A review by thereadingrambler
A Shot of Gin by Phoebe Wagner

adventurous emotional fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

One Sentence Review: A vampire/urban fantasy novel that presents much-needed updates and twists on the genre, leaving me wanting more. 

Juniper “Gin” Cain works security for a vampire-owned casino in Reno, Nevada, after discovering that her blood is gross to vampires, implying she is not quite as human as she thought she was. That was two years ago, and since then, she’s only gotten pulled further into what she calls the darkness, the secret world of fae, vampires, werewolves, witches, and more. The longer Gin spends in the darkness, the more strange powers she discovers she has. She resists learning to control them, afraid of herself and everything else, even as she finds a new home and family with the other casino employees. Everything starts to fall apart when a zombie appears, not just because there is a zombie in the casino but because zombies are supposed to be extinct. 

Gin is supremely relatable and likable. She has undergone a series of traumatic events and responds to them in a way that I found believable and understandable. Her responses and actions came out of a place of confusion, trauma, fear, longing for normality, and loneliness countered by her stubbornness, cleverness, and generally being a good person. There was something so relatable about her struggle to deal with everything she’s learned about the world and herself but still have friends and community and do right by them. We are given enough about her backstory to understand where she came from and where she wants to go, but not so much that we are bogged down in the details of tragedy to create cheap sympathy. Wagner creates a realistic, lived-in young woman who has a past, present, and future without having to overwork her emotional and mental experiences. 

The secondary characters fleshed out Gin’s character and this paranormal version of Reno. The two main vampires, Colton and Clarisse, were delightfully twisted and ambivalent in their allegiances with the perfect dash of sexy hunter (or huntress). Leia, Gin’s former college roommate and a witch, was a complicated character mirroring Gin’s own complexity. Their relationship fell apart, and they have their own interpretations of why that happened and what the results are now. Winston, the changeling, is the world’s most supportive friend. I appreciated how all of Gin’s friends gave her the space to process what was going on in her world but didn’t let her wallow in a pity party. She was given a night to get drunk and forget everything, but the next day, she needed to get back to solving her problems. I want to know more about every single character. 

This isn’t a book with a staggeringly original plot, but like with most of my favorite books, I don’t care if the plot is predictable if the characters are interesting. After all, how many of us live truly original lives, but aren’t we still each individual?
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