Deadly Spells

December 8, 2014
In the jumbled third Prospero’s War magical mystery (after Cursed Moon), detective Kate Prospero finds that balancing work with her personal life is becoming increasingly challenging. When the leader of her former coven is murdered by a Brazilian shapeshifter, Kate and her colleagues at the Magical Enforcement Agency must battle to keep the cartels out of the magical underworld city of Babylon. Tensions between magical and nonmagical residents are already high with the election of the city’s first Adept mayor, Kate’s former boyfriend John Volos. The parallels of magic and drug addiction are still present, but less prominent than the relation of magic to organized violence. Wells also attempts to continue some strands from the previous two volumes, resulting in a somewhat disjointed structure and perfunctory mention of previously key relationships. The valiant attempts to deal with the Adept versus Mundane discrimination, particularly in Kate’s love life and her brother’s school life, end with a more idealistic than realistic resolution. Agent: Rebecca Strauss, DeFiore and Co.

February 15, 2015

A new player has entered the potions-dealing underworld of the city of Babylon, and cop Kate Prospero and her partner Drew Morales fear that the already high level of violence among the magical covens is going to boil over. Agents from the Brazilian potion cartels are making a move, perhaps aided by people in Kate's old coven, the Votaries. She continues to face down her criminal past while raising her troubled younger brother, fighting the attentions of not only Morales but old flame (and new mayor of Babylon) John Volos, and trying to stop the coven war that's about to explode. VERDICT One of the best new series in urban fantasy continues to impress as Wells (Cursed Moon; Red-Headed Stepchild) shows her troubled heroine still struggling with her past but arriving at a better balance that promises a happy future. If this is the final book, it's a good one, although the world Wells created in which potions stand in for drugs and covens are as dangerous as any urban gang is rich enough to support more stories.

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