Book review: Night Child, by Jes Battis

Title: Night Child

Author: Jes Battis

Publisher: Ace/Penguin (USA) - not currently published in the UK, but I know my local indie store has it ;)

Publication Date: June 2008

Notes: Book 1 in the OSI series

Description: "That's a dead vampire, I though. My boss dragged me out of bed at two in the morning to see a dead vampire? I might be an Occult Special Investigator for Vancouver's Mystical Crime Lab, but a dead vampire is routine and no reason to dirturb a person's sleep. Then I took a closer look at the body..."

Tess Corday soon realises that there is not going to be anything ordinary about this case - not the lab results on the cause of death; not Mia Polanski, the teenage girl living at the address found in the vamp's pocket, who may well be in thrall to a demon; and certainly not Lucian Agrado, the necromancer who is liaison to the vampire community. Agrado is supposed to be part of the solution, but Tess suspects he might be part of the problem.

Under pressure from her boss, Tess is trying to go by the book on this one. But when Mia reaches out to her, she risks her career to help the girl - and finds herself in the middle of a paranormal conspiracy that will changer her life forever. Or possibly end it...

My thoughts: I wish I'd picked Night Child up sooner. There's an excellent independent fantasy bookshop near me, and I've read the back of this book several times, but somehow never picked it up. Thankfully, I saw it for 2.99 last weekend and grabbed it straight away.

Jes Battis kicks off the story with Tess looking at a body in the wee hours of the morning. There's apparently some tension between vampires & mages (like Tess & her team), which makes it a delicate situation to be doing a vampire postmortem. Tess has a review coming up, and her boss who seems to enjoy picking at her, is trying to get her to run this case exactly the way it's supposed to go. I like that she sticks to her convictions despite that. When Mia gets in touch with Tess and her partner Derrick, Tess sticks with what she thinks is right, even though it risks her losing her job. This is a constant through the book - Tess is of an age where she should normally be higher up in the structure of the OSIs, but she enjoys the job she's got, so she's stayed there. It was good to see a female lead who isn't the most magically powerful, or the biggest in the playground in other ways, but can still be described as 'strong'. I think there is potential there for us to learn more about her power in later books and for her to become more than she thinks she is - it reminds be a bit of the early Rachel Morgan books by Kim Harrison.

I did find the early chapters a little slow going, but after a break of a couple of days, I really got in to it, and I hope to read the next one soon. I don't want to say too much about the plot, because there are lots of twists and turns, but I'm interested to see where things go from here - a couple of incidents from Tess's past clearly affect her in this book, and I want to see if the events of Night Child change things.

I really enjoyed this first book by Jes Battis, and I certainly plan on picking up book 2 in the OSI series, A Flash Of Hex, soon. I'd recommend it to fans of Kim Harrison and Tanya Huff. I give Night Child 7 out of 10.

~Ailsa

Red-headed Stepchild, by Jaye Wells

From the back cover:

Things to do:

1) Infiltrate rival vampire cult and assassinate leader

2) Get rid of demon houseguest

3) Ditch the hot mage stalker

4) Betray family

In a world where being of mixed blood is a major liability, Sabina doesn’t really fit in. And being an assassin – the only profession fit for an outcast – doesn’t help matters. But she’s never brought her work home. Until now.

Her latest mission is uncomfortably complex, and threatens the fragile peace between the vampires and mage races. As Sabina scrambles to figure out which side she’s on, she uncovers a tangled political web, some nasty facts about her family and some unexpected new talents. Any of these things could be worryingly life-changing, but together, they could be fatal.

I’d been ‘hmm’ing and ‘hah’ing about buying Red-headed stepchild for months, since it first came out in the summer, and now I wish I’d got it sooner.

The action starts straight away, with Sabina’s world being pulled apart from the very first chapter, where she shoots her friend because she’s been told he’s a traitor. It’s never made clear what the relationship between Sabina and David was, but it was obviously close, because the echoes of this incident follow her through the novel, as she’s led to question everything she’s lived with.

I was a little bit surprised that Sabina had followed her orders with such unquestioning obedience for so long, but when her illusions break, boy, do they do it in a big way, and I can’t wait to see how revelations In this book affect her in book two, The Mage In Black. The early chapters brought through such a strong picture of what Sabina was like, her bold, kick-ass attitude staying constant throughout the novel.

My favourite secondary character was the mage Adam. (What is it with hot guys called Adam? Several of my favourite fictional guys are called Adam.) I loved the mystery of him from the moment Sabina met him in a bar. I don’t think we really got to see much of him in this book, but I think ‘The Mage In Black’ means we’ll get to see more of him in that book. ;-) And I like the blossoming romance between these two characters – it develops at a sensible pace for their prejudices and suspicions.

The plot moves quickly, and as usual with a good book it kept me up well past my bedtime! There were so many twists and turns, so many exciting things for the characters to deal with, but unlike some novels, the reader can still keep up, which is another great point in this novel’s favour. It was also good to see vampires pitted against something new – the mages. I also love the way their hair colour identifies vampires, and the shade shows how old they are. Little things like this make it a very well-built world, and I’m sure the sequels will be just as strong.

The ending was satisfying, too. Ms Wells has found the balance between a drawn out end that goes on too long, and the sudden stop that leave you wondering what happened. It tied up the important bits, answered some last minute questions, and left me desperate for the sequel.

Overall, I’m giving this 8/10 stars. Vampire fans should add this to their TBR piles, and Ms Wells is definitely one to watch for the future!

Book 2, The Mage In Black, comes out in April next year.

Exciting news!

Jaye has very kindly agreed to do an interview with us here at the Book Bundle. If you get questions to me quickly, I can include them in the interview. Look out for it soon!