Property of a Lady Faire

April 14, 2014
Gumshoe mage Eddie Drood, aka “Shaman Bond,” finds his family ties strained in the scattershot eighth Secret Histories novel (after Casino Infernale). A phantom Voice tells Eddie that it’s holding his parents hostage. Eddie must find the mysterious Lazarus Stone to secure their release. He and his girlfriend, witch Molly Metcalf, endure over-the-top encounters with various entities in their quest for the stone, last in the custody of the Lady Faire, a multiply-gendered person who incites universal sexual desire (and whose portrayal may make transgender readers cringe). Eddie and Molly’s nonstop bantering forms a nucleus around which frantic encounters coalesce, providing diverting, if overwhelmingly pointless, action. Green attempts to wrest significance from the medley of bizarre incidents by focusing on Molly’s loyalty to Eddie, despite her own grievances with his family, and his choice between love and family power. However, the silly atmosphere is too pervasive for the story to escape shallowness.

May 15, 2014
A likable addition to a supernatural series (Casino Infernale, 2013, etc.; each volume is understandable even if you haven't read the others) about Eddie Drood and his family, whose self-appointed vocation is to protect ordinary humans from otherworldly nasties.This time out, Eddie, in his private-eye persona of Shaman Bond (modeled on James Bond, of course), must go to London's Wulfshead Club, where a series of unfortunate information leakages has taken place. He soon solves that one, but there are plenty of other items on the agenda. His recently deceased grandmother, the Drood Matriarch, bequeaths him a mysterious box that she promises will make him Patriarch of the family. Such a prospect holds no appeal, so Eddie takes the box but doesn't open it. The Merlin Glass, the magical doorway that allows Eddie to hop between dimensions, appears to have developed a will of its own. Worse still, Eddie and sidekick/girlfriend/witch Molly Metcalf are summoned to the government's Department of Uncanny, where Eddie's grandfather is Regent of Shadows-or, rather, was, since the supposedly unkillable Regent is now dead, slaughtered horribly along with his entire staff. And everybody who's anybody is blaming Eddie and Molly. Next, a disembodied Voice announces that it's kidnapped Eddie's parents, and if he wants to see them again, he'd better locate and hand over the Lazarus Stone, an object that has the power to bring people back from the past. To learn more, our heroes must interrogate the dreaded Drood in Cell 13. Via some patient-well, OK, violent-sleuthing, Eddie and Molly learn that the irresistibly alluring and unfortunately elusive Lady Faire has the item in question-and she's not about to let it go. Tons of plot, nonstop semicomic action, and further revelations about the entire Drood brood and their mysterious mission-what's not to enjoy?Close to the best of a fun series.

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May 15, 2014

Eddie Drood is on the outs with his notorious family again but this time might be for good. When he returns to the family manor for the reading of his grandmother's will, he is offered a powerful artifact that would allow him to rule over the Droods, but only if he gives up the love of his life, the witch Molly Metcalfe. Eddie instead decides to go after the Lazarus Stone, an object once owned by his family that has the ability to control time. The stone is in the possession of the Lady Faire, however, which means this mission just got seriously dangerous. VERDICT Jumping from battle to battle, the action never stops in this eighth series entry (after 2013's Casino Infernale) that attempts to cross James Bond-style secret agent high jinks with urban fantasy. Fun, escapist fare that goes down easier if you don't think about it too hard.

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