It is absolutely criminal what Kim Harrison does to Urban Fantasy! This has got to be the best Morgan Kingsley book yet – and the one that will have you bawling your eyes out the most!

Not quite as dark as some of the previous books in the series, this one is more like the first, less worry about the Ivy/Morgan dynamic, more action and trying to haul Morgan’s butt out of the fire.

Morgan seems to be growing up a little; the time with Al seems to be doing her a little good. However, every conspiracy theorist out there is going to loathe the witches’ council, manipulative buggers that they are.

I love the Morgan Kinglsey series, but I have a definite preference to the three members of ‘Vampiric Charms’ working on a case than delving too deeply into their interpersonal relationships. I’m content with the dynamic as it is, without the need to explore it further, particularly the Ivy/Morgan relationship, if it’s meant to be anything more, it will happen. So I was completed delighted to have a plot that was really about trying to stop Morgan from being killed by the Witches Council. Just like running from an I.S. death clause, only, they’ve all learn SO much more since book one! It just has to be explosive doesn’t it?

With Morgan being her normal self, skating on thin ice and holding on to life by a thread, Ivy quietly going through her normal OCD, Jinx gets to play the comic relief most of the time (as well as being the one to bail them BOTH out when the brown stuff fly’s). However, I think he’s come up with my all time favourite phrase in Black Magic Sanction:

This is so sweet, I think I’m going to barf fairy farts

It just appeals to the inner child in me!

For the most part this is pretty light, or at least in comparison to the rest of the series but Ms Harrison is not afraid to kill off her characters, or to let them die. This just isn’t fair! I swear I cried solidly for two chapters, and then continued to offer the odd sniffle throughout the rest of the book. I have never encountered an author who could blind-side you while telling the story head on like she can.

This story is a little more complete than some of the others, but there is still a definite air of continuation, and many, many, more adventures to come.

It’s so delightful to see the story go back to a similar feel as the first book and has given a whole new lease of life to the series. It feels like we’re ready to start a whole new chapter in the Morgan Kingsley saga, and now I just can’t wait to see what happens next.