld with the D’Artigo sisters hearing more and more stressful news as the world hangs in the balance

But the D’Artigo sisters cannot focus on the tragedy and devastation in Otherworld. A Daemon cult is trafficking slaves and attempting to invoke a demigod of vice and corruption capable of unleashing utter devastation across the city. With vampire businesses targeted as well, the D’Artigo sisters have to act – they have no time to mourn; not for their father, not for the dead of Elqaneve and not for those who died in Menolly’s bar.

This book is pretty much a continuation of Autumn Whispers, the last book. So much so that they almost feel like one book especially since Autumn Whispers ended without any real ending

A lot of what I said in the last book pretty much applies to this as well – it feels like a distraction and a frustrating one at that. We have Shadowwing and his demon army trying to invade Earth. His allies are launching a huge invasion cross Otherworld. An alliance is forming to try and push them back and one of the major nations of the Otherworld has fallen. Many of the spirit seals have been lost and now need to be quickly reclaimed for fear of Shadowwing getting his hands on them, ripping over the portals and invading Earth.

And the sisters are focused on… something else entirely. There’s a possible daemon plot (daemons are different from demons), the raising of a demi-god and a kidnapping/trafficking/slavery ring as well as threats against vampire businesses and… this is all unrelated to Shadowwing and I have to ask why it is here and why are the sisters involved?

I’m not saying these events are important but they’re literally in the middle of world destroying invasion against both the Otherworld and Earth. So why is this on the sister’s to handle who already have way too much on their plate? We have Carter, the half-demon, half-titan why doesn’t he step up? Vampire businesses are being targeted, why can’t Roman take this over, since he’s the major vampire authority? Fae and other supernaturals are being kidnapped so can’t the Earthside far queens step forwards? The shapehifters?

Why aren’t the sisters trying to form their alliances against the invasion – or hunting down the spirit seals or calling on the dragonflights to honour their commitment and fly to battle. The sisters have enough on their plate without being the first responders to every single issue everywhere

Autumn Whispers (Otherworld #14) by Yasmine Galenorn

Things are never quiet for the D’Artigo sisters. They’ve been called on to find a missing fae. Grandmother Coyote has some ominous warnings for them concerning a Daemonically charged building (and when one of the Hags of Fate warns you about something you need to pay attention) and the sisters even learn more about their family history – and unknown members of the human side.

But all of that is eclipsed as the war in the Otherworld reaches new and terrible heights.

There’s so much I love about this series. I love the rich world setting. I love the many different groups on Earth and in Otherworld. I love that they all have their own histories and politics and agendas and magic and presence. I love that there’s such a huge richness to everything

I love that there’s so much effort to make even relatively minor side characters into fully flesh out beings with their own stories, their own wants and needs and agendas and personlaities

I really love the connection between these characters – all of them. There’s a real sense of family and community – both chosen family and blood kin, lovers and friends. The connections are excellent. There’s also a lot of close and meaningful female friendships – not just with the sisters, but with Iris and Sharah, with numerous women in their lives. There’s a wonderful lack of bitterness or snarling between them I really appreciate

There’s some good LGBTQ diversity. The gay male couple are vanishingly minor and only appear when the sisters want something. But Menolly is bisexual and married to another woman who she values deeply and their relationship is held up as being every bit as meaningful as those of the other sisters. Their long lost human cousins also include a lesbian couple which, while minor in this book, is likely to be more involved in the next

We still don’t have many POC considering the vastness of the cast, really the only memorable, notable POC I can think of is Morio, who is Japanese, and even he wasn’t exactly a meaningful part of this book. Yes, Trillion is dark skinned, but as I’ve said before I’m not sure if this fits comfortably as racial inclusion as he’s not really any human race- but a dark skinned species of elf; even if it is good to see supernatural creatures not all be white by default

I really don’t love Shade and Delilah. While I have said that even minor characters are well developed and have histories and agendas and a presence – the exception is Shade. Which is a problem since he’s Delilah’s love interest and a major character – but he’s hollow. I don’t even know what his shadowy-ness even means. He just is.

Haunted Moon (Otherworld Series #13) by Yasmine Galenorn

There’s a new front opening in the war against Shadow Wing – cemetaries are being ransacked of ghostly residents, zombies being raised and a new, sinister psychic network has started in the city

Their all too brief holiday is over, it’s time for Camille and sisters to get back into the action

This world continues to be huge beyond all measure – we have the massive range of different beings, the fae, the elves, dragons, demons, the wereanimals and vampires and witches and magic users of various stripes. We have the different realms, the threat that the demons represent, the battle on so many levels across so many plains. It’s huge, it’s vast and every single part of it is used and involved excellently

While, as I’ve mentioned below, this can lead to some distraction, it also creates a book where everyone lives. Camille and her relationships are really passionate and powerful. They’ve really done a good job of building a home life in the story along side the massive battles against everything this huge world can throw at them. The characters have also grown a lot since the first book. Ok, a lot of that is in the many new shiny powers they have managed to hoard, but there’s also how they grew as people, how they’ve found their level with their various other characters (though I still hate Camille’s relationship with Smoky).

There’s also a real sense that they have built something. For a while I thought we were just going to have random monsters every single book without any real sense if progress. But it has become clear that the war isn’t just about the spirit seals, but also about the networks and allies that Camille and her sisters are building. The war will come, and it won’t simply be a case of who owns the most spirit seals wins. I really wish they’d focus on this far more – the preparation, what the susters have achieved.

Flight from Hell (Otherworld #15.5) by Yasmine Galenorn

Shimmer is a blue dragon, exiled from the Dragon Reaches after a very ill-advised theft, she now has to live Earthside with most of her powers stripped from her.

She only been on Earth for a short time - but when she starts acting very out of character, Carter, her lover calls on the D’Artigo sisters to try and find some answers and try and find Shimmer herself, who has vanished

Menolly quickly uncovers a connection between Shimmer’s odd behaviour and a new threat in town – a vampire sorcerer looking for revenge.

I have issues with this novella. Mainly the same issues I have with the Otherworld Series in general, but exacerbated by this being a shorter story. There is just such a lot of recap and reminder of previous stories, so much hammering home who everyone is, what everyone has done, what has happened before and why and how that wasn’t really needed here which would clutter up even a full length novel, let alone a novella

This novella has been bogged down with all the litter of the last story. Menolly being Roman’s consort, Smoky and Shadow’s existence, Camille’s relationship, Delila’s dead twin, Menolly’s past and scars, the previous vampire serial killer, what Iris is currently up to, chase and his elven heritage, the magical storm in Otherworld – all of this is completely unnecessary to the plot and has been added in almost as padding

This adds to some other elements of over-descriptiveness – like a lecture on the merits of locking your car from Menolly. Or detailed descriptions of Carter’s cats. We really don’t need this – we don’t need this in a full length book, in a novella this is overwhelming the short plot line we have. It also makes elements that would have worked – like following up a dead end in the investigation with Wilbur – not work because it felt like more padding. When you have so many excess story elements, every new dead end or red herring, even for plot purposes, just adds to this padding

This excess padding contributes to another major problem – this isn’t a book in the Otherworld Series. It’s set in the same world, but it’s supposed to be the first book in the Fly By Night Series following Shimmer, Ralph and Alex. And in that it failed epicly.

Every part of this story was told almost entirely from Menolly’s point of view – one of the main characters from the Otherworld Series. All the relevant action was performed by the three D’Artigo sisters who are the protagonists in the Otherworld Series. Alex just follows the sisters around really adding a great deal or doing an awful lot to establish his character. We have some, but he’s so overwhelmed by the sisters. Ralph is barely even there, I completely forgot about him repeatedly and thought he was an excess character. And Shimmer? We get a little from her at the beginning of the book and enough of her back story and culture to make her interesting enough as an outcast from her society with strong class parallels. I think her story could be interesting. But this isn’t her story. This is the story where she is the object – she exists in this story to be rescued and that’s about it. The background we’re given could easily have been the background for someone the sisters are investigating – she’s nearly completely absent as a character in this book.

Shadow Rising (Otherworld Series #12) by Yasmine Galenorn

Menolly and her sisters continue their epic battle against Shadow Wing and his quest to bring the demons to Earth and the Otherworld. A new front has opened up in Otherworld, the sorcerers rising up from the Southern Wastes to bring the world to war again.

While on Earth, the Lord of Ghosts has unleashed a torrent of spectral monsters preying on any with sufficient magic to be tasty – but their goal may be far more insidious than that.

And through all this, Menolly has a wedding to plan – and to find out exactly where she stands with Roman, and, through him, where she stands with the vampires as a whole.

Reviewing this series is becoming increasingly more difficult – because I often find myself without anything original to say that I haven’t said about the previous 11 books; they’re all strong in the same way, they’re all weak in the same way, all that changes is the details of how those strengths and weaknesses are expressed

On the plus side we have an incredible rich, broad world. I honestly don’t think I’ve read an Urban Fantasy series that has even close to the varied world that this has. And it’s more than just the standard grabbing an encyclopaedia of world myths and legends and just copying down every name. Every group, every faction has its own history and politics and goals and depths – they’re more than just a word or a brief thumbnail: they’re cultures and peoples and realised characters

The same applies to side characters, very few of the named characters in this book are just names. They have histories and lives and goals and personalities – there’s a lot of fully fleshed out people in this series – not just names and place holders

Together this increases the epicness of this book: there is a real cost to battles lost because people will be lost, people who have been established as having meaning and a presence. There’s also a great sense of the epic brewing because of all of these cultures and forces coming together – either as allies or enemies – each of them throwing their force to the war – but also their history and culture to the battle.

The downside to all this is the books are really stuffed, there’s a lot of exposition, a lot of distraction and this can leave the whole series feeling unbearably overloaded and awfully slow because there’s so much to dredge through before we can even come close to reaching the meta. Especially since so much of the books are unnecessary side plots, recaps or exposition.

Take this book – we had some excellent development of the world building of the vampires, what it means to be a vampire, their origins and their culture. We had some good look into Otherworld History with the southern wars against the Sorcerers and how that relates to them being a current threat and some world building on the nature of magic. This lead to some foreshadowing for the future as well as another front in the battle. The main plot was against battling against Shadow Wing’s chief evil lieutenant in the world and it actually took up a fair amount of the book making it at least a somewhat dominant focus of the characters that is better than in previous books where it felt like an afterthought

Shaded Vision (Otherworld #11) by Yasmine Galenorn

A bombing rocks the supernatural community, stunning them with fresh grief, anger and worry – who is behind it? Fingers instantly point to the human anti-supernatural hate groups who are growing louder and more vicious with each passing day. The newspapers engage in the worst kind of “journalism” and there have even been a string of rapes attached to anti-fae hatred.

But how much is it the human haters, and how much is it a new scheme by the demons, newly reinforced with forces of nightmare from both the demon world and one of the worst Sorcerers in Otherworld’s history coming to Earth to further their quest for the spirit seals.

In many ways, this book brought the series back on track to a degree. After a few books of endless distraction, personal drama and side-plots we returned partially to the main plot and partially to a dominant side plot. And, frankly, it was about damn time because the series was rapidly losing itself.

But now we have dramatic bombings and tackling of two major issues. Firstly - the human prejudice against the fae and the supernatural in general, how difficult that is making things and finally rallying to strike back against that and do something concrete to shift the tide of public opinion. I like that it was addressed and they finally did something rather than spend several more books wasting chapters on lamenting on it but not actually doing anything. I think it was generally well done with some very good ideas but also that it was rather simplistically fought and defeated. The big bad was too careless and too easily brought low, the general community was too eager and too easily rallied against hate (which, if history tells us anything, is rather dubious since the non-affected community is usually far more apathetic than that). It was good, it was nicely addressed – but it was a little simple.

The second storyline was the big one – Shadowwing! The big bad is actually on everyone’s radar again. We have bombings, investigation, killing off bad guys, alliances with the demonic underground and generally being back on track. As a bonus, I think we’ve also seen the last of at least 2 pernicious elements that were clinging to this series way past there should-have-been-dead-and-buried dates.

Of course, this wouldn’t be an Otherworld book without endless distractions: Chase’s heritage, Zachary’s new life, Shamas’s secret, Delilah’s completely failure to live like an adult and keep clean and Iris’s wedding. Some of them were good – like the wedding, but a lot of them were also really really pointless. There’s also a real problem with character and storyline bloat that necessitates a lot of recap. My bright spot is that I think a lot of these storylines are being closed.

Courting Darkness (Otherworld #10) by Yasmine Galenorn

Hyto, Smoky’s ancient and lethal draconic father, has finished threatening from afar and is finally making good on his threat to make Camille suffer – blaming her for how much face he lost in the Draconic world.

Having a powerful White Dragon hunting you is a terrifying situation – but with friends falling into portals and the Elder Fae lurking around and running amok, Camille can hardly hide.

But nor can she escape the grasp – and tortures – of her ancient, sadistic father-in-law.

Oops, I spoke too soon.

Ok, a little unfair, but I can’t help but be a little disappointed in this book – primarily because the series were getting better. Better written, more focused world building and characterisation, more pointful storylines and at least some of the bloat corralled – or if there was going to be bloat at least it would be USEFUL bloat. So did Blood Wyne advance the main story? No. But it expanded relevant world building – the vampires – and developed Menolly’s character and relationships (and introduced new plot lines that weren’t all that essential but the Otherworld series loves its side tracks). So bloat – but bloat with a purpose.

But this?

The main storyline centres around Camille and Smoky’s evil father. Already that’s going to be shaky because Smoky’s evil father has been a pointless background looming adding nothing to the whole series for a very long time – it was the very definition of a storyline that could have been cut. It has added nothing in 9 books except angst and it adds nothing now. It wasn’t even used as an avenue to develop Smoky’s character to explore the dragons’ world building. It did nothing to advance the world building or the meta plot

Nor did it develop Camille’s character – unless we consider additional trauma to be a necessary expansion of her character (I don’t). We don’t see her develop any real connection to Aeval yet, despite joining the Unseelie court in a week (the whole book covers about that long). There’s nothing really from her relationship with the Moon Mother, her magic – or, well, anything.

About the only change to anything when this book finishes is Camille has some more scars and trauma and they pick up a grateful refugee to act as a maid.

The main plot line is pointless.

Blood Wyne (Otherworld #9) by Yasmine Galenorn

Menolly and Nerissa confirm their relationship in this book, growing closer than ever before despite the changes stalking Nerissa’s live – and despite the pressures pushing in on Menolly, including her vampire “daughter” requiring more of her attention.

There’s a vampire serial killer stalking women which in turn flares up human hatred against vampires. There’s also a vampire election coming up and the eldest child of the Blood Wyne, the oldest vampire, the vampire queen, is in the city and is determined to set what the results of that election will be.

He also has designs on Menolly herself.

I am torn a little here on the story. On the one hand I have the same problem I’ve had with these books since the very first – there’s a huge world here, a huge number of characters and all of them seem to have their own storylines that WILL get space in the main book (rather than spin off series of their own). Similarly, the main characters aren’t just focused on the main storyline – other things happen to divide their attention, like Delilah and the Autumn Lord and Chase or Camille and her father and the Moon Mother.

This book focuses on a main character, Menolly, but the story is a departure from the focus on Shadow Wing and the impending invasion. Instead we focus on vampire politics, a serial killer and developing the world building of the vampires with a side order of relationship issues and the Wayfarer bar. Morio, Camille, Vanzir, Smoky, Chase and the Demon underground all have their own storylines developed as well. And pretty much none of it relates to Shadow Wing or the war.

And this is where the being torn comes in. Part of me wants to complain about the distraction, and certainly I do question whether it’s necessary for us to have Chase and his new abilities taking up space or Smoky having his issue with his father. I’m not sure they add anything to the story except be more clutter underfoot.

But part of me also acknowledges that the reason why all the characters of this series are as strong, as fully fleshed and as identifiable as they are is the effort the author puts in to making sure that every character has a life of their own – which, by necessity, means they have stories of their own (but do we have to see them all?) And part of the reason why the world is so rich and compelling and complete is because it has all of these elements that do intrude into their lives rather than there just being one thing happening. It does make the world real – after all, how often can we focus on one issue in our lives and the rest of the world go away? Why should Menolly, a vampire, be able to focus on the war with Shadow-wing and completely ignore the vampire world? Why should Smoky be able to act without dragon politics ever imposing on his life? This really lets the world building tell itself – we could have Menolly drily tell us the risks vampires face of losing themselves – or we can see the a vampire face that very same, tragic fate. There’s  a lot of excellent world building about politics, about vampires and about basic characterisation that is expanded through experience rather than info-dump

Harvest Hunting (Otherworld #8) by Yasmine Galenorn

We follow Delilah this book – and how her life has changed. Following a skunk-inspired make-over and realising that her relationship with the now nigh-immortal Chase is coming to a close, she enters a new chapter of her life with the Autumn Lord – and his sexy representative.

Along the way, they have a kidnapped werewolf to rescue, a spirit seal to find and some dangerous werecoyotes to thwart. And, of course, there’s still the Bonecrusher to defeat – and she’s bringing the fight to the sisters’ home.

This series is HUUUUUUUUUUUGE!

And I don’t just mean number of books. I can tackle several books. But it’s HUUUUUGE within those books. It has a vast cast of characters and the author has really gone out of her way to ensure every single one of those characters is a character. They’re not just names. They have things happening in their lives. They have lives, they have issues, they have their own stories and battles and causes.

Which is certainly good in some ways, don’t get me wrong! But there are a gazillion billion trillion of them all handling their stuff at the same time. Ok, maybe not handling their stuff, but certainly mentioning their stuff at least.

This goes along with a huge amount of recapping. A truly vast amount of recapping – and so much has happened in each sister’s life and the story in general that some of it is helpful – but it adds to the unwieldiness, bogs down the pacing and drags the story down.

There’s also still a problem with the writing. It has IMMENSELY improved since earlier books, don’t get me wrong, especially the fight scenes (though I still think we see far more of what everyone else is doing in combat than is realistic or necessary) but we still have things like the group meetings where everything is reiterated (again, not nearly as bad). The worst habit remaining though are clothes, cares and scenary. They can drive from A to B without me knowing exactly how they’re getting there, I don’t need to know what car they’re driving or who is in what car and I really really really don’t need to know what clothes everyone is wearing all the time. By this stage, we know what clothes everyone habitually wears, take it as a given.

Bone Magic (Otherworld #7) by Yasmine Galenorn

As the war against Shadowwing continues, Camille and her sisters find more and more on their plates. Stacia Bonecrusher, the demon lieutenant is Shadowwing is still at large and plotting to get her hands on the spirit seals. But it’s difficult to focus on her when the undead are running amok, the portals to the Netherworld are open and ghosts and zombies need to be returned to their rest – as if rampaging fae and demons weren’t enough.

But there’s more complexities with Smokey’s family ferociously disapproving of his marriage to Camille – and Camille earning the enmity of Smokey’s father, a dangerous White Dragon. And Trillian returns – which means balancing her 3 lovers.

Then there’s further plotting the spirit seals – it seems Queen Astaria is not content to just hold on to them and there’s growing tension between the Otherworld Fae and the Triple Threat – the three newly re-established queens of the fae. Camille finds her in the middle of demands from both the courts of the fae, and summoned to Otherworld to see the plan hatched with her father despite her misgivings.

Then there’s the Moon Mother, Camille’s goddess, who has her own plans that may force Camille’s path.

In many ways Bone Magic was a much tighter book than previous books in the series, There was much less unnecessary description, the fight scenes were quicker and smoother without the huge pre-amble that used to precede them. We have their daily life, but without it being bloated with unnecessary detail dragging down the whole plot. It was tighter, it moved more smoothly and there were less distractions. It wasn’t perfect – there was still an unnecessary need to describe what everyone was wearing at all time and some really massive geography info-dumps that weren’t needed or that helpful - though I’m impressed at the sheer amount of planning and work that has gone into creating this world. Yasmine Galenorn almost certainly has drawn maps and it wouldn’t surprise me if she had a stack her own height of world building notes.

But we also have recaps. Now, the recaps, as far as recaps go, are pretty good, they’re concise, they carry a whole lot of information in the smallest possible space. But this is book 7 in a series – book 7 in a series that has a lot going on, a lot of side plots and a lot of different factions and powers and a vastly huge world. There is no way a recap can be short and not be an info-dump.

Review: Demon Mistress (Otherworld Series #6) by Yasmine Galenorn

 Menolly steps back up as protagonist in this book as the sisters come across an old potential crime while burrowing through the storerooms of the Wayfarer. Tracking down a missing elf from years ago isn’t easy, but is complicated by a missing vampire, a posse of undead, a friendly neighbourhood necromancer and his wandering ghouls, a demonic frat house who get exactly what they deserve and a whole new force of demons who fight on the astral plane

It’s a lot to juggle and, of course, behind it all is the politics from Otherworld and the eternal threat of Shadow Wing and his demons.

Menolly also has relationships to balance – Nerissa is finding her time taxed with the puma council demanding she assume a political role; while Vanzir and Rozuriel both pursue Menolly, their demonic natures fitting powerfully well with Menolly’s vampirism.

One of the main problems I’ve had with this series in the past is that it brings in a lot of extraneous issues, lots of side plots and lots of distractions that bogs down a very epic story – which is further exacerbated by the over-description, unnecessary recapping and constant talking everything through.

So I was really happy that this book managed to avoid a lot of that. I think part of it is that the world is so huge now there’s a limit to how much recapping and reiteration you can actually do. Similarly most of the storylines and elements were pretty much relevant to the plot without too much in the way of distraction. The writing was more concise, there was no need to reiterate the battle order every time they fought, less random anecdotes from Iris, less putting the end of the world on hold so they could have a meal – it was tighter. There was still some side references that made things longer than they needed to be, but they were relevant side references to things like the fae queens or Iris’s personal life. The story was much more contained and moved at a much brisker pace with a far greater sense of both the urgency and the epic consequences they face.

I wasn’t especially happy with how the story started, however. I can understand going after the astral demons since Delilah was targeted and people were dying. It was a nice reminder that, while Shadow Wing must be the priority, he’s not the only threat out there and they can’t focus on him when there are bodies on the ground. I can also understand Chase asking for information on the missing vampire from Menolly since she’s his vampire contact and it’s only a matter of asking questions. What I don’t understand is, with the ominous threat of Shadow Wing looming over them, they decided that it’d be great to search for an elf who may or may not have gone missing several years ago. Where’s the triage? Where’s the sense of priorities? I’m actually a little put out that it did all end up being related to Shadow Wing. Maybe it’s supposed to be a sense of how wide spread his power and influence is, but I felt it was a little “hey we got another spirit seal!” “How?” “Uh… we kind of stumbled over it, to be honest.”  The story itself was great – fun, well written, well paced – but the beginning and end were shaky.

I also think the friendly neighbourhood necromancer is really unnecessary in a cast that already has a rather large cast of characters. This is a wonderfully huge world with a massive, multi-layers epic storyline with so many factors and sides and forces that it always stands on the edge of becoming bloated.

Of course, it’s that world and epic story that keeps me coming back to this series. The fae, the devas, the different realms of fae, the demons and their factions, humans, shapeshifters, vampires – I don’t think there are many worlds I’ve come across that are as rich as this series. And it’s not just the sheer number of supernaturals that are present, it’s how all these forces are relevant to the plot line. All of them have an influence and all of them have a stake – they’re not just mentioned in passing, they are integral parts of the story

Nighthuntress (Otherworld Series #5) by Yasmine Galenorn

The fate of the world still rests on the sister’s shoulders. The instability of the portals between the worlds means more and more monsters are creeping through to Earth, including creatures from the Netherworld, further stretching their time and attention.

The quest for the spirit seals continues, the battle to find each of the artefacts before Shadowwing which has only become more urgent after their defeat to the Rakshasa in the last book. And the Rakshasa has become ever more ruthless – willing to target their friends and loved ones to force them to capitulate.

And their personal lives don’t get any simpler with Delilah having both demands from the Autumn Lord – and future plans – as well as drama from Chase, her human boyfriend. And Camille learns more of the fate of her lost lover, Trillian.

All to a background of endless political upheaval from fae civil war in Otherworld, to the newly formed Earthside courts creating tension and potential disruption even as they try to build a more united force to face the demons.

My main problem with this book is one of balance which relates to a criticism I’ve had with this series before. These books are growing huge. We have the three sisters. We have Iris, Smokey, Trillian, Morio, Chase, Zachary, Rozurial and Vanzir. We have a huge host of minor characters. We have the major powers – the Queen of the Elves, the civil war in Y’Elestrial, Shadow wing and the demon invasion, the portals breaking down allowing random monsters through, the “Triple threat” of the new three earthside fae courts. We have a host of monsters and creatures of every kind. We have the panther pride and wereorcas and wereseals and a computer database and a vampire organisation – there’s such a lot of powers here. The realms we know the most (earth and otherworld and the demon realm) are backed by the Ionyic Sea and the Netherworld, the Northlands and then there’s different regions within each. There’s the elemental lords and the hags of fate and doubtless many things I have forgotten.

It’s huge. With such a vast world with so many references and so many parallel powers, stories and considerations, this book needs to be tight to avoid meandering all over the place, to keep the story relevant and not get lost in the vastness of this and keep the sense of urgency going.

But this series has never been good at that. I’ve complained before about the mundane elements of the sisters’ lives clogging the story - like eating meals etc. The problem with these is that the insights into their lives are interesting when discussing, say, Maggie growing up. But that doesn’t mean we need to know how many pancakes Iris has prepared for breakfast or Smokey keeps buying pizza take away. This is compounded now by constant references to the world that aren’t necessary – we had references to the past battle with the werespiders, we had Camille telling Delilah about Smokey and Rozurial travelling through the Ionyc sea – many little references like this. When we throw in side quests like hunting down random venidemons and  going plant hunting in Otherworld and the whole story is horrendously cluttered.

It’s not that all of these references and side quests and mundane elements are wrong – far from it. It’s just that there’s so many of them in this incredibly large world that there desperately needs to be some triage.

Which brings me neatly to what I love about this series. The world. The sheer amount that is here may trip up the story – but the richness and fullness of the world is something that leaves me in awe. Despite the many many books we’ve read with all their diverse worlds, I don’t think any fictional world has as much detail and as much breadth and depth as this one.  The different planes of existence, with their own politics and powers, their own effects, their own influences, their own dramas form something that is almost unbelievably huge – which makes it all the more important to be careful not to drown in it.

Review of Hexed. Anthology by Ilona Andrews, Yasmine Galenorn, Allyson James and Jeanne C Stein

As with our previous reviews of anthologies we’re going to take each story separately then look at the book as a whole.

Magic Dreams by Ilona Andrews

I have read Ilona Andrews Kate Daniels series and I loved it. So already a novella set in her excellent world was always going to go down well with me. This book follows Dali, the White Tiger shapeshifter and Jim, werejaguar and alphas of the cat shifters. After an outpost of, shifters is destroyed, Jim goes to investigate and is infected with a curse. Dali, as the pack’s only magical expert, sets out to undo the curse and face down the creature that has claimed him – despite her own doubts and having to enter dangerous places where White Tiger body parts are highly valued.

For someone who has read her books, this story is excellent. It takes 2 of the side characters – Dali and Jim – and expounds upon them. We get a lot more insight into Dali’s character – and she’s always been one of the more intriguing with her calligraphy based magical system, the frustrations of being a white tiger with all this supposed potential and never feeling she meets it – and being a vegetarian, half-blind tiger in the first place. I like Dali, always have – she’s strong, spunky in a “I will prove myself and I won’t be limited” kind of way, brave with doubts but determined to prove them wrong.

For someone who hasn’t read the book, I believe this will be extremely readable. By choosing 2 side characters, there’s no need to be acquainted with the series to get a handle on the back story. The world is complex, intricate and amazing but it is excellently portrayed, doled out in small doses with occasional moments of exposition that neither dragged nor overwhelmed and nothing was told that was unnecessary to this short story. We don’t have 6 books work of world building crammed into a novella.

When it comes to racial inclusion, it was also a great story – Dali is Indonesian and we see a number of different Asian cultures and characters, Jim is Black, in fact, I don’t think there was a White person in the story except as side characters. All in all, an excellent short story and if I weren’t already hooked on the world, I’d dive in.

Ice Shards by Yasmine Galenorn

Like Ilona Andrews, I read Yasmine Galenorn’s Sisters of the Moon/Otherworld series and enjoy it. This book follows Iris, the house sprite, delving into her past as a priestess and addressing some of her secrets. She was banished from the priesthood a long time ago when she was accused of killing her consort. Without her memory, she couldn’t tell if she were guilty or not, and even torture at the hands of the priestesses did not break her memory blocks. Her lover was turned into a hungry, evil shadow preying on the people of the Northlands. She is determined to track down the shadow and set him free – and in doing so, confront her possible guilt once and for all.

In this case, I’m glad I read the series because I think this book would have been hard without it. Iris is accompanied by Rozurial the incubus, Smokey the dragon, Camille the half-fae witch and Howl the Elemental Lord. Already that’s not only a lot of characters, but that’s a lot of character’s whose natures need explaining. Rozurial at least could easily have been dropped – and this could have easily been Iris on a solo quest with Howl as a guide. Worse, the book frequently references events and characters in the main storyline that just aren’t relevant and give more information than is necessary. As someone familiar with the books, I recognised them, but someone not so aware risks tripping up.

I am glad to see more of Iris in the story, especially since in the main series of books she’s a side character who is often called upon to help but not as a protagonist and the story itself is interesting. But it could have been tighter and, inclusionwise it was, again, completely lacking.

Review: Dragon Wytch (Otherworld Series #4) by Yasmine Galenorn

 Camille D’Artigo is the protagonist in this book, facing the every growing and worrying effects of the war against Shadow Wing and the civil war in Otherworld – a war that is now affecting their family as well as bringing chaos to the Otherworld, allowing all kinds of monsters to break through the portals and wreak havoc on an unsuspecting Earth.

Now she has a unicorn gifting her with an artefact of legend of immense power that may be one of their best hopes against Shadow Wing – except it’s been lost and it’ll work just as well for their enemies as against them.

And there’s a new spirit seal to find – and this one is being hunted by a lethal and cunning Rakshasa, far more dangerous than any of the other demons they have had to face. Added to that, Morgaine is back and the ancient, power-hungry sorceress has her own plans involving Titania, the long defunct Seelie queen

To complicate all of that – Smokey, the ancient and mighty dragon, is demanding her attention as well, as per their agreement. But Smokey wants into her heart and not just her bed – which is difficult with her current lovers to take into account.

My only major complaint with this book – in fact the series in general, is its poor pacing and the easily distracted protagonists. I think this book is especially bad for it. There’s one moment in particular that stands out. They are trying to find the Pixie with the Black Unicorn’s horn before anyone else, since this is an artefact with massive, incredible power. It simply cannot fall into the wrong hands. Menolly, after working at the bar, gets a lead on the horn (and it turns out to be true) so she goes home and…

… watches Jerry Springer with Delilah, waiting for Camille to get up rather than waking her. When she does get up (early because something else entirely interrupts her) she, Delilah and Menolly start weeding the garden. No, really – the horn could right now be heading into demon hands but they’re doing some gardening. Then they have breakfast. Then Iris regales them with a tale from when she was a House Sprite in Finland. Then Camille potty trains their pet gargoyle. And I am sat there reading this book and restraining the urge to yell at it because the world is supposed to be on the brink of collapse, demons are supposed to be invading, civil war is breaking out in Otherland, the world is in Serious Peril so some urgency may be required.

An additional problem with that is it makes me less happy with the variety of plots. We have a lot of different threads in this book – we have the Rakshasa and his minions looking for the spirit seal, we have the Unicorn and the horn, we have the problem of the Cryptos and the unguarded portals, we have Morgaine and Titania, we have Camille with Smokey as well as big insights into Camille’s past. All of these plot lines add to the overall story and are wonderful threads of the plot that really go together well. And individually I like each one. They really add to the richness of the world and the much greater sense of the coming battle – but because the pacing is already slowed down by random domesticity it makes me less patient with anything that might stop the main plot line actually moving forwards.

Changeling (Otherworld Series #2) by Yasmine Galenorn

The sisters ongoing battle against the demons continues as Shadow Wing’s forces look for the spirit seals, a way for them to break through to Earth and, from there, break through to Otherworld as well. The fate of both world rests in the balance and the D’Artigo sisters make a thin line of defence.

They have only a little support from the Queen of the Elves, because Otherworld has it’s own turmoil. The fairy queen, Lathanasar, has become more erratic and cruel, her increasingly failed rule has now lead to outright civil war, dragging in the other forces of Otherworld and destroying or occupying the agencies that should be helping against the demons.

Into this we follow Delilah, the middle sister, cat shapeshifter and private detective (her cover job, at least). She’s approached for a case – a local werepuma pride is under attack by an unknown murderer and her and her sister’s skills are needed to track it down – becoming all the more urgent as the bodies pile up and there’s a clear link to Shadow Wing’s campaign. Along the way she has to make some deals with some terrifying entities, Elemental lords of extreme power that untap some long dormant power within her.

And she loses some more of her innocence, some more of her naivety and is faced with more of the cruel, stark reality that faces them in this war – to say nothing of the complications in her love life, with her polyamorous nature clashing with her human boyfriend

This world is huge – with 3 realms of beings, a million kind of fae, shapeshifters, demons, vampires and many variations of each, it’s a world with near infinite diversity. I could spend hours just pouring through the world building alone. Part of this is because each element seems to have some weight, there’s not just werepumas, they have their own society and customs and it differs depending on whether they’re Earthside or Otherworld. The vampires aren’t just vampires, they have their own meetings and difficulties. The kingdoms of the fae and the elves have their own cultures and depths. There’s a weight behind the world building that suggests a lot of work and preparation has gone into it beyond just names and labels.

And that full, rich world with all its possibilities and magic feeds directly into the story. We have epic forces and a thousand options and a constant idea that anything can raise its head. I do think the action scenes were a little truncated and could have been less anti-climactic, but following to them is interesting as we learn more. It’s not the most novel concept – find the bad guys, save the world – but the path there is original because it wends through so many different characters and so many fantastical diversions. It isn’t a mystery – there’s no questions and little investigation, it’s more a hunt, a battle and an exploration and they become ever more deeply involved in a much wider and larger meta-plot.