Questions, Part 3 (Spawn #3) ★★★☆☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Questions, Part 3
Series: Spawn #3
Author: Todd McFarlane
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comic
Pages: 32
Words: 1K

Synopsis:

From Imagecomics.fandom.com

Spawn suddenly recalls his ex-wife's name is Wanda Blake. He decides to head to Central Intelligence Agency Headquarters to dig up Wanda's file to find her. He thinks about how he used to think it's an invasion of privacy but now he just wants his old life back. His memories are slowly returning to him and he knows the devil is playing with him. He knows there are many unanswered questions he needs to solve like who the clown was he met in the alley.

Elsewhere, Malebolgia laughs as he watches from his throne. He continues his plot to expand his army and use Spawn to aid in gathering the requisite soldiers. He's glad he has sent several other followers to check in on him as no one from Hell truly trusts each other.

Sam Burke and Twitch Williams pour over the casework they have pilling up with the mob heart surgeon killings. Outside, Violator prowls the alleys singing songs to himself about murder.

At the Central Intelligence Agency Headquarters, Spawn breaks in to find Billy Miller sexually harassing his secretary Linda who is already married. Spawn picks him up by the throat and warns him to keep it in his pants. He then takes the file on Wanda Blake and retreats into the night.

Malebolgia laughs as Spawn uses violence which he loves and yearns for.

On the rooftops, Spawn reads she had started a fund in his name and maps the information to her current location.

Outside of Wanda's house, Spawn uses his Necroplasm energy to transform into a Caucasian once more. He rings the doorbell and is beside himself with how beautiful she is. When a small child named Cyan comes to the door, he faints.

Upon waking up, he finds Wanda has married Terry Fitzgerald, and together they had Cyan. He is belittled as he could not have children with Wanda and now understands the devil is playing with him showing him that his wife has moved on, remarried, and had children. Spawn leaves wishing her happiness.

In a nearby alley, Spawn's spell wears off and he returns to his vigilante costume. The clown walks up and threatens him again. This time he transforms in his true form of the Violator in front of him. Slightly surprised, Violator takes advantage of Spawn's distraction and quickly plunges his hand into his chest ripping out his heart. Spawn collapses on the ground dead.

Violator walks away, shocked that Malebolgia's favorite human was already dead.

Violator hears, "who said anything about being human" from behind him and turns around to see Spawn rejuvenated with green Necroplasm healing his heart wound.

My Thoughts:

If I was 15, I bet this volume would have blown me away. Spawn finding his wife, only to find she has remarried and has a little girl, that is quiiiiiiiiite dramatic! Him vowing vengeance on the demon (it's name is Malebolgia I guess?) reminded me of what happened to Ghost Rider in one of the storylines, ie, he is given powers of darkness but chooses to fight the darkness instead of joining it.

Pile on the revelation that Spawn is supposed to be the focal point for a new army of somethings for the demon and you have a real passle of problems!

This little “Questions” arc has been a good intro to Spawn. I've enjoyed it and I like the art enough that I think I'm going to keep on reading this series. I'll try to talk about the artwork in the next volume, as it's really hard to write about a storyline for a 25page comic. I don't know how dedicated comic bloggers do it for volume after volume. My hats off to you.

★★★☆☆

• All of My “Spawn” Reviews

Questions, Part 2 (Spawn #2) ★★★☆☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Questions, Part 2
Series: Spawn #2
Author: Todd McFarlane
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comic
Pages: 32
Words: 1K

Synopsis:

From Imagecomics.fandom.com

A clown stands in an alley discussing all the gruesome ways he can kill someone to a regular alley cat. The clown claims to be the Violator to the cat and that he would be going after Spawn later that night.

Spawn is drawn to the top of a church cross for the second time. He begins wondering how he'll find his wife and how she'll accept him now that he's been disfigured. He curses at the devil for betraying him in his deal to come back and knows that he's messing with him. He knows he's controlling when he gets these visions and thinks it's a sick twisted game to him. His thoughts are interrupted when he spots a strange clown waving at him from the shadows of a nearby rooftop. The clown disappears into the shadows.

Later that night at the Dawncorp Building, mobsters are attacked and have their hearts ripped from their chest. The Violator stands over a bloody mess.

The news channels report on more "heart surgeon" killings. Another channel reports on Wanda Blake opening a new care clinic for disabled children.

On top of the church, Spawn attempts to use his magic to transform his skin back to the way it was before he died. He's shocked to find out that he turns himself into a white man when he knows he should be African American.

Sam Burke and Twitch Williams discuss the paperwork piling up on their desk. They now have six cases from the heart surgeon and no leads.

The violator takes out a mob boss named Gino. He shudders when Gino mutters the name, "Jesus" over and over again and rips out his heart.

Spawn receives a flashback of Jason Wynn, who had taught him to fight. He recalls getting into more fights and disagreeing with Wynn's ideals. He found that Wynn was slowly becoming evil. Spawn becomes faint from the shock and exhaustion. He falls into a nearby alley.

Upon waking up, he finds the clown and recognizes him from the rooftop. The clown tells him the he is the Spawn and a hellspawn sent back to earth. Shaking it off, Spawn dismisses the clown and walks away. Upon turning his back, the clown reveals his true form of being the Violator and asks him to not turn away and to, "have a heart!"

My Thoughts:

So, first revelation is that it is NOT Spawn who has been killing off the mobsters, but some sort of demon who calls itself the Violator, a gruesome looking killing machine of a monster. He also seems to be, at the same time, a short fat crass crude clown. A very peculiar juxtoposition.

Spawn is having his memories trickle back and realizes part of his deal with the demon involved magic. He tries to heal himself from the burnt husk that his body is and turns into a blond haired, blue eyed white man. We learn he's supposed to be a black man. At the same time we see a little counter go down from 9.9.9.9 to some lower number, so it is apparent that when Spawn uses magic, it's not a limitless resource.

The Violator is yanking Spawn's chain in some verbal abuse when the comic ends. I was looking at the digital file I have and it's only 25 pages long. Not because the comic is missing 7 pages of story but because it's missing 7 pages of ads. When I tried to review my Silver Sable comics almost 3 years ago I really noticed the ads in the paper copies I had. Thankfully, those ads were not included in these digital Spawn comics but just realizing they took up almost 25% of the book is eye opening.

★★★☆☆

• All of My “Spawn” Reviews

Questions, Part 1 (Spawn #1) ★★★☆☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Questions, Part 1
Series: Spawn #1
Author: Todd McFarlane
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comic
Pages: 32
Words: 1K

Synopsis:

From Imagecomics.fandom.com

Spawn (Al Simmons) stands on top of a building in New York City. He died and has returned but he can't recall why he's there. He remembers being tricked and how this wasn't the deal he expected.

Five years ago in 1987, news flash reports discussed the recent death of American hero, Albert Simmons, who had saved the president's life previously working in the CIA. Some channels reported on how his wife, Wanda Blake, appeared with another man at the wake, Martin Alexander.

Spawn recalls being a part of the CIA, Jason Wynn, and his death. He wanted to return to someone, someone he loved. When he sees a vision of his wife, he recalls making a deal with a demon to return. He curses the demon as it was his terms and now he can't recall his past life. Spawn feels his new power surging through him and decides to find his wife. Once he gets some answers, he'll track down the demon who screwed him on the deal.

At a crime scene elsewhere, Sam Burke asks Twitch Williams about a mobster murder. Twitch explains several times to Burke that while he was thrown through a window, he died of his heart being removed from his chest and being shoved into his mouth. Burke shows little remorse as several other major crime syndicate members had been killed recently in a similar manner.

At a nearby rooftop, Spawn spots several men sexually attacking a woman. He easily disposes of them and uses part of his necroplasm to bomb them.

As the men flee, Spawn experiences another flashback, even stronger than before, and he feels he MUST find Wanda.

Upon returning to his senses, he finds he wept in the woman he saved arms as she holds him and feels his pain.

News reporters report on today's news of 1992 that a fourth gangland murder has been committed. There are also reports of the spotting of Spawn.

As Spawn wanders through the streets, he angrily pulls down his glove and realizes his body is charred and physically disfigured.

Twitch and Sam can't believe the physical damage Spawn caused to several of the gang members with his necroplasm bomb.

Elsewhere, Malebolgia watches over Simmons and says outloud to himself that he will have so many more problems coming his way as he breaks into a maniacal laughter.

My Thoughts:

Last month Paul did a review of a comic called Spawn Universe. Spawn is a comic book character from the 90's and has been successful enough that he's still around and inspiring his own multiverse. It made me feel rather old. I was getting into comics the same time that Spawn was just hitting the comic book stores and wowing all the teenagers with its edgy, dark, “mature” content that Marvel and DC weren't willing to provide to teenagers. Since I stopped being a teenager just a year or two ago I figured it was time to check out this iconic character that really helped make Indie Comics viable.

First off, the Fandom page provides so many answers to things that I had questions about which were not possible to know without having read much further, that I'm hesitant to visit there again. I will of course, because writing my own synopsis for a 32page comic book is a total downer and not what I signed up for when I was born.

It would appear that Spawn was a Special Forces military guy who died, made a deal with a demon to return to life so he could be with his wife. Only the demon, surprise surprise, had some additional clauses that he didn't tell Spawn about. Like not remembering his former life. So Spawn figures out he's back to hook up with his wife, but he doesn't know who she is or anything. During this period he's killing off crimelords, for no reason that I can tell. And he's doing it extremely violently and making a big splash doing it.

He has a costume, which we know nothing about. I figure we'll learn why it's so “cape'y” later on. There are also many references to Youngblood, another superhero team produced by Image Studios, the same studio that produced Spawn. We also see the demon that made the Faustian bargain with Spawn, which means they are real and not just a delusion of his. Which leads me to wonder, are there going to be angels or other supernatural forces for Good?

A lot of questions. Which I'm sure is exactly what McFarlane had in mind in crafting this. Nothing keeps people coming back and buying your comic like unanswered questions that they want the answers to.

★★★☆☆

The King in Yellow and Other Horror Stories ★★★☆☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The King in Yellow and Other Horror Stories
Series: ----------
Author: Richard Chambers
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: Horror (kind of)
Pages: 177
Words: 72K

Synopsis:

Consisting of the following short stories:

The Repairer of Reputations

The Mask

In the Court of the Dragon

The Yellow Sign

The Demoiselle d'Ys

The Prophet's Paradise

The Street of the Four Winds

The Street of the First Shell

The Street of Our Lady of the Fields

Rue Barrée

My Thoughts:

The author of this collection states outright in the introduction that only the first 6 stories are truly related to the subject of the King in Yellow and that the rest of the stories are just romances about young people in some frenchified town. I was extremely thankful for that warning. It helped me finish the book instead of DNF'ing it.

I must say that I really enjoyed the stories that dealt with the story of the King in Yellow, however tangentially. Madness and weirdness, insanity and the supernatural, all mixed together without quite being able to tell which was which. It really hit my literary tastebuds and was delicious. If any of you have any suggestions for more King in Yellow reading, please drop me a line in the comments.

The romances on the other hand, were what dragged this down to a 3star read. They weren't terrible like a Georgette Heyer romance, but neither were they anything near an Austen romance. They were mediocre stories about young people being all hormone'y and young people'ish. If that's your thing, then have at it and enjoy.

I wish there was a site called TheKinginYellow.com where it listed all the books or stories associated so I could simply go down a list. By the by, I checked and some scumbag is holding onto that domain, trying to sell it for over $3000. I hope he goes mad. Anyway, it doesn't seem that TKIY has the same fanbase and mythology as say Lovecraft, which means fanfics won't be as extensive. Oh well.

★★★☆☆

The Exorcist (The Exorcist #1) ★★☆☆☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The Exorcist
Series: The Exorcist #1
Author: William Blatty
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: Horror
Pages: 282
Words: 101K

Synopsis:

From Wikipedia

An elderly Jesuit priest named Father Lankester Merrin is leading an archaeological dig in northern Iraq and is studying ancient relics. After discovering a small statue of the demon Pazuzu (an actual ancient Assyrian demon), a series of omens alerts him to a pending confrontation with a powerful evil, which, unknown to the reader at this point, he has battled before in an exorcism in Africa.

Meanwhile, in Georgetown, a young girl named Regan MacNeil is living with her famous mother, actress Chris MacNeil, who is in Georgetown filming a movie. As Chris finishes her work on the film, Regan begins to become inexplicably ill. After a gradual series of poltergeist-like disturbances in their rented house, for which Chris attempts to find rational explanations, Regan begins to rapidly undergo disturbing psychological and physical changes: she refuses to eat or sleep, becomes withdrawn and frenetic, and increasingly aggressive and violent. Chris initially mistakes Regan's behavior as a result of repressed anger over her parents' divorce and absent father.

After several unsuccessful psychiatric and medical treatments, Regan's mother, an atheist, turns to a local Jesuit priest for help as Regan's personality becomes increasingly disturbed. Father Damien Karras, who is currently going through a crisis of faith coupled with the loss of his mother, agrees to see Regan as a psychiatrist, but initially resists the notion that it is an actual demonic possession. After a few meetings with the child, now completely inhabited by a diabolical personality, he turns to the local bishop for permission to perform an exorcism on the child.

The bishop with whom he consults does not believe Karras is qualified to perform the rites, and appoints the experienced Merrin—who has recently returned to the United States—to perform the exorcism, although he does allow the doubt-ridden Karras to assist him. The lengthy exorcism tests the priests both physically and spiritually. When Merrin, who had previously suffered cardiac arrhythmia, dies during the process, completion of the exorcism ultimately falls upon Father Karras. When he demands that the demonic spirit inhabit him instead of the innocent Regan, the demon seizes the opportunity to possess the priest. Karras heroically surrenders his own life in exchange for Regan's by jumping out of her bedroom window and falling to his death, regaining his faith in God as his last rites are read.

My Thoughts:

I think this book would have been much easier to read as fictional horror if I didn't believe that demons are real, that possessions are real or that exorcisms are real. That being said, Blatty is no Christian. He grew up catholic and this story deeply reflects that but he was what you'd call a “nominal” catholic. A “nominal” X is someone who likes to say he is X but only believes or practices select bits of X while criticizing and trying to change every other bit of X. It is kind of like saying you love pizza and then only eating the cheese and throwing the rest away.

My main issues with this book weren't about the demon possession or the nature of evil. Unfortunately, it was all with the nature of God. The older priest, Merrin, believes that God is an Omega Point (from what I understand that is extremely similar to the hindu idea of Nirvana, where everyone becomes part of one gigantic thingamajig and loses their individuality). That is extremely problematic for me as it denies what God has revealed about Himself in the Bible as a personal God. It also makes Jesus' sacrifice on the cross and His resurrection meaningless as we're all going to reach perfection naturally on our own through evolution.

My other issue is that Jesus, as God, is barely mentioned. In the Bible, in the New Testament, the disciples of Jesus and then later others, cast out demons in Jesus name. They didn't use complicated rituals and perform mystical ceremonies. The name of Jesus has power for those who believe in Him. It really felt like the author believed in the power of evil and demons but wasn't quite so sure about the power of God.

With these issues in mind, I think this is going to be the first and last book by Blatty that I read. There's a sequel to this called Legion that I had on my TBR but that's not going to happen now.

On a final note, ouija boards are dangerous. They open the user up to the supernatural and unfortunately, only the evil side of that. Don't play around with them folks, they are not a game.

★★☆☆☆

 

Crusade (Saint Tommy, NYPD #5) ★★★✬☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Crusade
Series: Saint Tommy, NYPD #5
Author: Declan Finn
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 171
Words: 53.5K

Synopsis:

From the Publishers & Me

Still working abroad, Detective Tommy Nolan has a hot tip that leads him to Germany. Women and children are disappearing from Catholic Bavaria. The local police have their hands tied. Tommy is the last hope for answers.

Yet again, Tommy is in over his head. What starts as a sex trafficking ring turns into a terrorist conspiracy to unleash Hell on Europe. To stop it, Tommy must fight Nazi vampires, terrorists, and a swarm of succubi who want him as their next meal.

With the help of a local german police officer, a jewish rabbi with the secret of the golem at his fingertips and a group of bavarian special forces armed with paintball guns filled with holy water, it's up to Tommy to put a stop to the rite that will raise Asmodeous the demon. Unfortunately, Tommy doesn't get there in time and a hell gate is opened. This allows Jade, the succubus who ran the sex trafficking ring to gain incredible amounts of power and become a low level demon herself. She and Tommy duke it out, Tommy wins and they find Asmodeous trapped within a circle. The battle exorcist from the previous book is left to deal with him.

Tommy adopts one of the girls rescued from the sex ring and it turns out she has some sort of psychic powers. With his wife just having given birth to his own biological daughter, Tommy's family is growing by leaps and bounds,

My Thoughts:

I think the first thing I need to say is that this book doesn't shy away from some very tough subjects. Sex trafficking is not only happening in Africa or the Middle East or South America. It is happening here in the United States and in all of Europe as well. It is pervasive and evil and Finn doesn't sugar coat it. He's not graphic nor describing the horrors in detail, but one woman is raped to death off page as an object lesson to the other prisoners. With that said, lets talk about the more pleasant aspects of the book.

Tommy gets to fight nazi vampire muslim terrorists. No joke. Vampires, unfortunately, play a very small part. They simply crumble to dust when touched by Saint Tommy. The author does go into speculation about pre-history, much as he did in the previous book about the stone and vampires are grouped into that era of lore. There are some seriously cool fight scenes but that leads into the one thing that made me knock half a star off the rating.

Finn is constantly making pop-culture references throughout this book. It was apropos and funny but those things have a very limited shelf life and I don't like them in the books I read. I find it cheapens them. Most of it was John Wick related this time. I love the movie John Wick and got it all, but in several years, even if the movie has cult status sticking power, people simply aren't going to know what Finn is referencing. Then there was the golem mecha vs the dragon succubi and I had to roll my eyes at that fight. It was just to over the top for my taste.

I've got one more book available to me in this series then I have to decide if I want to continue or not. Finn is up to book 8 and from the reviews I've seen he does have an end game plan, but it won't be for several books after 8. Upon reflection it would seem that my best option is to stop after book 6 and let him finish the series. Good thing I had this little conversation with myself!

★★★✬☆

• All My "Saint Tommy, NYPD" Reviews

Drood ★★★★☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Drood
Series: ----------
Author: Dan Simmons
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Horror
Pages: 725
Words: 281K

Synopsis:

From Wikipedia & Me

The book is a fictionalized account of the last five years of Charles Dickens' life told from the viewpoint of Dickens' friend and fellow author, Wilkie Collins. The title comes from Dickens' unfinished novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood. The novel's complex plot mixes fiction with biographical facts from the lives of Dickens, Collins, and other literary and historical figures of the Victorian era, complicated even further by the narrator's constant use of opium and opium derivatives such as laudanum, rendering him an unreliable narrator.

Collins narrates the story of how Dickens met a strange fellow named Drood at a railroad accident. Dickens is convinced that Drood is some sort of evil incarnate while Collins is pretty sure Dickens is just being Dickens.

As time passes however, Collins is no longer so sure that Dickens was wrong. Dragged along by Dickens in his quest to find Drood and uncover the mystery of who he is and what his goals are, Collins becomes a pawn of the mysterious Drood. Drood is King of the Underworld and a practitioner of dark arts lost since the times of the Pharoahs. At the same time Collins is also wooed by one Inspector Fields, a former head of Scotland Yard who is convinced that Drood has killed over 300 people and plans on some sort of supernatural takeover of London.

Caught up in his own literary world, Collins must contend with Drood, Fields, the success of Dickens and his own increasing use of drugs such as laudanum, opium and morphine to combat the pain and hallucinations brought about by syphilis and the scarab beetle put into his brain by Drood to control him. With the death of Dickens, Collins is sure that Drood will leave him alone, even though Dickens revealed to him that everything that had gone on before was a combination of mesmerism, hypnotic suggestion and drugs, all as an experiment on Dickens part and making use of Collins.

Collins knows better though and even though he outlives Dickens by many years, the shade of Drood haunts him to the end.

My Thoughts:

I went into this completely blind. I was hoping for a completion of Dickens' unfinished The Mystery of Edwin Drood. This was not that book. This was the syphilitic hallucinatory ramblings of an opium and morphine addict.

There were times that the narrator would talk for a whole chapter and then at the beginning of the next chapter you realized that the entire thing had happened in his head, or in his opium dreams or was just a wish fulfillment on his part. It was disturbing to say the least and by the end of the book I was having bad dreams. I didn't realize it, but this WAS horror and it affected me as such. Not your gruesome 80's slasher kind of horror, but the invisible dread that hovers over your soul kind of horror. While I've read some of Simmons SF, I'd never sampled his horror offerings. After this, I won't be trying out anything else by him.

With all of that, this was fantastically written, kept me glued to the pages and even though an unreliable narrator tends to send me into the screaming heeby jeeby rants I never once thought of stopping. Simmons kept me reading page after page like he had inserted a magic beetle of his own into MY brain. And that was disturbing to me too.

I think that some familiarity with Wilkie Collins' works, at least his Moonstone, would help a lot. Since this is a fictionalized account, I'm not sure that too much knowledge would actually help as the confusion between fiction and reality would make this even more of a psychedelic read. Unless you LIKE having your mind messed with, then by all means, dive into this head first and see what happens.

As a completion to The Mystery of Edwin Drood this was a complete failure. As a standalone horror story, it was a complete success. I shall try my hand again at finding another “ending” to the Mystery. I have my eye on one by David Madden but considering it was never released as an ebook, I'm not sure if I'll be able to get a hold of it. If you've heard of any other books or authors who tried to complete the Mystery, let me know please.

★★★★☆

• All Of My "Charles Dickens" Reviews

City of Shadows (Saint Tommy, NYPD #3) ★★★✬☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: City of Shadows
Series: Saint Tommy, NYPD #3
Author: Declan Finn
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 160
Words: 49K

Synopsis:

Tommy, now working for the Vatican as a spy for the New York Police Department, is assigned to go to London, as a new level of darkness seems to be hovering over the city. His “official” assignment is to help recover a lost jewel that was stolen from a museum. With known associates of an imam from the local mosque being shown on video as the ones committing the crime, Tommy thinks it's going to be an easy peasy piece of cake.

Then the imam accuses him of racism. The cops take his guns away. The cops try to arrest him. He's attacked by a group of young muslims with bottles of acid. He's attacked by muslims with what appear to be super powers. He's attacked by the shadows themselves. And the clients, a Power Couple of low royalty, who hired him to recover the jewel accuse him being in cahoots with whoever stole the jewel. Not a good time for Tommy.

This jewel, according to legend, was given to Pharoah by a god and is supposed to contain enough power, once properly charged with hatred, despair and death, to destroy a city, or control it. The imam wants to wipe London off the map, the Power Couple want to control England and Tommy wants the jewel destroyed. By the end of the book nobody gets what they want.

Tommy does save London, cleanses the jewel with a baptismal font's worth of holy water and gives it over to be hidden away in the archives of the Vatican.

My Thoughts:

This was probably the most action packed book so far. There's a riot scene where the muslims are out burning, looting and raping and Tommy bilocates many, many, many times to save anyone he can and ends up dying over and over and over in horribly gruesome ways. They don't just fade away, they are him and he feels it.

The author also makes a lot of hay, with my FULL support, about the ridiculousness of the London “knife” laws they have on the books. The main point wasn't that Authority had taken away the citizens right to defend themselves but that they had voluntarily given it up. It was depressing. At the same time Finn makes sure to focus on the fact that the real fight isn't against people but against the powers and principalities of this world, ie, demons. Tommy never makes the mistake of making even the iman his enemy. Right up until they confront a trio of the angelic host he tries to give them the chance to repent and at the end, they simply reject it. And suffer the wrath of archangels in consequence.

I did get a good laugh when he takes a poke at Evangelicals as self-righteous know it alls, because you're going to meet people like that and I've met them. The problem is, he ignores the fact that those same exact kind of people also are part of the roman catholic church. And I'd like to make one point here, while this is advertised as a “Catholic Adventure” series, it is really a “Roman Catholic Adventure” series. While Finn would say there is no difference, as a 7^th Day Adventist, there is a world of difference.

I continue to enjoy this action packed series with a more realistic look at what urban fantasy would look like from a Christian perspective. It also makes me thankful for the relative peace and quiet that I enjoy where I live.

★★★✬☆

• All My "Saint Tommy, NYPD" Reviews

Infernal Affairs (Saint Tommy, NYPD #3) ★★★★☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Infernal Affairs
Series: Saint Tommy, NYPD #3
Author: Declan Finn
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 182
Words: 51K

Synopsis:

From Amazon.com & Me

Detective Tommy Nolan is having a bad day. Gunfights are no longer a rare occurrence in his life. Not since he caught a serial killer demon and destroyed a death cult. He’s already had to relocate his family once. If things don’t settle down soon, he might have to leave New York for good.

And the NYPD can’t keep ignoring all the chaos and slaughter around Tommy. Add a murdered priest, a SWAT team raid, an internal affairs investigation and a million-dollar bounty into the mix, and Tommy’s whole week is ruined.

Every demon, monster, and gangbanger in New York and New Jersey are crawling out of the pit to claim the reward on Tommy’s head. It’s hard enough to fight demons when they’re breaking the law. But what can you do when they’re hiding behind it?

Turns out the Mayor is the mysterious Warlock and he wants Tommy dead to pay off his spiritual debts, of which the mayor has run up a lot of. With enough power, the mayor can turn New York City into a living hell and pay for his powers with the misery until the end of time.

Tommy's not about to let that happen! When the mayor takes a direct hand in attacking Saint Tommy, the bodies fly. But when the mayor's debt comes due, Hell doesn't care if he has Tommy in his grasp; the bill is due NOW and nothing is going to stop the demons from taking payment.

Tommy is saved to fight another day.

My Thoughts:

Another great action packed volume. And we get vampires. Well, to be honest, Tommy sees them and when they touch his blood they go up in smoke, so they disappear. I'm hoping we get more of them in later books. You get some demonic drones too.

It has been a couple of months since the previous book and life for Tommy and his family has settled down. Once the bounty goes out though, Tommy puts his family with D (the “good” criminal) and goes hell for leather with his partner. When he realizes he can't single handedly take down the Warlock due to the scumbag hiding behind the law, Tommy brings in the Feds. This has the affect of bringing Tommy to the attention of a single individual who seems to be doing what Tommy does, but on a national or international scale. Definitely opens up the literary vistas for us to explore.

Another thing I like is how short these are. At under 200 pages, I can read them on a weekend afternoon or a snow day and still have time left over to start the next book in my rotation. Makes me feel like I'm A Powerful Book Lord (more than I already am I mean).

★★★★☆

• All My "Saint Tommy, NYPD" Reviews

Death Cult (Saint Tommy, NYPD #2) ★★★★☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Death Cult
Series: Saint Tommy, NYPD #2
Author: Declan Finn
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 184
Words: 50.5K

Synopsis:

Even though Tommy defeated the demon in the previous book, the cultists who raised it are still at large and very unhappy that Tommy stopped them in their tracks.

Tommy is in the process of moving out from his old house with his family when they are attacked one night by what can only be described as zombies. Tommy realizes the cult is after him and his family and begins investigating.

Once again his investigating brings him into contact with the “Medical Facilities” where abortions are performed, whether the patient wants it or not. Tommy tracks down truck loads of discarded baby bodies which the cultists are using in their satanic rituals, which include eating said babies.

With pressure from the Mayor, Tommy is unsanctioned and has to go after the cult without police backup. Once the cult kidnaps his son, Tommy realizes he can't wait either. With help from a gang, Tommy and those who believe in his Wonder Worker powers go up against the cult.

Tommy and Co take down the Cult, destroy an idol of Moloch and think they destroy the man who has been creating and controlling the zombies. The book ends with Tommy having a face off with the Mayor and one of the Mayor's more powerful appointees turns out to be the voodoo man, still very much alive and well.

My Thoughts:

Once again, I thoroughly enjoyed this read. Part of my enjoyment stems from the fact that the author seems to really consider just how things would play out in these scenarios. If you stopped a cult, do you think they'd be “Oh, we lost. Good game. Ta ta.” Yeah, I don't think that either. Finn also shows what an uphill battle Tommy has because of people in power. He also shows that Tommy isn't living in a vacuum and that his choices affect those around him.

But at the same time, Tommy is never overcome. He trust that God gave him the powers he has for a reason and he's willing to use them to the fullest extent possible. When his son is kidnapped, Tommy is fully cognizant that to save his son he's probably going to have to sacrifice his own. Not once does Tommy whine or complain or act like a self-entitled wimp. When things go wrong, he doesn't blame God nor does he blame those around him. In short, Tommy is the kind of character I like to read about.

The introduction of zombies and the bokor (the person controlling the zombies) being a man of power in the city certainly made sense and also created some future battles. Having destroyed the idol of Moloch, the bokor's totem of power, you know he's going to continue going after Tommy and his family. And that is something else that I liked and want to talk about. Tommy never snivels about how he needs to be alone and cut off from his family to protect them. He realizes that he is stronger for being with them AND that part of his duty as a husband and a father is protect them. His wife has several guns, knows how to use them and does so. Tommy's son has a pistol, is learning krav maga and knows what to do when certain scenarios happen. Tommy and his family have thought through scenarios from each place in their house and have what the proper response is and they practice that. The man is enabling his family instead of crippling them with fear and a “hide and hope for the best” attitude. Oh, I am loving this series just for that. Tommy is a hero and one that I am enjoying reading about.

The action, while not quite as intense as the previous book, is still high and tight. Gun battles are great to read about, that is for sure.

★★★★☆

• All My "Saint Tommy, NYPD" Reviews

The Private Life of Elder Things ★★★★☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, Librarything & Bookype by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: The Private Life of Elder Things
Series: ----------
Editor: Adrian Tchaikovsky
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Cosmic Horror
Pages: 207
Words: 77.5K

Synopsis:

Publisher's Blurb

From the wastes of the sea to the shadows of our own cities, we are not alone. But what happens where the human world touches the domain of races ancient and alien? Museum curators, surveyors, police officers, archaeologists, mathematicians; from derelict buildings to country houses to the London Underground, another world is just a breath away, around the corner, watching and waiting for you to step into its power. The Private Life of Elder Things is a collection of new Lovecraftian fiction about confronting, discovering and living alongside the creatures of the Mythos.

With stories from Adrian Tchaikovsky, Keris McDonald and Adam Gauntlett

My Thoughts:

This was a fantastic little read. I only have one quibble, which is why this got 4 stars instead of 5. One of the stories deals with a ghoul and ghouls reproduce by necrophilia. It wasn't the main part of the story and isn't revealed until the end, but it just made me go “Oh, that is disgusting!” and wonder if I'd made a mistake in picking the book up. Thankfully, nothing like that is repeated.

I'm a sucker for short story collections. Something about an author distilling a story down to just a couple of pages, or even up to 20'ish, works really well for me. Now, I can't read just ONE short story. I won't sit down and read one short story all by itself. So short stories that are online only (like the Powder Mage short stories were before McClellan put them altogether in one book) are a complete no-go for me. But give me a collection and bam, I'm eating that stuff with 2 spoons, 3 forks and a bottle of ketchup!

I also have a soft spot for cosmic horror. As long as it's done well and doesn't rely only on violence and profanity to shock the reader. The Rites of Azathoth was such a book and when I started this collection I was a little afraid that that was what I might be getting. Thankfully, I got some good writing and some excellently shivery stories. Just what I wanted and expected from a book with a title like this!

One thing to be aware of is some of the limey slang. One of the stories especially seemed to be deliberately written so as to be incomprehensible to anyone outside the shores of Albion. If I hadn't read the movie review of The Sweeney a couple of months ago, I'd have been totally lost. Gor blimey govnah, the Sweeney is doing a real snazzertowsin. Ok, I made that up, but for that one story I felt like I had to get half the story from context instead of the actual words.

If Tchaikovsky were to put out another collection like this, I'd definitely be interested. But without his name I doubt I'd try something by the other two authors.

★★★★☆

Hell Spawn (Saint Tommy, NYPD #1) ★★★★☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission 

Title: Hell Spawn
Series: Saint Tommy, NYPD #1
Author: Declan Finn
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Pages: 206
Words: 59K

Synopsis:

Tommy Nolan is a detective in New York City. With his wife and young son, Tommy lives within walking distance of his precinct offices. One day Tommy begins to experience some strange things, things he can't really explain. But that all is washed away when a little girl is murdered right in Tommy's neighborhood and the killer leaves a personal message for Tommy written in the girl's blood. Then one of Tommy's neighbors is murdered in the same fashion. The problem is, Tommy had talked to her on the phone, long after it was possible for her to be alive.

Turn's out there's a demon loose in New York City and it has teamed up with a psycho killer who is a discredited medical doctor. Discredited because he experimented on live victims without their consent. Tommy manages to put the perp in jail but the demon's name is Legion and takes over many of the inmates and causes a riot that even the SWAT can't put down. Possessed men aren't too worried about a few paltry bullets or tear gas after all.

Tommy, after getting some backup from his local priest and all the surrounding priests, heads into the prison to confront the demon and exorcise it. He's a man on a mission from God and begins to experience the powers that Saints throughout history have been recorded as having.

Exorcising the demon gets the prison under control, but Tommy's life is forever changed as the demon reveals that Tommy has been chosen to be the Patron Saint of Detectives. While this situation has been dealt with, Tommy knows that a righteous man's work isn't finished while he has breath in his body.

My Thoughts:

First things first. On Amazon, right in the title, this bills itself as “A Catholic Action Horror Novel”. It certainly is. Considering how other urban fantasy series shove paganism down their readers' throats without a second thought, I don't see that being a problem though. Unless you're a religious bigot that is.

Now, was that a great opening paragraph or what? I was aiming for abrasive and since I bristled at myself when I read it out loud to see how it sounded, I knew I had succeeded. But seriously folks, if you can deal with Dresden or the Iron Druid Chronicles or Jayne Yellowrock or that author Jim Hines, well, you should have zero problems with the views put forth here. Especially if you espouse tolerance as the mainstay of your beliefs.

I enjoyed this a lot. While I have my issues with specific doctrines of Catholicism and even with the whole “Saints” thing, thinking of this as a supernaturally powered cop worked just fine. And it helped that Tommy had to obey some really strict rules that had 1000's of years of history behind them. Every ability exhibited was one that previous saints had shown, so Tommy isn't simply pulling power out of his butt. The internal consistency was refreshing. Too many times the rules of urban fantasy seem to get made up as the author goes along, or to not really have any rules beyond “it's supernatural, we just don't understand”. While the rules are being revealed to us as readers, they have a deep and abiding history backing them up.

One word of caution however. This is graphic in terms of violence. Finn doesn't shy away from describing in detail just how the demon possessed man kills his victims. It is really horrific. What is even more horrific is when it is revealed what those killings are based on in real life.

Another thing I did like was the whole family dynamic. Tommy and his wife aren't having drama to ratchet up the tension. She's the wife of a cop and knows what that entails. Tommy is teaching his son krav maga so he can defend himself and to help others who are being bullied. His son isn't a psycho emo goth whatever who Tommy is trying to “connect” with. Tommy is being the dad that every dad should be. It was just great to see a main character being in a stable family. They helped each other instead of draining each other.

Overall, I was very pleased with this read and am looking forward to more in the series. I believe there are currently 7. I know that Finn has also authored several other series. One of them falls squarely into the paranormal romance category though, so even if it too gets the “A Catholic Action Horror Novel” I'll be avoiding it like the plague.

★★★★☆