Review – Shadow Hunter (Rosie O’Grady’s Paranormal Bar and Grill, Book 1) by BR Kingsolver (3/5 stars)
Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Length: 276 pages
Publisher: Independently published
Release Date: April 7, 2019
ASIN : B07PZ47VQV
Stand Alone or Series: 1st book in the Rosie O’Grady’s Paranormal Bar and Grill series
Source: Borrowed through Kindle Unlimited
Rating: 3/5 stars
“When my magic manifested at puberty, my parents sold me to the Illuminati. The Order of the Illuminati trained me as an assassin, spy, and thief. But when they sent me to steal a magical artifact that reveals Truth in all things, I discovered that I was working for the Dark and not the Light. The Illuminati trained me well, and paid the ultimate price for their deception.
Thousands of miles away, I landed a job in a quirky little bar. But the scattered remnants of the Order still strive for world domination, and no one leaves the Illuminati alive.”
Series Info/Source: This is the first book in the Rosie O’Grady’s Paranormal Bar and Grill series. I borrowed this book through Kindle Unlimited.
Story (3/5): This started out as a pretty awesome concept. I loved the backstory about Erin training with the Illuminati as an assassin from a young age. I also loved that she realized she was being manipulated and chose to leave that lifestyle. Honestly, I ended up kind of wishing this first book was that back story rather than what it ended up being. Erin ends up landing in a smallish town and working for a small magical bar she stumbles into (Guild Codex: Spellbound series anyone…OMG it was exactly the same). From there she gets kind of forced into a turf war between vamps and werewolves and possibly another Hunter from the Illuminati.
What started out as an intriguing character and backstory degenerated into a complete mess of politics and Erin stumbling around from one bad situation to another.
Characters (3/5): I initially really liked Erin and thought she was going to be interesting to read about. Her naivete about the world and relationships, despite being an assassin for years, was intriguing. However, she quickly started to just kind of “go with the flow” of things and stumble around a plotline that put her into one suspicious position after another. I lost interest in her and respect for her quickly. The other characters at the bar also seemed initially to be very intriguing. Unfortunately, too many characters were introduced too quickly and the descriptions of them all weren’t very memorable. This made all these side characters blur into just a mass of extra people that I didn’t care about or engage with.
Setting (3/5): The setting was fine. It started out kind of cool with the whole secret Illuminati base, but that quickly turned into a typical bar in a small city urban fantasy type of setting. Nothing all that unique or intriguing.
Writing Style (3/5): There were some cool ideas in here, the action scenes are decently written, and I liked the way Erin used magic. This is definitely a bit more gritty than some other urban fantasy I have recently read; just more gore and more swearing and more adult topics. However, I didn’t ever engage with the characters well and didn’t enjoy that this devolved from something unique into something that was quickly very typical urban fantasy. This ended up being a mashup of vampire politics, secret mage associations, outlying faerie towns, etc, etc. It’s like too much was introduced too quickly and it was hard to care or place what was going on. Despite the short length I almost didn’t finish this.
My Summary (3/5): Overall there were some things about this I liked but it ended up being pretty mediocre when all was said and done. The start is the best part here with the Illuminati background and Erin’s interesting childhood. After that the story is a very typical and very messy blend of vamp politics, secret mage associations, and other typical urban fantasy tropes. Erin takes very little initiative and kind of just lets the disorganized plot push her around. Too much was introduced too quickly and none of it made a lot of sense. I really wanted to love this but just ended up wanting to be done with it and move onto something else. This makes me very sad because I was hoping Kingsolver would be a new favorite of mine!
