When I moved to New York to become a world famous journalist, I never imagined that snagging a job at a seedy tabloid would change my career path from trashy reporter to undercover agent. I’m Makenna Fraser, a Seer for SPI. I can see through any disguise, shield, or spell that a paranormal pest can come up with. I track down creatures and my partner, Ian Byrne, takes them out—usually saving my skin in the process.
Our cases are generally pretty routine, but a sickle-wielding serial killer has been prowling the city’s subway tunnels. And the murderer’s not human. The fiend in question, a descendant of Grendel—yes, that Grendel—shares his ancestor’s hatred of parties, revelry, and drunkards. And with New Year’s Eve in Times Square only two days away, we need to bag him quickly. Because if we don’t find him—and the organization behind him—by midnight, our secret’s out and everyone’s time is up.
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The Grendel Affair was an entertaining start to a new series. Shearin takes some of my favorite things from the urban fantasy genre, namely familiar monsters, mythology, and real world locations, and combines them into an interesting new take on what happens when just a few disgruntled people get their hands on technology that really shouldn't exist.
Mac and her coworkers are quirky in a good way, each one showing the beginnings of a personality that should be great for many books to come. Ultimately that's probably the only place where I'd say this book was lacking: action and plot it had for days, but I wish I'd learned more about the how the people who work at SPI came to be there. But at the same time that probably would have been a huge boring info-dump for one book so I'm going to keep my fingers crossed that we continue to learn more in future installments.
I'd highly recommend this to people looking for a new series in 2014, though it might not appeal to those who like a lot of romance in their book. There are hints of it here but it's not a major plot point or even really something that get's talked about at all until the very end.
Overall Feeling - B
Series - 1) The Grendel Affair 2) The Dragon Conspiracy (Coming 2014)
