Black Swan Rising

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When New York City jewelry designer, Garet James, stumbles into a strange antiques shop in her neighborhood, her life is turned upside down. John Dee, the shopkeeper, offers her a large sum of money, to open a silver box. When she does so, otherworldly things start to happen. Garet learns that she has been pulled in a prophecy that is hundreds of years old, and opening the box unleashes an evil force onto the streets of Manhattan.

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Fair submitted by Susan4Pax -prev. sueij- on August 14, 2013, 8:00pm (Warning: Contains minor spoilers) This was a random "Here's a new author, give it a try" Christmas gift, which is always a fun thing. And it was a reasonably fun romp, but I'm not sure that I'll bother reading the second (or, Lord help us, the third) book in the trilogy.

First off, it took a while before it felt like we really got into anything worth reading... yet this wasn't because there weren't eventful things happening. It was odd.

Second, this was set in NYC in a way that really smacked the reader across the face. My sense of it was that this is one of those books where if you know NYC like the back of your hand, you are supposed to read the book and feel like you recognize every street corner and landmark that is described. But as someone who had visited a couple of times and just really doesn't care, it was personally a turn-off to have the city itself be such a major character. I want the characters and storyline to drive the story. Tolkien pulled off having the landscape be a character, but most others should leave it alone.

And third (here comes the minor spoilers), I felt like the authors used a saltshaker approach to populating the novel. "Hmmm... it's a fantasy. Let's add a vampire... and some fairies... we need a dragon... got any sprites yet? How about a goblin-y thing?" It just felt too haphazard and forced.

So... y'know... not a bad book, but not really one at the top of my list.