Fantasy Dreamer's Ramblings

Darkness Calls by Marjorie M. Liu
Hunter Kiss Series, Book 2
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Year: 2009
Pages: 303
Author's Website | Twitter
Read an Excerpt

They are the obsidian shadows of my flesh - tattoos with minds, hearts, and dreams. By day, they protect me. But when night calls to them, they leave my body, dissolving into their true form - as demons…

Nomad born and bred, demon hunter Maxine Kiss has always relied upon herself to fight the darkness that surrounds her, the predators-human, zombie, and otherwise - who threaten the earth. But one man has penetrated her lonely life: Grant, the last of his kind. With music he is able to control any living creature…including demons. And now his life is in danger.

Haunted by the past, determined to change the future, Maxine soon understands that to save Grant, she has only one choice-to lose control, and release her own powers of darkness…

Darkness Calls begins shortly after the ending of The Iron Hunt, the first book in the Hunter Kiss Series. You will find the same exquisite story telling style that was displayed in The Iron Hunt, and the action is pretty much non-stop from start to finish, gritty and dark in nature as before, moving at a faster clip than the first book. A couple of new characters are introduced, helping spice up the storyline and some answers are given to the questions left dangling from the first book.

I want to say, I adore the boys! The boys, Maxine's living, demon tattoos, are indestructible, sharp as obsidian, yet soft and adorable at the same time. It depends on if they consider you friend or foe, which side of them you get to see. I loved how the boys would hum a Bon Jovi song that would fit the situation at hand throughout the book. It helped heighten the drama and give you a feel for that scene.

"Their tiny claws pricked my skin like kneading cats, and their soft, high-pitched hum of Bon Jovi's "Social Disease" filled the air."

Maxine's and Grant's roles are almost a reversal from the usual boy/girl relationship. Usually, you see the guy as the dark, brooding, kick your ass personality in the relationship but not here. That's Maxine's role. Don't interpret that as Grant is a pansy because he's not. Grant can definitely take care of his own and then some. Grant is Maxine's lighthouse when the waters are dark and rough.

This series should be read in order, especially since The Iron Hunt sets the back story for the Hunter Kiss Series. As you can probably tell, I'm hooked on the Hunter Kiss Series, I'll be looking for the next novel when it comes out.

• Hunter Kiss * Novella in the anthology Wild Thing
• The Iron Hunt - My Review
• Darkness Calls

Other Reviews:

• Babbling About Books, and More!
• Darque Reviews
  
• LiteraturelySpeaking
  
• Preternatural Reviews
• Undercover Book Lover
  

The Iron Hunt by Marjorie M. Liu
Hunter Kiss Series, Book 1
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Year: 2008
Author's Website | Twitter
Read an Excerpt

Silver smoke winds around my torso, peeling away from my ribs and back, stealing the dark mist covering my hands and lower extremities...tattoos dissolving into demon flesh, coalescing into small dark bodies. My boys. The only friends I have in this world. Demons.

I am a demon hunter. I am a demon. I am Hunter Kiss.

By day, her tattoos are her armor. By night, they unwind from her body to take on forms of their own. Demons of the flesh, turned into flesh. This is the only family demon hunter Maxine Kiss has ever known. The only way to live-and the very way she'll die. For one day, her demons will abandon her for her daughter to assure their own survival-leaving Maxine helpless against her enemies.

But such is the way of Earth's last protector-the only one standing between humanity and the demons breaking out from behind the prison veils. It is a life lacking in love, reveling in death, until one moment-and one man-changes everything...

Maxine Kiss was raised by her mother to be a loner and a nomad, moving place to place, keeping to herself, having no friends outside of the boys. The boys are her living tattoos that she wears on her body by day, they peel away at night to become her personal, demon protectors that she lovingly calls "my boys". Maxine is from a warrior race of demons created long ago to guard the humans from the demons and zombies. She is the last of her line and they call her The Hunter.

Going against family tradition, Maxine has put down some roots with Grant Cooperon, who has a few special gifts of his own, in Seattle, Washington at the Coop, a homeless shelter owned by Grant. Grant is also a former priest. Maxine has some trepidations about about living with Grant but she loves him and can't keep herself from not staying with him. In Maxine's own words:

"Grant Cooperon, my magic bullet. And it was going to kill me one day."

Maxine senses that the veil, a prison created ten thousands years ago to imprison the most dangerous of demons, has opened and something evil has slipped through the cracks to earth's realm. Maxine has to find out what slipped through, before it finds her.

I love the way Marjorie M. Liu writes, her words are like poetry, the way they flow off the page. It was a treat to read The Iron Hunt coupled with Ms. Liu's writing style and an introduction into world of demons that is a rare one with many dimensions to explore. I enjoyed the closeness and companionship that Maxine shares with her boys. The romance in this story is very subtle, the love shared between Grant and Maxine is unquestionable from the very the start. Which I think is refreshing to see the protagonist in a solid relationship throughout the story. Maxine Kiss is a strong, warrior through and through but she is also kind, she has a softer side.

This is a read that requires your full attention because there is so much going on every page. At times the story can be dark and bleak. The Iron Hunt is an engrossing, solid story with action throughout it's pages. The end ties up the major plot point of this story but leaves a lot questions needing answers. Most of those questions are answered in Darkness Calls.

The Iron Hunt has a prequel Hunter Kiss, a novella in the Wild Thing anthology. I did not read the prequel and feel it didn't hinder the story in any way.

On Goodreads I gave this book: 4 Stars

• Hunter Kiss * Novella in the anthology Wild Thing
• The Iron Hunt
• Darkness Calls - My Review

• Darque Reviews
• mis(h)takes
• Scooper Speaks