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Oct. 29th, 2012 11:56 amFor the record: I am in New York! We are not yet underwater and are in fact spending the unexpected day off quite comfortably at home, in our pajamas, hanging around on the Internet! So far there are no signs that this state will not continue, further updates as warranted.
Meanwhile I will take this opportunity to talk about my favorite New York-based paranormal romance-ish series, Alaya Johnson's Zephyr Hollis books.
-- okay, admittedly, there is not much competition here, since I don't think I'm actually reading any other paranormal romance-ish series. But these are set in the PARANORMAL 1920s and are about a determined do-gooder known as the "Vampire Suffragette" because of her earnest and idealistic dedication to causes such as immigrant rights, childhood education, and vampire blood banks! She is so very much That Girl, you know, the one you knew in college who spent half her time standing on street corners handing out leaflets, and you took one every time to make her feel better even though you also guiltily knew you were going to throw it away when you passed the next street corner because you didn't want to carry around an extraneous piece of paper for the rest of the day. IT'S GREAT. I LOVE HER.
I also love her roommate, Aileen, a romance-novel-reading medium who would just like to make enough cash with her psychic abilities to have a nice wardrobe, and their sort-of friend Lily the socialite reporter, and Nicholas, the tiny psychopathic child vampire that she is teaching his letters to, because that is just what Zephyr Hollis DOES when she comes across tiny psychopathic child vampires. (I talked about my mental casting of Nicholas in my review of the first book of the series, Moonshine; you get three guesses and the first two don't count.)
As is often the case with these sort of things the romance is the least interesting part to me, but Zephyr tries very hard to be responsible about the ethics and power dynamics of her Thing with Amir the morally ambiguous djinn and I very much appreciate that! This is especially true in the second book, Wicked City.
The plot of Wicked City also features vampire Prohibition battles, and a big Mayoral election, and a beautiful and tragic gay interspecies cop romance, and the development a Destiny for Zephyr, which makes me kind of sad because I didn't think Zephyr needed a Destiny! Zephyr's Destiny was to be the best and most earnest and idealistic do-gooder in the city and that was enough for me.
On the other hand it also gave me the promise of Zephyr and Aileen and Lily as WACKY CRIME-SOLVING ROOMMATES in Book Three, along with more Magical 1920s Social Issues, so, you know, I'm back on board regardless.
Meanwhile I will take this opportunity to talk about my favorite New York-based paranormal romance-ish series, Alaya Johnson's Zephyr Hollis books.
-- okay, admittedly, there is not much competition here, since I don't think I'm actually reading any other paranormal romance-ish series. But these are set in the PARANORMAL 1920s and are about a determined do-gooder known as the "Vampire Suffragette" because of her earnest and idealistic dedication to causes such as immigrant rights, childhood education, and vampire blood banks! She is so very much That Girl, you know, the one you knew in college who spent half her time standing on street corners handing out leaflets, and you took one every time to make her feel better even though you also guiltily knew you were going to throw it away when you passed the next street corner because you didn't want to carry around an extraneous piece of paper for the rest of the day. IT'S GREAT. I LOVE HER.
I also love her roommate, Aileen, a romance-novel-reading medium who would just like to make enough cash with her psychic abilities to have a nice wardrobe, and their sort-of friend Lily the socialite reporter, and Nicholas, the tiny psychopathic child vampire that she is teaching his letters to, because that is just what Zephyr Hollis DOES when she comes across tiny psychopathic child vampires. (I talked about my mental casting of Nicholas in my review of the first book of the series, Moonshine; you get three guesses and the first two don't count.)
As is often the case with these sort of things the romance is the least interesting part to me, but Zephyr tries very hard to be responsible about the ethics and power dynamics of her Thing with Amir the morally ambiguous djinn and I very much appreciate that! This is especially true in the second book, Wicked City.
The plot of Wicked City also features vampire Prohibition battles, and a big Mayoral election, and a beautiful and tragic gay interspecies cop romance, and the development a Destiny for Zephyr, which makes me kind of sad because I didn't think Zephyr needed a Destiny! Zephyr's Destiny was to be the best and most earnest and idealistic do-gooder in the city and that was enough for me.
On the other hand it also gave me the promise of Zephyr and Aileen and Lily as WACKY CRIME-SOLVING ROOMMATES in Book Three, along with more Magical 1920s Social Issues, so, you know, I'm back on board regardless.
