StandingWater Creations

As I’ve already said, we are following Rachel Morgan. She is the protagonist to these stories. They are all told in the first person and from her point of view (POV). At first she works for the I.S. (Inderland Security). The mythological creatures answer to law enforcement. After all, you can’t expect humans to go up against weres, vamps, witches, and other creatures.

Because she is our headstrong and slutily dressed protagonist, you accept that when she says she is being blackballed by her boss and given all of the crap assignments, she is being blackballed by her boss and is being given all of the crap assignments. Frustrated, she is given the assignment to bring in a rogue Leprechaun (add that to the list) and, in the process, she decides to make a deal with the devil, let the guy go, and, in the process, get three wishes.

Enter Ivy Tamwood. She’s a vampire. She was also Rachel’s partner once upon a time. She runs into Rachel as Rachel is trying to decide to actually let the leprechaun go and, as a result of this, Jenks (pixie back-up to Rachel) Ivy and Rachel all decide to leave the IS.

From the get-go, Rachel is in deep doo-doo. The IS take a hit out on her. Ivy, because of her connections in the undead world, doesn’t have to worry about it; but Rachel gets to brunt of her former boss’s anger.

The first book, then, is as much about Rachel avoiding ending up dead as it is introducing the reader to this new world. Dead Witch Walking is a rather appropriate name because, for all intents and purposes, she is supposed to die. A running joke, throughout the book, is the betting that takes place on how long she will remain alive.

The answer, to that question, is at least three book and this summer going on a fourth book.

Like I said, this is a good series.

I bought the first book on a whim. I’d been coming across it on a variety of websites, one of them kept suggesting it because I’d purchased The Strange Adventures of Rangergirl, and so, one day when I was in Borders I stopped over in the horror section, found the first book, and purchased.

I believe it was set aside waiting for me to read another one of Hard Case Crime’s republications of old pulp mystery books, a scifi from one of my favorite authors in that genre, Robert Heinlein, and then Dead Witch Walking.

After reading it I waiting, like, twenty-four hours and then went and purchased the second book. Again, when I was done with that one I told myself I’d wait a week or two, because I was going camping and had some other responsibilities, but within another twenty-four hours I’d gone out and purchased the third book.

Now, I know there is another book with some of Kim Harrison’s writing in it, a short novel or short story from Ivy’s perspective. I also know that her fourth Rachel Morgan novel, A Fist Full of Charms comes out in a couple of months and on her website.

What I am really saying, without writing about the three books I’ve written, is that I really like this author’s writing. I think she’s got the stuff and after three books I think people will start to really take notice of her work. She is the up and coming Anne Rice or Stephen King without the blood, sex and gore.

Admittedly, with all of that said, in the third book there was one drawback and that was a sex scene between the witch protagonist and Kisten, another vampire who was the right hand man to Rachel principal antagonist throughout the stories (hah! if you’ve read the stories you will tell me it is Trent, but you’d be WRONG!!!) and, I think, someone who is trying to get back into the principal antagonists favor by doing what Ivy refused to do.

Confusing? Certianly. I wrote it intentionally that way. These books are good enough that I feel it would be a poor form of me to give away the stories, the endings of any of the books, or the middles, for that matter. Needful to say, I can’t wait for the fourth installment to come out so that I can read it and then wait, rather impatiently, for the fifth installment.

This I know, Rachel’s series of boyfriends are all real jerks, ass’s, and there’s not a one of them who isn’t going to stab her in the back the first chance they get.