Magic Bleeds

By Ilona Andrews

Ace Books

eISBN: 978-1-101-18776-0

4.75 stars

Magic Bleeds is the fourth book in the Kate Daniels series.  And, let me tell you right here how much I love these books.  I put off buying this one when it came out this summer (Why I don’t know?  I think it had to do with a book buying ban or some other foolishness.) but I gave in when I knew I would be traveling for work.  I wanted something that would suck me in, entertainment, and leave me searching out places to read.  Andrews provided me that little respite with this book, and also, how happy was I to find out there are three more books to come after this one!  So, now the gush is over…the review.

Kate Daniels is making good on a bet she lost to Curran, the Beast Lord.  When he stands her up, she does her best not to make her way to the Keep and rip his head off knowing that as an employee of the Order of Merciful Aid which deals with all magical problems, it would make relations between the Pack and the Knights of the Order even more difficult.  Instead she goes about her days cleaning up magical messes trying not to think about Curran.  Without knowing it, she stumbles onto a strange phenomenon, magically poisoned individuals that emit plagues.  These infectious people start showing up all over magic-ridden Atlanta and all seem to become her problem.  While trying to deal with and contain a possible plague, Kate’s aunt, a god who loves to demolish worlds, appears and it’s not a happy family reunion.  In the midst of trying to figure out how to kill her aunt, she finds herself falling harder for Curran who seems intent on making her his mate.

As the fourth book in the series, I will say this — you can read this book on its own because much is explained and the story here is self-contained enough to make it easy to follow — but why would you do such a thing?  There’s too much fun to be had reading them all.  What I love about this series is the world itself.  The Atlanta in these books is subject to waves of magic that flood the city with craziness.  There are shapeshifters, vampires (But of a different type than most are used to so don’t let that turn you off.), mages, beasts, and everything else you can possibly think of.  Kate is crass, hardheaded, crazy, and funny.  She cracks jokes at the most inappropriate times and she makes the story fantastic.  It’s an odd mix I’ll grant you but you have to trust that somehow all of the ways in which magic makes things happen in these books will work and it does.  Andrews takes a number of fantasy elements and staples and tweaks each one so that it becomes gritty and dark.  For me, it’s like brain candy of the highest caliber.

The love story between Kate and Curran finally comes to some understanding in this book and I couldn’t wait for it to happen.  In fact, I had been waiting for three books for this one so without wanting to ruin this if you haven’t read it yet, I won’t say more.  While I’ll admit to not always being a huge fan of love sub-plots, this one worked for me.  Kate and Curran are two great characters and the reason I keep reading this series.

If you’re looking for different, dark fantasy, you might want to try these.  It’s not your standard fantasy telling but this is a world that will pull you in and you won’t want to put the book down.  The three previous books in this series are: Magic Bites, Magic Burns, and Magic Strikes.