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A review by richtate
Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews
2.0
I read this book because a friend of mine had highly recommended (see constantly nagged me to pick it up) that I pick it up and give it a try. I’m generally a huge fan of urban and high fantasy so after spending an hour toiling over what should be my next selection, I decided to give it a go, even though I had been somewhat resistant to the idea for quite some time.
Really should have stuck to my gut feeling on this one.
The novel itself is relatively shortly, very similar to early works of Butcher, Kearne and Harris and is certainly a quick read. I should say that personally the size of a novel never sways me one way or another. A good story is a good story, right? In this case it fell way short of being in that arena.
Personally I found the book to be rather unimaginative in the writing itself and that isn’t to say for a moment that Andrews hasn’t created a unique world in a post-apocalyptic, magic infested world where supernatural beings are very prevalent. It has all that in spades. The text itself seemed to drone on as the main character, Kate moves through a somewhat complex murder mystery.
Oddly, I also feel the need to defend this as obviously this was a first time publication and number one in a series so I’m sure the author wished to keep to a low word count in an attempt to make this viable to publishing houses, and I don’t begrudge that thought process at all.
The characters themselves are sort of interesting. Kate is dealing with the leftover drama of a dead family and losing her only remaining link to her childhood. There is also one other character, Curran, who I took an instant liking to but other than those two the rest of the cast is really just wallpaper, bland and never reaching any sense of growth or a compelling attachment in this reader. Again, there is the obvious trap here of low word count meets a slew of characters. Perhaps it would have been better to keep the story a bit more focused.
There are so many things Andrews could have done well with her backstory and characters, but she simply didn’t. I’m sure being that this a series all of these things evolve with the major storyline itself, but after reading the first installment I find myself wondering if it’s even worth my time to pick up another volume.
Overall I walked away from this with a meh sort of feeling. It was an OK book with and alright story. Maybe I’m a little spoiled at this point but I feel that there are plenty of authors that fill this space and do it much better than Andrews did in this specific piece.
Maybe I’ll give the second volume a shot, but I don’t see that happening soon. Maybe I just don’t get it, and maybe I don’t identify with it as well as others who have rated this book so highly, but for me it really isn’t worth the time to pursue the series after what I’ve just read.
Really should have stuck to my gut feeling on this one.
The novel itself is relatively shortly, very similar to early works of Butcher, Kearne and Harris and is certainly a quick read. I should say that personally the size of a novel never sways me one way or another. A good story is a good story, right? In this case it fell way short of being in that arena.
Personally I found the book to be rather unimaginative in the writing itself and that isn’t to say for a moment that Andrews hasn’t created a unique world in a post-apocalyptic, magic infested world where supernatural beings are very prevalent. It has all that in spades. The text itself seemed to drone on as the main character, Kate moves through a somewhat complex murder mystery.
Oddly, I also feel the need to defend this as obviously this was a first time publication and number one in a series so I’m sure the author wished to keep to a low word count in an attempt to make this viable to publishing houses, and I don’t begrudge that thought process at all.
The characters themselves are sort of interesting. Kate is dealing with the leftover drama of a dead family and losing her only remaining link to her childhood. There is also one other character, Curran, who I took an instant liking to but other than those two the rest of the cast is really just wallpaper, bland and never reaching any sense of growth or a compelling attachment in this reader. Again, there is the obvious trap here of low word count meets a slew of characters. Perhaps it would have been better to keep the story a bit more focused.
There are so many things Andrews could have done well with her backstory and characters, but she simply didn’t. I’m sure being that this a series all of these things evolve with the major storyline itself, but after reading the first installment I find myself wondering if it’s even worth my time to pick up another volume.
Overall I walked away from this with a meh sort of feeling. It was an OK book with and alright story. Maybe I’m a little spoiled at this point but I feel that there are plenty of authors that fill this space and do it much better than Andrews did in this specific piece.
Maybe I’ll give the second volume a shot, but I don’t see that happening soon. Maybe I just don’t get it, and maybe I don’t identify with it as well as others who have rated this book so highly, but for me it really isn’t worth the time to pursue the series after what I’ve just read.