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A review by kittyg
Poison City by Paul Crilley
2.0
* I was sent this book for free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review *
This is an urban fantasy book, and let me start out by saying that urban fantasy is often a genre that I don't tend to love as much as high/epic fantasy (hence the slightly lower rating). This book is slightly different from the 'average' urban fantasy in that it's set in South Africa. I liked that it wasn't the typical set up, and there were a few moments in the book where I felt as though I enjoyed seeing that culture come through a bit.
We follow a man called Gideon Tau (a.k.a. London Town) and his side-kick/spirit-animal Dog. Together they investigate crimes (of the magical kind) and get mixed up in all sorts of pretty dark goings-on. It definitely reminded me a LOT of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files books, so if you like them you may well like this, but it also had hints of Ben Aaronovitch's style too.
What I did like about this story is that it doesn't take long to get into the action and it was pretty fast-paced the whole way through. When it comes to crime-based books I like it to be quick and easy to read, becuase I find that I get a little bored otherwise, but this one was a fun and fast one.
One element of Urban fantasy that I don't really care for is a lack of character development. As the urban fantasy story is almost always on Earth in normal society, I feel like this leaves more time to develop characters over world, but I so rarely see this. It's not to say that the character's within this are totally flat, but they aren't totally real to me either becuase they didn't fully convince me of their motives and there were times when I felt as though the reasoning was a little thin.
On the whole this is a fun start to (what I assume will be) a series. I think there is potential, and there's a lot going on, but for me Urban fantasy is something I do tend to rate fairly harshly, so bear that in mind. If you do enjoy Urban fantasy books then you'll probably like this more than I do, but even if you haven't tried them before and just want a start point with Urban then this one works for that too. I would give this a 2.5*s overall.
This is an urban fantasy book, and let me start out by saying that urban fantasy is often a genre that I don't tend to love as much as high/epic fantasy (hence the slightly lower rating). This book is slightly different from the 'average' urban fantasy in that it's set in South Africa. I liked that it wasn't the typical set up, and there were a few moments in the book where I felt as though I enjoyed seeing that culture come through a bit.
We follow a man called Gideon Tau (a.k.a. London Town) and his side-kick/spirit-animal Dog. Together they investigate crimes (of the magical kind) and get mixed up in all sorts of pretty dark goings-on. It definitely reminded me a LOT of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files books, so if you like them you may well like this, but it also had hints of Ben Aaronovitch's style too.
What I did like about this story is that it doesn't take long to get into the action and it was pretty fast-paced the whole way through. When it comes to crime-based books I like it to be quick and easy to read, becuase I find that I get a little bored otherwise, but this one was a fun and fast one.
One element of Urban fantasy that I don't really care for is a lack of character development. As the urban fantasy story is almost always on Earth in normal society, I feel like this leaves more time to develop characters over world, but I so rarely see this. It's not to say that the character's within this are totally flat, but they aren't totally real to me either becuase they didn't fully convince me of their motives and there were times when I felt as though the reasoning was a little thin.
On the whole this is a fun start to (what I assume will be) a series. I think there is potential, and there's a lot going on, but for me Urban fantasy is something I do tend to rate fairly harshly, so bear that in mind. If you do enjoy Urban fantasy books then you'll probably like this more than I do, but even if you haven't tried them before and just want a start point with Urban then this one works for that too. I would give this a 2.5*s overall.