Darker Angels by MLN Hanover
Urban Fantasy- Sept 29th, 2009
4 stars

Darker Angels is the 2nd in the MLN Hanover's urban fantasy series. This series starts with tension and has some unexpected twists that are sure to keep the pages turning. I do feel it can be read alone. However, new readers will have a better understanding from having read the first book since it will give them insight into the nuances of the full cast of characters.

Jayne Heller was a typical college student until her mysterious uncle died. Suddenly Jayne finds herself the keeper of a dangerous heredity legacy. One that includes fighting spiritual parasites and wizards. She must quickly adapt to a dark underworld where she is untried and where the rules of the game can mean certain death. Now that she has finally resumed a sense of normalcy in her `new position' she is contacted by a mysterious FBI agent who pleads for help. She asks Jayne and her cast of buddies to save a young girl from possession in New Orleans. As Jayne and her group try to save the girl new doubts about what she has been taught are called into questions as she tries to steer herself between the murky lines of right and wrong. As she fights against betrayal and an unexpected and deadly foe Jayne has all she can handle.

This dark work will delight fans of urban fantasy looking for something new and different. Instead of the usual cast of shifters and vampires MLN Hanover concentrates more on the magical and a seamy world filled with deadly possession, dark magic and consequence. Her novel is not cut and dried and many times I was torn between liking and disliking the characters as fealty shifted and emotions ran high. Jayne continually struggles to decide who are her really her friends and who are her true enemies. For those readers looking for an edgy and dark atmospheric story, they will find a haven in this new series. However, if you are a reader who enjoys lighter books with more clearly defined endings you may feel disappointed. Although this book does have a little romance it is primarily fantasy with plenty of bite and mystery.

In short, this is an original series that will be sure to thrill readers of dark fantasy.

Reviewed by Steph from the Bookaholics Romance Book Club ( )

The premise: ganked from BN.com, because I'm lazy like that (and have a LOT of reviews to catch up on!): When Jayné Heller's uncle Eric died, she inherited a fortune beyond all her expectations — and a dangerous mission in a world she never knew existed. Reining in demons and supernatural foes is a formidable task, but thankfully Jayné has vast resources and loyal allies to rely on. She'll need both to tackle a bodyswitching serial killer who's taken up residence in New Orleans, a city rich in voodoo lore and dark magic.

Working alongside Karen Black, a highly confident and enigmatic ex-FBI agent, Jayné races to track down the demon's next intended host. But the closer she gets, the more convinced she becomes that nothing in this beautiful, wounded city is exactly as it seems. When shocking secrets come to light, and jealousy and betrayal turn trusted friends into adversaries, Jayné will soon come face-to-face with an enemy that knows her all too well, and won't rest until it has destroyed everything she loves most....

My Rating

Worth the Cash: it's not quite as strong as Hanover's debut, but once it kicks into gear and certain twists are revealed, the book definitely lives up to the precedent set by Unclean Spirits. Other readers may figure out the twists long before I did, but I'll admit I was reading at warp-speed and simply let certain details bother me (and trust me, if you don't figure it out, there's going to be quite a lot of things at first that BOTHER you) in hopes that everything would come together in the end. And they do (which means they don't bother me any more). There's lots of fun to be had, revelations to really enjoy, and an excellent use of setting in post-Katrina New Orleans (says she who's never, ever visited the city, so she may be wrong, but she liked it). Overall, I was very pleased. I still enjoy the cast very much, especially with all of their human flaws, and I look forward to seeing what kind of trouble they get into next. Especially given the last line of the book, which I wanted to hit the author for. No, seriously. It's a great ending, but you're going to want to hit Hanover too. :)

Review style: I'll be nice and won't get into any spoilers, save for a few minor things that aren't spoilers to begin with. Fair? If you're interested, the full review is at my LJ, which is linked below. As always, comments and discussion are most welcome. :)

REVIEW: M.L.N. Hanover's DARKER ANGELS

Happy Reading! ( )

Good series. This is another solid installment. Liked it. I like stuff that deals with the voodoo aspects, and this is one of those. ( )

I picked this book up the moment I saw it. Having greatly enjoyed the first in the series, it was a no brainer for me to dive into part two.

I recall really enjoying the various characters surrounding Jayne in the first tale. This one has more of a focus on Jayne, and less on any of the other characters. I still want to know more about Chogyi and Ex. And I'm still very curious about these lawyers at Jayne's disposal. This was not to be in Darker Angels.

Although I didn't enjoy this as much as the first one, Unclean Spirits, it's still an alright follow up. Something felt like the characterization, settings, and actual events weren't as sharply depicted as they were in the first tale.

The thing is, this might have been done so on purpose. The stories are told in first person from Jayne POV. And there are definite mind games going on through the first 2/3 of the story. I would say the very beginning of the book, and the last 1/3 are very close to the first books pace.

The tale here revolves around a serial killer/rider that has been tracked to the Big Easy by an ex-fbi agent. This agent, Karen, was apparently an old friend of Uncle Heller.

The gang (Jayne, Aubrey, Ex, and Chogyi) all head to New Orleans without much of an idea of what to expect. The descriptions of New Orleans are pretty decent. This is taking place after Katrina, and the signs of it's devestation are detailed through out this story.

The story is also steeped in voodoo. This leads to some interesting situations.

All in all, I believe this would have been better to read immediately after finishing the first one. I still enjoyed it, and finished it in one week. But the first one, I completed in a marathon one day reading. ( )

I don’t read urban fantasy – or so I thought. I tried a novel or two when the bookshelves started to fill up with covers depicting women scantily clad in black leather, all with tattoos on their lower backs and weapons of one sort or another in their hands, but they seemed rather generic and – at least the ones I read – not all that well-written.

Then I heard about that M.L.N. Hanover was actually Daniel Abraham, the author of the Long Price Quartet. So far I’ve only read the first in that series, A Shadow in Summer, but I admired it greatly, and am looking forward to reading the next three straight in a row when time allows. So much did I like Abraham’s work that I was willing to take another chance on urban fantasy and try out the two novels in the series titled The Black Sun’s Daughter, written by Abraham’s alter ego.

I’m glad I did. The two novels published in the series to date, Unclean Spirits and Darker Angels, are a kick to read, just pure adrenaline-fueled fun. I haven’t had this much pure entertainment since I rode the Screaming Eagle at Six Flags in Gurney, Illinois a million years ago. I wish there were more books in this series available right now, because I’d swallow them whole right this minute.

Unclean Spirits starts when Eric Heller dies and leaves his entire estate to his niece, Jayné Heller (her first name is pronounced zha-nay, but it’s frequently mispronounced as plain old Jane). Jayné is just a few days shy of her twenty-third birthday when she learns that she has suddenly become wealthy – the kind of wealthy that not only doesn’t have to worry about where the next meal is coming from, but doesn’t even have to worry about keeping a roof over her head, because she can always pay cash for a house if she needs one. She meets her uncle’s lawyers and his assistant, Aubrey, all of whom seem normal. Although she’s pretty dazed at her sudden good fortune – especially given that she’s just dropped out of college, has been disowned by her immediate family, and hadn’t figured out what to do with herself when this news came out of the blue – everything seems as normal as it can seem when you’ve essentially won the lottery but lost the only relative you cared about.

That is, it seems normal until Jayné goes to her uncle’s apartment in Denver and finds a corpse in the bedroom. Things quickly get worse when the corpse opens its eyes and speaks to her. But everything’s okay; Midian is simply very, very old. In fact, he was born the year they stormed the Bastille, he explains. And oh, by the way, it was a bunch of evil wizards who killed her uncle. Jayné is dubious until four figures break into the apartment and try to kill her, and she is able to fight with a great deal more ability than she ever imagined. Between the two of them, Midian and Jayné kill the four strangers – and Jayné is now deeply into something about which she knows nothing.

Unclean Spirits tells the tale of how Jayné begins to learn who her uncle was and what magic is, and a very little bit about who she is herself. She does this while attempting to destroy the magician who killed her uncle, working with his allies. There are a number of disasters along the way, including the near death of a young man Jayné finds herself beginning to love. Relationships with others begin for the sake of convenience and turn into strong bonds of friendship and sometimes enmity. As the book ends, Jayné is still alive and has accomplished what she set out to do, but she is still almost completely ignorant about her inheritance – both in terms of what material things are out there, and in terms of what she has gained by learning of the magical world she lives in. Jayné is strong, sexy and smart, but she isn’t too much of any of these; she is far more real and vulnerable than your average heroine.

Darker Angels opens six months later. During the interim, Jayné has had her staff – her uncle’s former assistant and two men who had helped him out from time to time, one an ex-priest known as Ex and one who is – well, Chogyi Jake is hard to describe, but the feeling emanating from the character is peace, even in the context of incredible violence. The group is in Athens, Greece, performing an inventory of Jayné Uncle Eric’s possessions in his house – now Jayné’s house – magical and otherwise. They’ve been skipping from city to city around the world doing the same thing, and they’re all exhausted.

Which means they’re not really in good shape to take on a new case. But when a call comes in to Eric’s cellphone (still programmed to say “Hey, you’ve got a call” in Eric’s voice, freaking out everyone who hears it) from a former client, asking for help in New Orleans, Jayné jumps at the chance to get more information about her uncle. If it means dealing with a supernatural beastie attempting to take over a teenager’s body, well, why not perform a good deed in the meantime?

But Jayné and her group are getting involved with New Orleans voodoo, and they don’t know the territory. Legba gives Jayné a good, strong warning early on that she barely survives; but Jayné is stubborn. The group fractures under the pressure, but still the notion of helping that teenager is so compelling that Jayné can’t help but soldier on.

In this second book, each of the characters becomes more clearly defined. Ex is no longer merely the one who performs exorcisms; he is a whole person, with his own loves and past and issues. Chogyi Jake becomes something more of a mascot to the group, with the way he exudes calm, though he is still more of a cipher than the others. Aubrey and Jayné both develop and retard their relationship, much like relationships usually work.

In the meantime, the reader gets a good look at New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. And the reader gets a lesson in voodoo and the power it gives its practitioners in this alternate universe, especially to women. And it’s all written with such tension that the book nearly vibrates in your hand. I read it in less than 24 hours, barely pausing to work, eat or sleep.

So I guess I read urban fantasy after all. At least, I read it when it’s written by M.L.N. Hanover. This is great stuff, and at mass market paperback prices, you can’t afford to pass it up. ( )