Grave Dance (Alex Craft 2) by Kalayna Price

Hello to all,

                  i'm posting this a little later than i hoped but my top priority at this moment is my dog. I had to go to the vet in emergency ( bad friday 13th) and the results are really, really bad. So, Right now i'm doing all i can to reverse the situation and stop the renal failure while keeping off the pain. Thankfully he has started to take his medecine without a fight but he isn't eating a lot right now and i can only pray everything will work and that he will get back on his pawn  healthy and happy  as soon as possible.

 Anyway i did manage to read, it just took longer^^ so today i continue with a series i started not too long ago but quite enjoyed and i wasn't disappointed so let see what i thought of Grave Dance

Happy Reading

Publisher: ROC

Publication: 2011

ISBN:  0451464095

Genre: urban fantasy, paranormal romance, witches, faes, Magic
Violence: strong
Language: normal
sex: none
Public: 18+

Source: bought

Short description from goodreads :

Whoever said dead men tell no tales obviously never met Alex Craft.

After a month spent recovering from a vicious fight with a sorcerer, grave witch Alex Craft is ready to get back to solving murders by raising the dead. With her love life in turmoil thanks to the disappearance of Fae Investigation Bureau agent Falin Andrews and a shocking “L” word confession from Death himself, Alex is eager for the distractions of work. But her new case turns out to be a deadly challenge.


The police hire Alex to consult on a particularly strange investigation in the nature preserve south of Nekros City. The strange part: There are no corpses, only fragments of them. A serial killer is potentially on the loose, and Alex has no way to raise a shade without a body, so she’ll have to rely on the magic of others to find leads. But as she begins investigating, a creature born of the darkest magic comes after her. Someone very powerful wants to make sure the only thing she finds is a dead end—her own

My opinion:

          This series is really getting more interesting after each book and I appreciate Alex more and more. She is an interesting character and I haven’t read about a lot like her. Yes I was hesitant before because this is a series about a witch making ghosts  and souls speak, with a death collector ( soul collector being more appropriate term) so I feared it would be really dark but I was wrong.

Oh this world is dark yes and there are some dark moment, violence etc but the focus isn’t on that… in a sense even the death doesn’t sound as terrifying either. Alex is respectful of the deceased; she doesn’t use them as general rule. I love her romance with Death, the soul collector… oki their relationship is strange and quite forbidden but it sounds sincere and he is protective of her. Falin, the fae, who appeared in book 1 can be gorgeous… and sometimes help her I don’t trust him ( yes in this story he gets some bonus point but if i could pick Death would get the girl)

This second book take place a few months after the events of book 1 in which Alex discovered her true nature… those events were not without leaving traces physically and psychologically… Alex is discovering new powers and her old ones don’t act like they did in the past… sometimes they seem more potent sometimes more unpredictable. In any case she knows she has to keep her head low to keep her secret.

When hired to look at a crime scenes, she discover that she can easily see past fae glamour  which could be dangerous for her but at first she doesn’t realize it’s glamour and tell a little too much. Also her fae nature is starting to affect her more deeply while she is still completely ignorant of their rules and of the numerous dangers.

I must say that the plot was really well twisted and I even had doubts at some moment^^; like I said Falin did won some points but I still don’t trust him. Alex will learn a lot about faerie and makes a few more enemies along the way.

This book doesn’t end on a cliffhanger at all but I must say I’m impatient for book 3. If you love Magic, investigation, suspense and romance this is a universe you should appreciate and more.

Score:  4,5/5

Disclaimer: All opinions are my own and no compensation was received in exchange for this review

Challenges:

Grave Witch (Alex Craft 1) by Kalayna Price

Good evening ( or day depending on the time you will be reading this^^) ,


                     Time is flying and Halloween is nearly upon us so i need to prepare after i take care of my health but at the moment i'm  wanting to read  more than anything else so when i was entering Brenda's event Ghoulishly Good Monster Mix Mash up and i saw yesterday a book that had been waiting on my pile for a long time i didn't resist and i started it... could have been used for yesterday topic ( zombie, reapers etc) at her event but i was really happy to discover that it was also fae and witch  and ghost ( this month main topic^^) and a lot less horror that what i feared at first.

This series had been recommended to me for long but i didn't feel like starting it ...it wasn't the right time, it could be too dark etc.... now it's halloween season so the "dark" factor was a little out of for me to delay my reading of this book and seeing the cover yesterday i just had to start it....once started i devoured it^^ a really great change with the last one i tried.

So today it's a great pleasure for me to introduce you to the Alex Craft series by Kalayna Price with the first book " Grave Witch". Happy Reading

Publisher: Roc

Publication: 2010

ISBN:  451463803

Genre: urban fantasy
Violence: mild
Language: normal
sex: mild
Public: 18+

Source: bought
 

Short description from goodreads :

 Grave witch Alex Craft can speak to the dead, but that doesn’t mean she likes what they have to say.

As a private investigator and consultant for the police, Alex Craft has seen a lot of dark magic. But even though she’s on good terms with Death himself—who happens to look fantastic in a pair of jeans—nothing has prepared her for her latest case. Alex is investigating a high profile murder when she’s attacked by the ‘shade’ she’s raising, which should be impossible. To top off her day, someone makes a serious attempt on her life, but Death saves her. Guess he likes having her around...


To solve this case Alex will have to team up with tough homicide detective Falin Andrews. Falin seems to be hiding something—though it’s certainly not his dislike of Alex—but Alex knows she needs his help to navigate the tangled webs of mortal and paranormal politics, and to track down a killer wielding a magic so malevolent, it may cost Alex her life...and her soul.

My opinion:

         I loved this one! I must said that I hesitate a lot before trying this series even if this book was in my TBR pile for age…I guess I was afraid it could be too dark but now I just regret not having read it sooner. This is a great mix of fae, ghosts and magic with a lot of action and glimpse of romance underneath.

We follow the adventures of Alex Craft, a witch specialized  in grave magic meaning she can raise shade, speak with ghosts and see in that other plane of existence… another bonus is that she can see and speak with souls collector and one she know since her childhood and nicknamed Death…. A really sexy male but they are rules and she can ask him all the questions she would love like his real name…. I loved their relationship and how it’s started did made me smile^^ . Sadly if her grave magic is really good, and that kind of magic is quite rare, all other kinds of “simple” classic magic are out of her reach or only possible at a basic level and with great difficulties. In a sense I loved she wasn’t all that powerful and had weakness it made her even more appealing.

Also the use of her power has a price and after each use she is left blind for a moment while her sight gradually deteriorates.

Alex has become a PI in memory of her best friend who disappeared without leaving a trace but so far it’s not really paying well however since her family disowned her for practicing magic  it’s one of the only job she can do and she does do it well. She even has several friends in the witch or magic community and also some fae ones like her house owner Caleb. It’s when she is called to investigate the murder of an important member of the anti fae and magic users group ( Witch and fae got out of the closet but sadly some are hard bind to strip them off any right) that things start to heat up. First, for the first time she loose control of a shade, normally only a memory, and get hurt before seeing something magically strange. Then she escaped narrowly to be shot at thank to a direct intervention of Death which should be forbidden.  Suddenly everyone wants to kidnap or kill her and it’s only with the help of a new fae: Falin that she must learn to trust and a ghost Royce determined to get his vengeance that she can have a chance to solve the case and she must do it quickly because a serial killer is killing women and her injury is worse that it seemed and she could loose her soul.

I really loved how some mysteries got hints sometimes subtle sometimes easier and I didn’t manage to guess everything so it was more than a pleasant read. I’m really curious to see who will get and keep her heart Falin or Death because both seem to be prevented to have a real relationship with her for a reason or another but both took risk for her. I also loved the universe as a whole and how the fae were depicted….she must find a way to save her dagger too I feeling she will need it a lot^^

So definitively a book I recommend and I’m so glad to have discovered it because it has all the element of an excellent series.

Score:  4/5

Disclaimer: All opinions are my own and no compensation was received in exchange for this review

Challenges:

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Brenda's halloween contests

One great thing with urban fantasy is the diversity of paranormal creatures that can appear in one book...hard to put those book in only one category so this one i inviting you to enter several of Brenda's contests...check the prize on the Zombie/Reaper Day Here; On the fairy Day here  and the Witch day (lot of fun today^^) Here. Remember you have only until Halloween and they are international! Good Luck