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Saturday 18 August 2012

Review: GUNMETAL MAGIC

Gunmetal Magic by Ilona Andrews
Book 5.5 of the Kate Daniels series
Genre: urban fantasy

About Gunmetal Magic:
Some people have everything figured out — Andrea Nash is not one of those people. After being kicked out of the Order of Knights of Merciful Aid, Andrea's whole existence is in shambles. All she can do is try to put herself back together, something made easier by working for Cutting Edge, a small investigative firm owned by her best friend, Kate Daniels.

When several shapeshifters working for Raphael Medrano — the male alpha of Clan Bouda and Andrea's former lover — die unexpectedly at a dig site, Andrea is assigned to investigate ... and must work with Raphael. As her search for the killer leads her into the secret underbelly of supernatural Atlanta, Andrea knows that dealing with her feelings for Raphael might have to take a backseat to saving the world ...
Source: Info in the About Gunmetal Magic was taken from at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12288282-gunmetal-magic on 09/03/2012.


Review:
Gunmetal Magic is just a novella in the Kate Daniels series. This is the story of Andrea, Kate's bestfriend. Included in this book, is a bonus story which is another novella in the Kate Daniels series, titled Magic Gifts. I've read Magic Gifts as an ebook about last year, I think, and is one of my favourites of the Kate Daniels novellas. Together, these two short stories make a good reading, specially for old time fans of the series like me. But really, I was looking for another installment of this series as a full book. A continuation of the story, not side trips. In fact, I thought I was buying one. And that was a bit of a disappointment! However, having said that, I was still happy to re-read about Ivar, my favourite dwarf, in Magic Gifts.

Gunmetal Magic managed to present a full story with a solid story structure and a good plot despite it being a short story only. The build-up to the climax was gradual and nicely orchestrated. But for some reason the story telling quality in this short story is not as compelling as previous works were that I found it rather odd. However I did like the author's excursion attempt into the realm of investigative crime fiction genre. It melded well. I think with a little bit more work, Ilona Andrews can shift genres with this series rather smoothly, into crime fiction.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 4
Character development = 5
Story itself = 4
Ending = 4
World building = 4
Cover art = 4
Pace = 3
Plot = 4

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Kate Daniels Series:

11 comments:

Blodeuedd said...

I am going to read this this coming week. So excited!!! :D

Cherry said...

Blodeuedd - Looks like you got a wonderful reading time to look forward to! Enjoy!! :)

Tales of Whimsy said...

Short but solid. That's awesome!

Cherry said...

Juju at Tales of Whimsy.com - Yes, it was awesome!! :)

Kristina said...

I need to get a this one and read it asap, I love everything by Ilona Andrews!

Cherry said...

Kristina - If and when you get your hands on this book, Kris, you have a wonderful reading time waiting for you! :)

Mervi said...

I'm currently reading this book and it's great. :) But what do you mean by short story? It's around 300 pages long, which is pretty much the same length as most Kate Daniels novels.

Cherry said...

Mervi - The entire book is 433 pages long divided into two stories. Gunmetal Magic is from pages 3 to 326. Magic Gifts is from pages 329 to 433. Maybe I just gotten used to reading a Kate Daniels book which is a 400 pages long, thus a 300-page one is rather short for me :)

Melissa (My World...in words and pages) said...

Gunmetal Magic is only a novella? Wow, that is one long novella. lol. It's the length of all the books in the Kate series. Huh, I forgot Magic Gifts was in there as well. Cool! Thanks! I have it here on the shelf and look forward to reading it soon.

Cherry said...

Melissa (My World...in words and pages) - It felt like a novella, maybe because I read it through too quickly :)

Melissa (My World...in words and pages) said...

That's a wonderful sign Cherry! :D To read through that fast. :)

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