Book review: Deal with the Devil by Kit Rocha

Title: Deal with the Devil
Author: Kit Rocha
Publication date: 28th July 2020
Publisher: Tor
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic Romance
Series: The Mercenary Librarians #1
Source: Review copy via NetGalley
Rating: 10/10

Description: The United States went belly up 45 years ago when our power grid was wiped out. Too few live in well-protected isolation while the rest of us scrape by on the margins.

The only thing that matters is survival.

By any means. At any cost.

Nina is an information broker with a mission: to bring hope to the darkest corners of Atlanta. She and her team of mercenary librarians use their knowledge to help those in need. But altruism doesn’t pay the bills—raiding vaults and collecting sensitive data is where the real money is.

Knox is a bitter, battle-weary supersoldier who leads the Silver Devils, an elite strike squad that chose to go AWOL rather than slaughter innocents. Before the Devils leave town for good, they need a biochem hacker to stabilize the experimental implants that grant their superhuman abilities.

The problem? Their hacker’s been kidnapped. And the ransom for her return is Nina. Knox has the perfect bait for a perfect trap: a lost Library of Congress server. The data could set Nina and her team up for years…

If they live that long.

My thoughts: I've been a fan of Kit Rocha for several years now, particuarly the two series they have which are set in the same world as Deal with the Devil, so I was really excited to hear about this new book, and new series, and the fact that they were moving to a major publisher. But the switch (they self published the other series') also made me a bit nervous: would aspects that I loved from a Kit Rocha book be toned down or absent, to try accommodating to that big publisher audience? I needn't have worried. 

We meet Nina first, as she fights off multiple attackers before retrieving a mysterious package. Amongst the fighting, the authors put in enough casual details of the surroundings that you build up a clear image of the run-down city, and start to get a feel for Nina's personality. Knox has been following her, and when the story shifts to his point of view, you get more details about the city, the corruption running through it from the big corporations that rule the place, and the information that both Nina and Knox have some kind of biological enhancements to their genetics. Nina is super fast, and Knox himself is very strong, as well as having a communication chip of some kind wired into his head to help him keep in touch with his team. All of Nina's crew and Knox's Silver Devils have more to them than meets the eye; there's a bit of a superheroes, x-men quality to things, except all of these characters went through operations and years of training to change their bodies, rather than being born with the abilities. 

Knox introduces himself, and offers Nina the job of finding the old server. Nina & co know that it is absolutely a trap of some kind, but decide to go for it anyway, and the two groups set off on a road trip like something out of The Walking Dead or Station Eleven, where you never quite know what kind of little local community you're going to find in the next desiccated town, or round the next bend of the road in the quiet forest. And through it all, both fully aware of the dangers, Knox and Nina start to fall for each other. The tension of knowing about upcoming betrayals and also the hope for a romance between two tired people working out kept me turning pages late into the night. But even knowing that there were big shocks coming for various characters when secrets got exposed, what actually happened did come as a twist to me.

In both the Silver Devils and Nina's little group, there are the found families and their unbreakable bonds that make a key part of any Kit Rocha novel. Other things I was really pleased to find, that I'd been wondering about: the chemistry sizzles between Nina and Knox from their first meeting, and builds to some exciting sexy scenes later on. There's also enough page time for the secondary characters that I'm already looking forward to seeing them get their own books later on in this series, and Kit Rocha has laid the groundwork for another excellent series of a corrupt system gradually being overturned the good guys, and the power of friendship, love and compassion. 

I highly recommend Deal With The Devil, and I can't wait for the sequel! Overall, I'm giving this 10/10. 

Thank you Tor for the e-review copy. 

Wither by Lauren DeStefano

Summary from Goodreads:

Obviously, something went terribly wrong. Genetic mutations have festered, reducing human longevity to twenty-five, even less for most women. To prevent extinction, young girls are kidnapped, mated in polygamous marriages with men eager to procreate. Sixteen-year-old Rhine Ellery, a recent victim of this breeding farm mentality, has vowed to break loose from its fetters; but finding allies and a safe way out is a challenge she can only hope she will survive. A dystopian fantasy series starter with wings. Editor's recommendation.


Wither is the first of The Chemical Garden Trilogy by Lauren DeStefano.  And I have to begin by saying if you like Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, I felt like this story went along those lines with Linton and the young Catherine (kind of, not exactly)...it just felt like that.


First thing that caught my attention with Wither is the cover.  Isn't it beautiful?  The way the girls hands are gripping the skirt of the dress in such a frustrated and almost confined way and how the bird in the cage looks connected with the line and circles to those hands?  I love it!  It really defines the story as a whole once you've read it.


Rhine is an orphan along with her brother, Rowan and they try to make the best of things in the house their parents left them after they died.  They make it look like they are poverty stricken so as to not lure other orphans or anyone else not wanted to their door.  They lock away their most precious possessions and items so they aren't stolen.  They even take turns keeping watch each night with a gun to protect themselves and what meager things they have for themselves.  That is until Rhine goes for a job and gets kidnapped by the Gatherers instead and taken to a large mansion somewhere far away from Manhattan and ends up becoming a sister wife with two other girls who were taken, Jenna and Cecily.  


Being married to Linden Ashby couldn't be the worst thing in the world to Jenna and Cecily is in love with it all.  Rhine, however, hates everything about the place, especially Housemaster Vaughn who is frantically working on an antidote to keep his son alive past twenty-five and maybe even try to help the girls to live past twenty.  There's no way out unless you are escorting your husband to a party in the city and even then the way is blocked.  Rhine puts on her facade and grits her teeth through all this living until she can figure out how to get out.


I will say this first, the only bad thing I found is that there is a lot of whining from the all the sister wives.  I wanted to smack Cecily across the back of the head and say, "Chill out okay?  You don't need to be so stuck up and rude to everyone."  To Jenna, "Sorry about your life, but really, quit moping."  And to Rhine I'd say, "Do something about it or just quit whining."  Other than the whining that takes place, I love the characters.


Rhine is a strong willed heroine that determines after being forced into this marriage to Linden Ashby that she will earn his trust to be able to run away.  I love the fact that she can be so determined and it helps her remember everything about her brother and never gives up hope that he may be out looking for her.  I love that she is the favorite of the wives among the servants, they will do anything for her, even if it means they may lose their job, or even maybe, their life.  Even when she starts to believe in her own facade in certain points and ways, she is able to shake it off and remember what her plan is.


Jenna is a quiet character.  At first I thought Jenna was stuck up and didn't care about anyone else, but I loved her later on.  She does everything she can to help Rhine leave the mansion and Linden behind without getting caught by their father-in-law, Vaughn.  Cecily, yeah, I hated Cecily through the whole story until the last when I felt more sorry for her than anger.


Vaughn reminded me of Heathcliff of Wuthering Heights for parts of the story.  The unrelentless, merciless being he is and how he creeps all the sister wives out.  I shuddered with every moment Rhine had with Vaughn and even with what he may be hiding in the basement.


Overall, I really liked this story.  It has great character development and is a character driven story.  The imagery is realistic and Lauren weaved a fine new world for us to see and truly believe it may exist.