decidedly average 2.5 stars
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I'd have given this 2.5 if i could, but will be generous and bump up to 3!
here is the formula for these books: (see also the anita blake series before it went porno & the kelly armstrong ones) - imagine a really self centred, hard bitten & cynical yet beautiful and ultra talented heroine. ensure every man she ever meets falls in love with her like they have with no other so that they become utterly devoted and romatically enslaved. throw in a few supernatural things, lots of violence and some kind of plot....light,readable but all very ho-hum in the end.
she has some good ideas (the parallell demonic world) and the sci-fi elements are interesting, but it's all so lazily written, with lots of repetition (if she had one almost giggle inappropriately in a really tense situtation she had about 50) and no real attempt to create believeable characters - which is the most important thing in a story where everything else is unbelieveable.
i though i'd try the urban fantasy genreas a change from the usual fantasy writers, but i find the style more akin to erotic/romance/detective/crime novels than true fantasy, and therefore ultimately a bit disappointing.
I'm sure that when i was a 15 year old goth i would have loved these, however i threw away my black lace gloves a few years back now....
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Fantastic book (and series)
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Falling into the darker edge of the urban fantasy genre, this book is a wonderful ride, and an introduction to a fantastic series. Dante Valentine is a character who has been hurt, and now does the right thing - no matter who it hurts. Forced to work for the devil, she is conflicted as he sets her to hunt down an old enemy of hers. The world is lush with a vibrancy seldom seen, and the characters are compelling. A warning that the series has a LOT of dark moments, but is definitely worth the read to come out the other side.
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Are we supposed to like Dante Valentine?
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Firstly, I would like to make it clear that I enjoyed "Working for the Devil" enormously. Necromancy AND plasma rifles;what more could you ask for? The pace is relentless and it was basically a 2 sitting book; it would have been 1 but other people sometimes expect me to do stuff. Many aspects of the world Saintcrow has created are genuinely original and she succeeds in evoking a thoroughly threatening atmosphere. Tierce Japhrimel is also the coolest sidekick ever. However, if you are looking for writing of, say, Jim Butcher's standard you will be disappointed. A lot of information about the environment is handed out in ham-fisted info-dumps. Character development is pretty much restricted to Dante, although, given how monumentally self-centred the protaganist is, this might be a deliberate device to illustrate her world-view. The ending is rushed and has something of a deus ex machina quality to it with previous impossible things turning out to be straightforward after all. Finally, the actual words could have done with some aggressive line-editing. Most of the technical faults are really evidence of how little respect the publisher has for the readership of this kind of urban fantasy and could have been easily fixed.
More interesting is Dante Valentine herself. It has been noted by other reviewers that she is an extraordinarily self-pitying whiner and I won't go into this except to agree. What no-one else seems to have commented on is that she appears to be a psychopath. While she endlessly complains about the bad things that happen to her, she never seems to consider the morality of her own actions for a second. The only ethics she seems to recognise are the concept of a contract and the idea of blood-vengeance. She reminds me of "Angel Eyes" in "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly." I've nothing against anti-heros, I grew up on Elric, but Dante's apparently total lack of self-knowledge is a missed opportunity. Perhaps this will be addressed in later books.
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Not another Hamilton clone, yay
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If you're looking for something a bit different in the supernatural / special powers / kickass heroine line, this is it. Danny is a Necromance, a raiser of the dead in a future where psi powers are as real as demons, who gets an offer she can't refuse from His Satanic Majesty, plus her very own demon to spar with in a quest to track down the man who murdered her best friend. Very immediate, sassy style, convincing world with believable technology and best of all it doesn't devolve into sex romps and moral qualms. Unmissable and unputdownable.
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Unexpected surprise
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I picked this book up after I read the blurb and it seemed interesting. The main reason I went for it I think is because you dont really get so many necromancy books lately, other then the Anita Blake series.
I was not expecting much, but what I got was amazing. I was instantly hooked on to Dante. She has a brilliant personality. I also found her demon protector very funny/cute in many ways.
The ending was heart-wrenching, but deffinately had me looking forward to the next in the series.
I really recommend this book to anyone who loved the earlied Anita Blake books :)
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