Discount Armageddon

Our heroine, from a family that broke away from the nonhuman-hating Covenant in order to study “cryptids” and promote coexistence with the nonhomicidal variants thereof, doesn’t really want to continue in the family business. She wants to dance! As she lives and works in NYC trying to make

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her dream come true, she encounters a dangerous and dangerously sexy member of the Covenant, and of course it turns out there’s another enemy entirely to fear: someone else is making innocent cryptids disappear. I really like McGuire’s (as Mira Grant) Newsflesh trilogy, and the October Daye novels are perfectly readable fantasy, but this book annoyed me because the noir-ish narration could not recognize when it had hit the punchline and needed to stop. A couple of nonrandom but representative samples: “What was the point of hide-and-seek if you weren’t allowed to dig pit traps or attack your opponents from behind? That was the first time I realized how different our home life was from everyone else’s. Everyone else wasn’t being taught to fight a war.” “Ever try to hide a gun in a competition rumba costume? It’s neither easy nor fun. The inner thigh holster that doesn’t chafe has yet to be invented by man, beast, cryptid, or Price.” (Oh, yeah, she spends a lot of time talking about being a “Price girl,” which just gave me horrific flashbacks to Gale girls and I kept wondering why she was disparaging the boys in her family by implication.) Clever aphorisms aren’t always: “Most of the time, there isn’t time to adjust to whatever’s going on before you have to deal with it. Life in our world is very sink or swim, and that’s for the best. If you can’t survive in the deep end, you should get out before you drown.” Really? If it’s sink or swim, how do you get out without drowning? Who or what is the helpful lifeguard or life preserver helping you out of the deep end in this analogy? Anyway, I will watch out for McGuire’s other stuff, but I will not reapproach this series without some indication of narrative improvement; it’s a bit of a shame since I liked the rest of the worldbuilding.

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A little lighter and more playful than the October Daye series, Discount Armageddon follows Verity Price - strip-club waitress by day, cryptozoologist by night, professional ballroom dancer in between - as she tries to figure out where the monsters - creatures - people she's trying to protect are

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disappearing to.

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I loved this book so much that when I go on vacation later this year I am giving a copy to a friend that almost never has time to read and tell her to read it. Verity comes from a long line of people that for centuries hunted and killed anything that wasn't human or hunted humans and we are not

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talking about animals here. The difference is several generations ago they came to the realization that what they were doing was wrong and now they try to help the cryptids hide among society and police them when they decide that they would rather snack on humanity. The price Verity and her family pay is now they must live under the radar of the Covenant of St George who hunt down anything that they see is wrong even if it doesn't prey on humans. Of course with Verity living in NYC, working as a waitress in a strip joint that employs several types of female cryptids and trying to be a professional ballroom dancer things are going to spiral out of control when a new operative from the Covenant comes calling to NYC to "cleanse" the town. I think what I liked the most about this as an urban fantasy is there was no magic, no possible second love interest and a family that is ready to drop everything to help out the heroine should she ask for backup.

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Did Not Finish

I just can't do it anymore.

Reading this book has quite literally been painful for me. In fact, my inner Seanan McGuire fangirl is currently curled up in the fetal position bawling her sad little eyes out in a very dark corner of my mind.

Listen, I don’t know what seriously trippy

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shit girlfriend was smoking while writing this hot mess of a story, but I do know that she’s capable of so much more (and better…much, much better).

Wow. I’m actually at a loss for words. I suppose I can sum up my issues with this book by saying that I found it to be laughably silly, boring, insipid, and completely clichéd despite its obviously desperate attempts at creativity. It was also over-the-top and trying way too hard to be the cool kid on the block.

Case in point, Verity, the heroine, was a blatant Buffy wannabe clone with the maturity level of a 12-year-old and the common sense of the Jersey Shore cast. She also had the ridiculous tendency to navigate through perilously high city rooftops via a mix of free running & parkour a la Cirque du Soleil meets Showgirls.

Furthermore, there was an absurd amount of info-dumping going on with borderline obsessive overuse of parentheses that was both confuzzling and incredibly distracting.

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Discount Armageddon is smart, stylish, and a fun to read novel. In it, Verity Price comes from a family of cryptozoologists, who have pledged their lives to study and protect cyptids after having broken away from the Covenant, a group that exists to protect the human race from these same cryptids,

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usually by killing them. Verity aspires to be a dancer, but is drawn in voluntarily or involuntarily into the family business. The cryptids come in a variety of forms from bogeymen to talking mice to dragon princesses. She is in Manhattan when Dominic, a member of the Covenant shows up and cryptid females begin to disappear. After a rocky start to the relationship, she and Dominic work together when they discover that a dragon is living dormant under Manhattan.

What I mostly liked about this story is the flare that Seanan McGuire has in her writing. She has a unique voice and a style that’s easy to read. The plot itself was well thought out and compelling. There were a few good twists along the way. On the downside, I thought the relationship between Verity and Dominic was too predictable. Verity herself was kind of a generic protagonist who didn’t stand out to me. Also, I thought there were too many cryptids in this novel, and it’s not very believable that so many would be able to live sort of out in the open without people uncovering them. Despite these flaws, the novel was fun to read and enjoyable, and worth your time.

Carl Alves - author of Conjesero

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In this exercise of manga-like silliness, our heroine Verity Price is heiress to a demimonde of bizarre creatures and convoluted conspiracies, but would mostly just like to carve out a career as a serious dancer. That I don't rate this novel a tad higher is a factor of wanting to see if the author

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can sustain the "comic inferno" tone of this new series.

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Seanan McGuire's been an author that I've been meaning to try for a while. I've heard good things about the Toby Daye series, and I do like urban fantasy stuff, so she sounded like a good fit. But I didn't really feel like starting a more established series, and when I heard she was starting

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another one, I thought I'd jump on that train instead. Particularly when that train, the InCryptid series, has such a nice pun in the series name, and, c'mon, Discount Armageddon, that's a cool name for a book. Eye-catching. Although eye-catching in a worse way (at least, from my perspective) was the cover, featuring a city landscape at night with our lead character in a pink halter and pink plaid skirt, carrying a gun (which, at least, that's sort of an outfit from the story. I know I shouldn't be embarrassed by what I read, but... yeah. I mostly knocked this one off at home.

The whole story here's not an embarrassment at all, really. Our heroine, Verity Price, is a member of the youngest generation of a family of, well, cryptid managers / police, in a sense. They keep an eye on the paranormal populations in their territories, New York in Verity's case, and while most of them just generally go about their own lives quietly, there are some who look to prey on the population at large. And that, of course, is also Verity's job - she keeps them in line, through words or through a well-placed ass-kicking. This job doesn't much pay the bills, though, so she works a cover job as a waitress at a strip club where most of the strippers are local non-humans of one variety or another. But really? Really what she wants? Is to be a real honest-to-God ballroom dancing champ.

So there are a lot of parts here to look at, and the plot is tipped off by the arrival of an agent from the organization that Verity's family used to work with, the Covenant of St. George, who has rather a different idea of what to be doing with those cryptids about, a rather more violently final one. So with a kill-'em-all agent, Dominic de Luca, showing up, Verity has to protect the group, and as she gets to know de Luca more, things get more... complicated.

The plot actually does work pretty well, a fairly driving and enjoyable tale, but in this case, it's the characters that really made the story for me: Verity, our first-person narrator, with a world-weary, tongue-in-cheek, but driven voice, proud of her accomplishments, but not really happy with her life; Sarah, her cryptid cousin, with psychic powers and an interesting biology; Dominic, a holy warrior, yes, but not immune to new ideas; oh, all of them, Verity's family, the super religious cult-of-the-Price-family mice in Verity's apartment, the whole world. It's well thought out and well-realized, and it gives the plot that much more heft. This one, it's a lot of understanding Verity's world and then messing it around, as befits the first book in a series, and it pays off. You get the regular kind of showing how this world differs from the real one, who inhabits it and setting the rules, and then lets things tick off the rails nicely.

All of which is to say, I did quite enjoy this. I'll have to try her other series soon, but this one makes for a nice, fast adventure, with good characters and a nice style. I see what the fuss was about, for sure. And even if I do think I'll try out Toby Daye, I'm looking forward to more about Verity, as well. Definitely a good read here for urban fantasy fans.

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Good. Well, it's Seanan, of course it's good. Very interesting setting and concepts; great characters; and neat situation. The romance angle was a little too obvious - I knew what was coming the first time they met. But it's good that they're now thinking about it, rather than just reacting. And

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I'd like to see Verity change her mind about something - as is, Dominic is doing all the changing. It's interesting that the bestiary is inaccurate - both from what's learned here, and (bogeymen) from what Verity thinks she should have kept in mind all along - that is, she knew it already. But fun, anyway, especially after reading the short story in Westward Weird. I keep trying to figure out where those two are in Verity's family tree... Great new universe, with, clearly, lots of stories in it. Looking forward to reading more of them.

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I loved reading Discount Armageddon by Seanan McGuire. It was as funny as it was exciting and hit just about every note right. Why write just about vampires or zombies or werewolves when you can write about all of them and more, just about any supernatural creature you’ve ever heard of and quite

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a few you haven’t.

My only previous experience with McGuire was the excellent Newsflesh zombie novels written as Mira Grant. Discount Armageddon is much more light-hearted but filled with the same trademark sense of humor that literally had me laughing out loud in places. Verity Price and her interaction with the Aeslin mice would be enough reason in and of itself to pick up this book. But there is a whole world filled with creatures, cryptids as they are called here, gathered from our fairy tales and our nightmares. These creatures are mostly integrated into our society. They are hunted by an organization known as the Covenant, a group from which Very’s (Verity) family split off generations ago. Her family now polices and protects the cryptids.

This is a fast and entertaining read, filled with action and humor. It’s a fascinating world filled with even more fascinating characters. The romance aspects of the book are just enough to entice some without turning off readers who don’t like romance to dominate. If you like a wise-cracking, butt-kicking heroine with plenty of action and a healthy dose of humor, you are going to love this book. I can’t wait for the next entry in the series. Highly recommended.

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Review Courtesy of Dark Faerie Tales

Quick & Dirty: Snake, shapeshifters and dragons! Oh my! Brilliant and witty world-building to this Urban Fantasy series but long expositions and info dumping may turn off some readers.

Opening Sentence: Verity danced circles around the living room, her amateurish

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pirouettes and unsteady leaps accompanied by cheers and exultations from the horde of Aeslin mice perched on the back of the couch.

The Review:

Verity Price comes from a family of monster hunters/sympathizers but all Verity wants to do is dance. She has moved to Manhattan to see if she could juggle her life as a cryptozoologist and a career in dancing. Her day job is a cocktail waitress for a strip club that is run by a bogeyman and she works alongside other cryptids. Verity’s day job and her family name allow her to learn more about the cryptids in her community.

The Price family broke away from the Covenant of St. George many years ago when they deemed that killing all monsters on site was cruel but also detrimental to the environment. The Covenant wants the Price family dead so the Prices have been in hiding ever since. Verity dances under another identity so as to not get caught. So the night when she gets caught in a Covenant trap by the sexy Dominic De Luca and gives away her family name right away made me wonder how smart she really is. Although I’m sure it is because she thought she could take him out before he gave away her identity.

Weeks pass since Verity met Dominic and she learns that cryptids have begun to go missing. Secretly she believes that Dominic is behind the disappearances but when she gets wind of something huge sleeping underneath the city she finds out something far more sinister is behind it. Verity and Dominic try to work together to learn more about the dragon sleeping under the city and who is behind all of the disappearances while figuring out if they can trust each other.

Verity is smart (but that can be questionable at times), funny and sarcastic. Verity would be the fun friend at a party but to hang out with her would be dangerous. Also, Verity lives with a bunch of Aeslin mice which speak English and somewhat clean up after themselves but can that really be sanitary? The mice are hilarious company but they would probably drive me crazy with their many holidays. Dominic De Luca is a little more practical about the events that are going on around him but his Covenant brainwashing still makes him a little boneheaded.

As the first book in a series Discount Armageddon comes off as a long info dump. Verity will go into long expositions about the creatures, what they are, how dangerous or not dangerous they are and if her family has any history with them. There are quite a few cryptids introduced in this book that make it a little hard to keep track of who is what but the Field Guide at the end of the book comes in handy at times. The world is dangerously deceptive but I relished the history and type of creatures that Seanan McGuire used in Discount Armageddon.

Overall, Discount Armageddon is a fascinating take on a whole new Urban Fantasy series. If you don’t like books with quite a bit of info dumping and long expositions then you may not care for this book but if you like sarcastic women, sexy men and interesting creatures then I would say give this book a try. I can’t wait to see what is next for Verity Price and Dominic De Luca.

Notable Scene:

The darkness boiled, and out of it came the servitors. There was no posturing this time; they moved with the speed of striking cobras, coming too fast for me to count. This game was at least as large as the one Dominic and I fought off together, and that had been a close victory. If I couldn’t find an escape route, the best I could hope for would be a swift and reasonably painless death. Piyusha’s body provided a mute, horrifying example of what the worst would be.

I launched myself into a high kick, my toe catching the lead servitor in the chin as I slashed out to either side with my respective weapons. I felt, rather than saw, the machete find a target, hacking deep into scaled flesh. The flensing knife hit nothing but air, but at least it drove back the attacker on that side, giving me a little more space in which to maneuver. None of the servitors went down. That would have been too much to hope for.

My lead foot finished its arc, hitting the floor just in front of the servitor I’d kicked. He looked dazed. I took advantage of the hole in his guard, bringing my other leg up and kneeing him firmly in the groin. Whatever mutagenic process created the servitors, some attributes of their mammalian origins remained intact; as soon as my knee hit his nuts, he doubled over, allowing me to bring my machete down across the back of his neck. He toppled.

I was still wrenching my machete free when a tail snaked out of the darkness behind me and wrapped noose-tight around my neck, jerking me backward. My hand lost its grip on the machete handle, leaving me with nothing but the flensing knife, which I didn’t dare start waving around my own throat. I dropped it instead, frantically clawing at the tail that was in the process of choking me. Air had suddenly become a much more valuable commodity with weaponry.

My fingernails couldn’t find traction on the scales covering the servitor’s flesh. One of my nails caught and tore, the sharp flare of pain barely distracting from the all-encompassing pain in my neck. My vision was starting to blur around the edges as oxygen deprivation set in. I kicked and thrashed, but my feet didn’t make contact with anything. Suffocation is one of those things you just don’t learn how to fight through. Big problem, that.

The InCryptid Series:

1. Discount Armageddon

2. Midnight Blue-Light Special (March 5, 2013)

FTC Advisory: Penguin/DAW provided me with a copy of Discount Armageddon. No goody bags, sponsorships, “material connections,” or bribes were exchanged for my review.

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I love all the books I have read from Seanan McGuire so when I saw she was coming out with this lighthearted yet kick-butt InCryptid series I was excited. I have loved her October Daye series and also really enjoyed the Newsflesh series that she writes under the name Mira Grant. This was an

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excellent book; creative and so much fun, it exceeded my expectations. The second book in this series will be titled, Midnight Blue-Light Special and is due to release in March of 2013.

Verity Price is a Price; she is also a cryptozoologist. The Price's went traitor against the Covenant some time ago and decided to turn from eliminating InCryptids to trying to help InCryptids live peacefully among humans. As such they've been hunted by the Covenant for a long, long time. Verity is a bit different than her family; she loves protecting InCryptids but she also loves ballroom dancing. She has moved to Manhattan to further her career as a ballroom dancer while keeping tabs on Manhattan's resident InCryptids. That is until Dominic, of Covenant origin, shows up to rain on Verity's parade...oh and then there's the whole thing about a dragon being asleep under the island.

This book was an absolute riot from cover to cover; I loved it. It was hilarious, action packed, smart, creative, and just so much fun. This is urban fantasy with a lot of fantasy in it and a lot of sass. Verity is just the most awesome heroine. Sure she has to work in a sleazy bar to support herself, but in between that she helps out those who can't help themselves, protects humanity from things that go bump in the night, and still manages to pull off a killer tango. She's not perfect, she makes mistakes, sometimes she is even a little bit vulnerable. This makes her into a wonderfully engaging heroine that you are constantly cheering for.

I also loved that despite her strange upbringing she still has a loving and caring relationship with her family. Granted most family doesn't lend help in the form of grenades and pit-traps...but you know each to their own. I love the religious talking mice that plague her apartment and turn the smallest random event into a strange religious holiday. I love the crazy creatures we meet throughout, you seriously never know what new type of creature is going to be lurking around the corner.

As for the male lead, Dominic is incredibly well done. Him and Verity don't hit it off at all in the beginning, but it was interesting to watch them both learn and grow by listening to each other's perspective. I loved how their relationship grew into one of mutual respect and how they had to compromise to make things work. I also loved that even though there is a little romance, it's not what drives the world and storyline. It is subtle and wonderfully woven into a complex world and plot.

The plot is part investigation (as Verity tries to figure out why single female InCryptids are going missing), part dungeon delver (Verity exploring sewers in hopes of figuring out the dragon mystery) and part ninja (think wall-hoping, roof-jumping, and other crazy forms of locomotion). It is unpredictable, but never confusing. This book was so darn hard to put down. I just had to know if they found the dragon and what was going to happen if they did find the dragon.

The book ends at a good spot, but I am dying to see more adventures with Verity and crew. I also loved the one-liner quotes that opened up each chapter, they were hilarious.

Overall I just love, love, loved this book. It reminds a little of the Nightside series by Simon Green; it's got that same type of dark, campy humor and similarly you never know what you will run into in the course of the story. Verity is one of those characters that constantly takes a licking and keeps on ticking; she is tough, smart, funny and is still easy to engage with. Pretty much all the characteres are awesome, the world is super creative, and the plot is full of fun surprises. I loved this book and cannot wait to read Midnight Blue-Light Special when it comes out. Very highly recommended for all those urban fantasy fans out there; in fact if you are a swords and sorcery type of fantasy fan you may want to give this a try...it has more fantasy than a lot of other urban fantasies out there.

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An urban fantasy, the beginning of another series. Very detailed world-building, with a Men-in-Black feel - lots of really weird alien forms. Verity Price, our heroine, has a job (besides being a cocktail waitress) to protect the cryptids (non-humans) from another human force dedicated to hunting

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them down and exterminating them. So does her whole family, who broke off generations ago from the Covenant (exterminators). There are hints of a whole ecology of human / cryptid life - the disappearance of the last unicorn in England was linked to an increase in water-borne diseases, for instance.

The setting is Manhattan. She meets a member of the Covenant, and needs to battle him to save the cryptids. But there is a rumor of a bigger problem - is there really a live dragon, asleep under the Island?

The book is a quick romp, easily read, and follows the conventions of modern urban fantasy/ romance. Recommended.

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I have been a longtime fan of Maguire's "Toby Daye" series so I was anxious to see what she would do with a new series. I am happy to announce that I loved "Discount Armageddon". This story is not nearly as dark as the Toby books but it still isn't all lollipops and roses. Innocent Cryptids are

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disappearing and maybe being murdered! Sure not all cryptids are decent and law abiding citizens but the cryptids in danger don't deserve what is happening to them. What are cryptids you may be asking? According to the book cryptids are "any creature whose existence has been suggested but not proved scientifically"...or to put it simply, a 'monster'. Enter our heroine Verity Price. Verity comes from a family line of people who hunt for cryptids and research them. They will take care of them if they are bad beyond redemption but they also see the value in the 'good' cryptids who are minding their own business. Not everyone believes the same way as the Price family. The Covenant is an organization that believes in completely eradicating all the cryptids. No cryptid is a good cryptid in their philosophy. Verity leads a double life...she has a public persona who competes in ballroom dance competitions...Verity's true life passion. Its the job of carrying on her family's profession that has her hiding from the Covenant and hunting the bad cryptids in the dark of the night. It is while she is hunting a cryptid that she finds herself face to face with a Covenant member named Dominic. Will they be able to work together on this one job? Will he find out about her ballroom dancing persona and out her to the Covenant who would like nothing more than to get their hands on any member of the Price family?

I found this story to be completely enchanting and engrossing. I loved reading about all the unique cryptids they encountered. I love that the author gave us a nice field guide to the cryptids in the back of this book. Verity is so easy to root for! She is witty and headstrong but very empathetic to the innocent. She is also conflicted about whether she wants to be doing the ballroom -dancing full time. Each person we meet along the journey, cryptid or not, is a completely developed character. Maguire could have taken some short cuts but she never did. I found myself empathizing with characters while mourning the loss of others we had only recently met. The characters are where Maguire shines regardless of what series she is writing. This sets her apart from the other authors in her genre.

There is no doubt that is going to be a must read series for me. My biggest question now is whether Verity will be the main character in the next book or if it will be from the view of another character of the Price family? I hope it will be Verity because I just adored her.

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This book is fun, in vaporous, non serious sort of way. It doesn't try to be serious, or even try to make the cryptid world less obvious than it is... The story is flimsy, the main character a bit of a flake, the leading love rather cardboard... but still, this is pure fun, and the author keeps the

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romance appropriate (Sex in the bedroom, no sex during danger...) Total mind candy.

Plus, I think the Aeslin Mice are absolutely wonderful... always feel like a God with a colony of cheering mice to welcome you home.

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Discount Armageddon reads like a particularly good episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer: it's clever, it's funny, and there's plenty of butt-kicking. I love how a lot of the cryptid biology makes just enough sense to feel plausible, and how Verity actually cares to notice that kind of detail.

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Looking forwards to the next book!

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Discount Armageddon is told in first person, from Verity Price's point of view. Verity -or Very- is a snarky young lady out to prove herself to her family while staying under the weather of the Coven. There's this whole history of Price family members not only leaving the order, but convincing

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others to leave the order and see their point of view. The Coven is an organization that hunts without discrimination any other species that don't fall into the human category. They are so into keeping humans safe that they will annihilate whole species. Some generations back one of the family members noticed a link between the disappearance of one species and the out break of a strong disease outbreak that ended up killing thousands of people... When the Coven wouldn't listen, they went into hiding. The whole family has a price on their heads.

Verity has been living in Manhatten, under cover as a dancer who tries out for dances and broadway shows. The dancing keeps her in shape and limber, closely following martial art moves. Not sure if this is accurate, but it works for the story. While she is trying out for different parts and shows, she is also making contact whenever she can with the cryptids {aka Monsters, or "others:", supernaturals} of the city. This is not easy, because people remember the Prices and other family members as killers of supernaturals and it's not easy to change habits and build trust when your family used to do its best to annihilate. But Verity has done an excellent job when she can.

There's just one teeny little problem - suddenly cryptids are disappearing. It seems that most of the cryptids who are disappearing are also young , single females. And when Verity tries to get some informaiton out of a cryptid, things get even worse. Now whole families are disappearing as well as young, single females...

And there's a rumor about a dragon....On top of that, it seems there is a young man from the coven getting in her way, making her drool, and generally wreaking havoc on her dance life, her undercover work and her emotions.

Throughout all of this, Verity keeps of a steady stream of snark. I was engaged through out the entire book. There were a few places where I felt like I was reading an educational novel, but these were thankfully shortlived, and about interesting species. So not as bad as it could have been. The dialogue between characters was believable and extremely fun to read in most places. The narration was good, with only the occasional lecture tones. The fight scenes were pretty good, though I though Verity should trained more on how to hold on to her weapons - seriously the girl kept getting her weapons thrown or knocked out of reach and how is that anyway to win any fight? All in all, a fun book to read with a lot of humor thrown in to balance out the gore and suspense. Good mix

It appears to be the beginning of a series. Based on this first novel, I' open to buying the next upcoming novel, Midnight Blue Special which will come out in March of 2013. Not sure what's up with the titles - I really couldn't figure out where the discount came in....though it might have something to do with the...well, that would be a spoiler. *g* But seriously - Blue Light Special? is it going to take place in a greasy spoon or a K-Mart?

As most people probably know by now - Seanan McGuire is not only the author of the October Daye series, but writes as Mira Grant the zombie series containing Feed and Deadline as well as poetry, songs and other things. There's something by her for everyone's taste.

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I love The October Daye series so when I saw that Seanan had another series starting I knew I would be begging to get my hands on a copy. Seanan does not disappoint in the first book in her new InCryptid series.

I found Verity to be entertaining, strong willed, and quite unexpectedly bad ass. She

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works as a waitress at a strip club, patrols and keeps the monsters in line in her territory, and cuts a rug whenever she gets a chance competing in ballroom dancing competitions. The price family was fascinating to learn about. They grow up training to be Cryptozoologists and fight on the opposite side of the monster killing Covenant of St. George. Every single one of the family has their own talents and I loved reading about what they can do and enjoy best.

Verity gets unexpected help from a member of the Covenant when woman in her city start going missing. Dominic lives and breaths the Covenant but Verity and what she has to say throw his beliefs into a tailspin. I thought they worked very well together and I enjoyed watching them fight their attraction for each other in one breath and putting their hands all over each other in another. They will definitely be fun to watch in book 2.

There was a great amount of action throughout the book. The cast of characters was vast and imaginative. The plot was fun and I had a great time reading the book from start to finish. OH and I cant forget the mice colony. Who would have thought of that?!? lmao, them and their holidays cracked me up. MIDNIGHT BLUE-LIGHT SPECIAL is scheduled for March of 2013.

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This was one of the most-buzzed-about urban fantasies last year, so I wanted to be sure to read it in time for award consideration. I've enjoyed several books in Seanan McGuire's October Daye series, so I already knew her writing was top notch. However, this book came as a big disappointment, and I

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struggled to finish it.

One of the trademarks of an urban fantasy is the voice: snarky, with a dry wit. Unfortunately, taken too far it becomes bitchy and annoying, and that's how Verity price struck me from the start. Then the male lead, Dominic from the Covenant comes in, and he's Lawful Good to her Chaotic Good. They are two extremes, which is intended to make for a good conflict and romance, but instead I felt they deserved each other because they were both so aggravating.

The end of chapter one was a major point I almost tossed the book aside. Verity releases a creature she had been tracking that has already killed over a dozen women. Verity's order to the thing: shape up and get out of my town. It's establishing that she's a cryptozoologist and doesn't killed anything unless she must (the opposite of the kill-all-the-things Covenant) but it irritated me that she let the thing go free to continue it's rampage outside of New York City.

There were many other things that shook my sense of belief in the story, like her shock that a member of the Covenant is on her turf (um, NYC is one of the largest cities in the world, why is that a surprise?), her cousin's abilities and how they conveniently locate things beneath the city, and the redundant mention of calling lizard men Sleestaks, while Verity seems way, way too young to have watched Land of the Lost. I have also read two other urban fantasy series that featurde large, important creatures sleeping beneath a city; certainly, the genre relies on twists to cliches like that, but now it seems way too prevalent.

I did like the humor in the book, when it wasn't going to far on the bitchy side. In particular, a Babylon 5 reference made me happy. One of my favorite things in the book turned out to be the religious mice who live in Verity's apartment and celebrate her entire family's history on a calendar of their own creation; it creates some foreseeable gags, but the mice are outright adorable and make me think of the Graham Oakley Church Mice books I loved as a kid. But for humor, I much prefer other series where the voice doesn't grate on me so. It's all about personal preference.

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This is a gem of a book for fans of the urban paranormal and strong female characters that are sassy, independent, and still vulnerable all in one package.

Verity Price comes from a long and distinguished line of "monster-hunters," at least until about four generations ago that is. That would be

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when her family split off from the 'Covenant' to move the North America and start protecting those same monsters they once hunted. The family business is cryptzoology, something Verity has trained for her entire life.

However Verity is torn between going into the family business or pursuing her own passion - dancing. Specifically ballroom dancing. She is so passionate that she has to dance under an assumed name and disguise, because there is always a risk that the Covenant will think that her family line was not completely terminated some time ago. Disguise in place Verity goes on national television's hugely popular 'Dance or Die' show. After the show ends she makes a deal with her folks. She will move to New York City for one year to try to make it as a dancer, but on the side she'll also be doing some outreach into the cryptid community to do more non-invasive research and to help them however she can. Of course part of that job means she is also a hunter, because she can't just let the cryptids kill humans. But before she takes the drastic step of killing them she tries things like relocating them first. Anything that will keep her from taking a sentient being's life simply for doing what nature designed it to do.

Verity has made decent inroads with the cryptid community, but not so well with the dance career because of all her work with the cryptids. And her work with the cryptids is about to leap into first place for a while, as Dominic, a member of the Covenant comes to NYC to see if the city is ready for a purge. If the Covenant comes to NYC it would mean there wouldn't be a single cryptid alive by the time they left; not too mention the risk to not only Verity, and by extension her entire family.

The characters are well-rounded and engaging from the very beginning, with the appeal of being relate-able and interesting. The interpersonal dynamics are entertaining and run the gamut from insane to downright romantic and sweet.

Ms. McGuire has a talent for world-building that is to be applauded, keeping the story well balanced between the world we know and the one we unknowingly share with the cryptids. The story arc moves along at a nice clip, never letting the reader's attention wander to others things they should be doing, like getting some sleep before work rather than continuing to read. And if all that isn't enough to make you want to pick up the book, then read it solely for the pleasure of experiencing the Aeslin mice!

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An inventive UF by Seanan McGuire, with a fun change in tone from her more serious October Daye books. I'm not wholly sold on the ballroom-dancer-who-is-also-a-monster-hunter angle, nor is Dominic on my Top 10 Hotties list, but the Mice are funny and the world McGuire created is one that I'd like

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to explore further.

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Cocktail waitress in a strip club by evening, a double identity as a dance show reality star and professional ballroom dancer, and a family career of studying (and sometimes policing) the Big Apple's incryptids: Ginger Rogers may have done everything Fred Astaire did backwards and in high heels,

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but Verity Price is killing monsters in - and sometimes with - her five inch stilettos. Very even has her very one colony of worshipful Aeslan mice (don't ask). It's a practically perfect life.

But when the things that go bump in the night - and make wonderful gingerbread - start disappearing, Very has her work cut out for her. You know those rumors about alligators in the subways? Well someone's decided the reality is a dragon, and they're intent on waking it up. Virgin sacrifice anyone?

Humor, action, a smart-mouthed, fashion-conscious heroine, and who could resist the mice? Definitely a keeper.

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typical of most the urban fantasy mix that is out there except Verity is a hot mess, in the worst connotation of that phrase.

Very fun book. The writing style is witty and humorous. The action keeps rolling. The writing voice and the alternate Cryptid-filled New York are what made me rate this book so high. That and the Aeslin Mice. I LOVE THOSE MICE.

The down points for me were...
- The romance you could see coming from a

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mile away. Dominic and Verity... I had high hopes they would wind up as arch-nemeses or something, even after they knocked boots. But instead they wound up all happy. Blech.
- How straightforward the plot was. Aside from Betty and Dave's involvement, there were no real twists. We were told it was a dragon. It was a dragon. They found the dragon and talked to it.
- The ending was anti-climactic. Especially after reading her Feed series, it was a huge letdown.
- I think I read somewhere that McGuire has OCD. I don't know if it was a joke or if it was serious. But reading her writing I can believe it. She repeats little details a lot.

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A great, fun urban fantasy set in New York. Verity Price is not a shrinking violet or still trying to "find" herself. She has definite choices, but she has what she needs to make a decision. Finally a heroine who is not a wimp! The cryptids are different, but different with reason, not just

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different to be different. They are people, too, kind of....

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