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3.62 AVERAGE
3.62 AVERAGE
I'd been craving urban fantasy and this certainly delivered. It was a nice change of pace from what I normally read. I liked the characters quite a bit but I'd have liked more from the action scenes. I've already ordered the second book and look forward to continuing the series.
I want to know what happens next now. Waiting for the next book is always the worst part of finishing your current book. I want to see more Moses & Gavin and find out who the mystery woman is. But most of all I want more Liam & Clair. If it is anything like Chicagoland Vampires it could be awhile still but I am willing to put in the time!
3.5
I thought this was going to be the typical dumb portrayal of New Orleans. And honestly no. It's a good post Katrina narrative without being about Katrina.
Sure it's your basic "New Orleans is a vibrant city of culture and look at parades," but it also goes a bit deeper and actually captures a local perspective with actual ways locals talk.
Billed as a romance. Not enough of that.
Overall pretty average urban fantasy that I happened to enjoy as someone who lived and loved in New Orleans.
I thought this was going to be the typical dumb portrayal of New Orleans. And honestly no. It's a good post Katrina narrative without being about Katrina.
Sure it's your basic "New Orleans is a vibrant city of culture and look at parades," but it also goes a bit deeper and actually captures a local perspective with actual ways locals talk.
Billed as a romance. Not enough of that.
Overall pretty average urban fantasy that I happened to enjoy as someone who lived and loved in New Orleans.
The Veil was rather boring and bland. It's obviously the first book of a series, and I think I am losing my patience with so-so introductory books just so the series can be stretched out to 10 books.
Claire lives in a dystopic-esque New Orleans. The world hasn't collapsed, but it is recovering from an invasion of magical beings that came through the Veil in the area. The Veil's been closed for a few years before the story begins. Yet, there isn't much infrastructure left and the people who chose to reside in New Orleans are at the whims of trucked in food and the Containment troops (feds) that stomp around looking for trouble.
I don't know if it was supposed to echo something of Katrina? It's not martial law or anything serious, however. The rest of the world appears to be going on just fine, but that's never stated so well.
There are cameras all over the city trying to catch anyone using magic. A few paranormals were left out when the Veil closed. In addition, some humans are Sensitives, meaning they can use magic.
The magic ability seems to be unique to the person. Claire's ability involves moving objects. She sees a wraith attacking a girl and steps in to help, and is forced to use her magic. She knows the camera has seen her and is panicking.
Anyone that uses magic is sent to Devil's Isle, which actually sounds a lot worse than it truly is.
A handsome Cajun bounty hunter, Liam, steps in and immediately wants to help her. And she spends the rest of the novel trailing along after him.
The Veil is a rather typical urban fantasy, but I was disappointed that I found it to have very little humor. Where was the snark? That's the one trope I expect out of my UF, a snarky heroine. Because at least she has witty comments to combat poor plot-lines.
Claire has two friends and you guessed it - one is a smart black girl (Tadji) and the other is a gay white guy (Gunnar). Of course. I actually preferred Tadji and wished she was the main character. She had a better backstory and had more personal conflict.
It's hard to pinpoint Claire's character. She is kind to the people who shop at her store, and appears to be willing to help anyone in trouble. Other than that, I found she wasn't so developed. She definitely wasn't meek, but I didn't feel a strong presence of snark or independence. She trailed Liam like a puppy dog.
I found the arrangement of scenes weird. Liam takes Claire to see his house right in the beginning? It made the book start off so slow. And then the real plot doesn't begin until 2/3 of the book.
There are magic learning scenes. A mean guy who bullies Claire who has sneaking suspicion of what she's up to. A character that is two-faced that was rather predictable. A magical battle at the end ad Claire does magical things way above her level because she's the main character that's why.
Devil's Isle was really bizarre. I had a hard time believing the military would be so lax about all the paranormals there. A few cameras? Let them roam around and live in whatever abandoned houses are there? Maybe I have a cruel mind, but I would put them all up in a bright, white dormitory with 24/7 surveillance, aka a prison. Because if I am suspicious of all the paranormals, as the federal government is in this book, why be so lax with interment?
And you let humans live in there and just walk in and out? Just cause it makes Liam seem super cool that he lives on Devil's Isle?
I didn't like Liam. He was one-dimensional. In fact, most of the characters were just cardboard cutouts of typical UF characters. I haven't read Chloe Neill before, so I don't know if this is a trend or is this book is juts an unfortunate miss.
The plot isn't too original, and Claire didn't interest me too much. It doesn't help that I was also reading an Outlander book concurrently, so I kept hearing the Scottish pronunciation of Claire in my mind as I read.
Claire lives in a dystopic-esque New Orleans. The world hasn't collapsed, but it is recovering from an invasion of magical beings that came through the Veil in the area. The Veil's been closed for a few years before the story begins. Yet, there isn't much infrastructure left and the people who chose to reside in New Orleans are at the whims of trucked in food and the Containment troops (feds) that stomp around looking for trouble.
I don't know if it was supposed to echo something of Katrina? It's not martial law or anything serious, however. The rest of the world appears to be going on just fine, but that's never stated so well.
There are cameras all over the city trying to catch anyone using magic. A few paranormals were left out when the Veil closed. In addition, some humans are Sensitives, meaning they can use magic.
The magic ability seems to be unique to the person. Claire's ability involves moving objects. She sees a wraith attacking a girl and steps in to help, and is forced to use her magic. She knows the camera has seen her and is panicking.
Anyone that uses magic is sent to Devil's Isle, which actually sounds a lot worse than it truly is.
A handsome Cajun bounty hunter, Liam, steps in and immediately wants to help her. And she spends the rest of the novel trailing along after him.
The Veil is a rather typical urban fantasy, but I was disappointed that I found it to have very little humor. Where was the snark? That's the one trope I expect out of my UF, a snarky heroine. Because at least she has witty comments to combat poor plot-lines.
Claire has two friends and you guessed it - one is a smart black girl (Tadji) and the other is a gay white guy (Gunnar). Of course. I actually preferred Tadji and wished she was the main character. She had a better backstory and had more personal conflict.
It's hard to pinpoint Claire's character. She is kind to the people who shop at her store, and appears to be willing to help anyone in trouble. Other than that, I found she wasn't so developed. She definitely wasn't meek, but I didn't feel a strong presence of snark or independence. She trailed Liam like a puppy dog.
I found the arrangement of scenes weird. Liam takes Claire to see his house right in the beginning? It made the book start off so slow. And then the real plot doesn't begin until 2/3 of the book.
There are magic learning scenes. A mean guy who bullies Claire who has sneaking suspicion of what she's up to. A character that is two-faced that was rather predictable. A magical battle at the end ad Claire does magical things way above her level because she's the main character that's why.
Devil's Isle was really bizarre. I had a hard time believing the military would be so lax about all the paranormals there. A few cameras? Let them roam around and live in whatever abandoned houses are there? Maybe I have a cruel mind, but I would put them all up in a bright, white dormitory with 24/7 surveillance, aka a prison. Because if I am suspicious of all the paranormals, as the federal government is in this book, why be so lax with interment?
And you let humans live in there and just walk in and out? Just cause it makes Liam seem super cool that he lives on Devil's Isle?
I didn't like Liam. He was one-dimensional. In fact, most of the characters were just cardboard cutouts of typical UF characters. I haven't read Chloe Neill before, so I don't know if this is a trend or is this book is juts an unfortunate miss.
The plot isn't too original, and Claire didn't interest me too much. It doesn't help that I was also reading an Outlander book concurrently, so I kept hearing the Scottish pronunciation of Claire in my mind as I read.
I thought this was a good start for a new (to me) urban fantasy series. I think what made it good instead of great for me is I didn’t have particularly strong feelings about any of the characters. I didn’t dislike them, I just wasn’t totally sold on any of them immediately like I was in Neill’s Chicagoland Vampires series. It was a very unique idea and I thought the world building was really interesting. I am intrigued enough to want to see where the story goes and will definitely read book 2.
For what ever the reason, I decided to start reading the first book of Devil's Isle series before I'd have a look at the Chicagoland Vampires series.
The book has a somewhat slow start, but it builds the world Claire Connolly, the main character lives in carefully. New Orleans in a postapocalyptic state is another main character. If I would have to describe the book, I'd say it is very atmospheric and offers very distinct flavours. It is not a book with constant action and fights, but it deals with many themes, like definitions of us and them, who is good and who is bad, how does a society draw its lines, how do individuals living within this society draw their lines and how open are they to change their understanding of what really is.
What I love about all the characters that show up in this book is, that they make decisions based on what is important to them and based on how they understand themselves. Each character has got to find their own truth within themselves and this is what we all have got to figure out over the life we live be it short or be it long.
The book has a somewhat slow start, but it builds the world Claire Connolly, the main character lives in carefully. New Orleans in a postapocalyptic state is another main character. If I would have to describe the book, I'd say it is very atmospheric and offers very distinct flavours. It is not a book with constant action and fights, but it deals with many themes, like definitions of us and them, who is good and who is bad, how does a society draw its lines, how do individuals living within this society draw their lines and how open are they to change their understanding of what really is.
What I love about all the characters that show up in this book is, that they make decisions based on what is important to them and based on how they understand themselves. Each character has got to find their own truth within themselves and this is what we all have got to figure out over the life we live be it short or be it long.
adventurous
challenging
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
3.5 stars. It didn't exactly wow me but I didn't have to struggle to read it either. The pacing was good and it's definitely a fresh take on urban fantasy and magic. It's often the case with urban fantasy that the first book just doesn't floor me, but there was enough potential here that I will definitely give the next book a go.
Nope. This did not grab me at all. Honestly, I should have known better. Actually, I DO know better. I KNOW I do not like "post-apocalyptic" books. So I am not sure why I put this on my list at all, other than to say that when I first read the description, it didn't *sound* like a post-apocalyptic story to me. I don't know if I was drunk when I read the description or what, because when I re-read it just now, after realizing I didn't like this, it very clearly reads post-apocalyptic. So, I am chalking this up to my being in some way impaired, both when I put this on my TBR in the first place, and when I started reading it.
So, if you like post-apocalyptic stories, you may love this. As I do not, I only made it to chapter 4 before realizing this was not the book for me.
I strongly suggest not using my review as a determinant of whether you should read this if you like the post-apocalyptic genre. It absolutely isn't my thing, so I'm not a good judge of how it works within that genre, but since I did start it, I am reviewing it [it's my policy to review every book I read or attempt].
So, if you like post-apocalyptic stories, you may love this. As I do not, I only made it to chapter 4 before realizing this was not the book for me.
I strongly suggest not using my review as a determinant of whether you should read this if you like the post-apocalyptic genre. It absolutely isn't my thing, so I'm not a good judge of how it works within that genre, but since I did start it, I am reviewing it [it's my policy to review every book I read or attempt].