Confession: when it comes to this series, I have not been a faithful reader *hangs head*. But I’ve been picking away at it & just recently finished “Ball Park” which I really enjoyed. So when this came along, I grabbed it. I could probably sum up the babbling that follows with 2 words. Loved it. But then I’ve never been known for my editing skills.

 

The book opens with an uncomfortable scene from 1958. A young cop is put through a hazing ritual to prepare him for going undercover to infiltrate the mob in Montréal. It’s a long term assignment…years. And if accepted, he no longer exists. He will become known as Coalface.

 

It’s now 1978 & cop Émile Cinq-Mars has just been promoted to Sergeant Detective. So it’s only fitting that with his new rank comes a new case. Someone has broken into an apartment building. Seventeen times. Yep, 17 flats & 11 storage sheds were robbed. While he admires the thief’s work ethic, the location strikes Émile as an odd choice. This is a poor area, it’s not like the tenants were rolling in flat screens & jewels. But in one of the apartments, something was left behind.

 

In alternate chapters we follow a man who’s been undercover for 20 years. He’s had a hard life & is no longer sure he can distinguish himself from the Italians, Russians & Hell’s Angels he mixes with. If there’s one lesson he’s learned it’s that you don’t have to be dead to lose your life.

 

Émile & his partner are trying to get their heads around the robbery when his old boss gets in touch. Captain Armand Touton is a legend on the force & was Émile’s mentor when he worked night patrol.  Although retired, Touton is still connected & has a job for his former protégé. He’s been contacted by a man known as Coalface with an urgent message. There’s a war coming between rival gangs & he has a request. After filling Émile in on the past, Touton makes it clear he’s passing the baton. Deal with it.

 

Buckle up, people. To quote Dr. Seuss, oh the places you’ll go. This is a dark, noirish mind bender of a story with an intriguing cast. On the surface it’s your basic cops vs. criminals but the characters & prose make it so much more. You’re dragged into a world full of secrets, violence & shifting alliances. And that’s just the police department. At times, there’s more honour & loyalty to be found among the so called “bad guys” but the downside is they tend to have a shorter life span.

 

The plotting is first rate but what puts it over the top are the characters. They’re diverse & so well depicted you can almost hear them breathing. Just be careful who you care about….they can be driving the story on one page & gone the next. Standouts for me include Émile’s partner Henri Casgrain, the smart & compassionate Reverend Alex Montour & hilarious neighbour-from-hell “The Bombardier”. And, of course, Émile.

 

If forced to pick one reason I keep coming back to the series, it would be this character. He’s a complex & compelling guy who is the beating heart of each book. Émile’s path to the police force was not a straight line. Initially he studied to be a priest until he had doubts about his calling. Then he turned toward becoming a veterinarian but that didn’t pan out either. However he has no regrets as those experiences proved valuable once he became a cop. Now he gets to hear confessions and deal with animals on a regular basis.

 

Émile is a thinker, a quiet & solitary man who often sees what others miss. His vocabulary & dust-dry humour frequently sail over the heads of colleagues. But not Henri Casgrain. For me, their relationship & dialogue was one of the highlights of the story.

 

If I had to give this book a label I’d call it a literary police procedural. From descriptions of the characters & their inner conflicts to the richly atmospheric setting, you become completely immersed in this fictional world. The plot is intricate, intelligent & sprinkled with dry, gallows humour (is it wrong that I was grinning during a funeral scene?). But it also reflects the brutal reality of the relationship between poverty & organized crime in a big city.

 

I’m a bit stingy when it comes to handing out 5 stars. It’s reserved for books that make me oblivious to my surroundings & completely engrossed in the story. This did that in spades & so just like that, I’ve got my first contender for the Top Ten of 2020.

 

 

  

The paranormal world is in chaos. The elders are tired of their younger people playing the field, causing trouble, and fighting with each other. Everyone who attends the UPAC Conference now has twenty-four hours to claim a mate of a different species. If they don't, they will never have a mate. The spell is cast. There is no escaping the Midnight Matings. Software developer Gavin Ashby is perfectly happy with his life. He finds other people annoying after being around them for only a short period of time, and having a mate sounds like pure torture to him. Video game tester Ant Marino is satisfied with his quiet, solitary life. After being accosted and almost forcibly mated, he meets the aloof but handsome Gavin. Neither Ant nor Gavin are prepared for the feelings that arise. Will the two men continue to dance around each other or will they pounce on love and never let it go.

 

Review

 

I am a sucker for unusual shifters and it is even better and here we get a mouse shifter (yay!) and lion shifter.

Ant and Gavin. Here is the thing. Gavin is a jerk. Now, he was raised to be that way but it is still annoying. However, he does learn and improve. But, yeah, he is mean and knee jerk to often.

Ant is much better character. Willing to make the best of a bad situation and supportive. Brave.

We get to spend time with the Pride which really who cares? Jerky Pride. Politics. Bleh. 

I would have loved to spend time in mouse culture with the Mischief. 

So, not great but I might try another in this multi author series because bunny shifter.

⭐2 stars⭐

People are not recipes to be carefully measured and mixed together. Life is imprecise and messy.

Q:
She rode well, he begrudgingly admitted. In the beginning, he had watched her for any sign that she might change her mind. There had been a moment when Roar turned back to gaze at the shrinking city that had made him hope she would reconsider. But after a long, lingering look, she’d faced forward, leaned into the wind, and picked up her pace. And from that point on, the only times she had looked back had been with caution, as though she expected a storm to come barreling after them at any moment.
... Little by little, her nervous glances backward lessened, so that by the time they stopped to eat and rest at a spot known as Death’s Spine, she appeared completely at ease. Almost … giddy.
...But his eyes kept wandering to where Roar walked along the rocky line of sandstone that gave this area its name. Death’s Spine was the unofficial end of Pavan territory, and from this point on it was them versus the wildlands. There was something captivating about Roar, standing upon that dividing line—framed by civilization on one side and wild terrain on the other. She stared out at the surrounding land, hair blowing in the breeze, taking it all in like she was tasting joy for the first time. He blamed Jinx’s earth magic; when she worked it always seemed to affect more than just whatever plant she was focused on. The sun shone a little brighter, the grass appeared greener, even the breeze seemed to luxuriate in the presence of magic, curling indulgently around them. (c)

Well, this book was surprisingly good! I say that only because it took me ages to get past the first few chapters. I don't know if I wasn't feeling it at first, or if the book is just slow at the beginning, but once Aurora sets off on her grand adventure things get amazing! I loved every minute after that.

 

To Cora Carmack, I say thank you for writing such a fierce, yet realistic woman. One who carries the scars of her past, and is strong enough to move forward. I also thank her for writing a male interest who was anything but typical. Locke is a man who understands his power, understands Aurora's hurt, and takes that all into consideration. The spark between them felt real to me, and watching it grow made me smile.

 

I loved this! I hope the follow up comes soon!