A review by writerdgabrielle
Tooth and Nail by Jessica Raney

4.0

I picked this up after hearing snippets of the next two read by the author. I know the author calls the exploits of Del Monroe "Appalachian Noir," but that only begins to define what is going on in this story. The closest I can offer for comparison is Elmore Leonard's world of Raylan Givens. But Raylan is conspicuously absent from this Hollow, leaving Galen Nolan unchecked to run his criminal empire.

Oh, and they're all shifters.

Well, not everyone. In this Appalachian town of, I imagine, a couple thousand souls, there are also vampires and ghouls, which Del learns to use to their utmost advantage by the end of the story. Make no mistake, Del will be pushed to the razor's edge, and it is a sharp one. Can she come back from it? Or has she accepted her destiny?

Overall, as a fan of Justified and urban fantasy, I was quite pleased with Tooth and Nail. My one complaint is that it was too short. And that is not in an "I wanted more," kind of way. There is more. There are two more books. I think there was room for more character development, beyond Del, and Nina to a lesser extent. I'm not suggesting bog the story down with excess fluff (or romance, bleh) but another 10k words scattered throughout may have made the difference for me between four and five stars.

Rated: Mature for language, violence, gore, drugs, animal death. Closed door.