Suzanne McLeod

Spellcrackers — (2008-2012) Publisher: 'My name is Genny Taylor. I work for Spellcrackers.com. It’s a great job, pays the rent, lets me do the thing I’m good at — finding magic and cracking it — and the bonus is it’s run by witches, which stops the vamps from taking a bite out of me. Not that vampires are the big bad any more, not since they launched a slick PR campaign — oh, and they brought the goblins on board. Now the vamps are sought-after celebrities, and Getting Fanged and taking the Gift are the new height of all things cool. But only if you’re human. And I’m not. I’m Sidhe fae. And I know firsthand just how deadly a vampire can be.’ When Mr October, a sexy calendar pin-up vamp, is accused of murdering his girlfriend, an old debt is called in and Genny is forced to help prove his innocence, risking her job and the protection it offers — and threatening to expose her own dark secrets. Searching for the killer plunges Genny deep into the hidden heart of vampire society. It’s not long before she realises that she and Mr October are both unwitting pawns in a centuries-old power struggle between London’s non-human communities... and it’s not just her own neck that’s at stake, but the lives of all London’s supernaturals.

Forthcoming (working titles):
The Hidden Rune of Iron
The Sharp Bite of Ritual

The Sweet Scent of Blood

Genevieve is the only sidhe fae in London and has a traumatic past involving vampires, which we readers learn about in flashbacks throughout the story. She works as a spellcracker, removing hexes from objects. There are two ways she can remove a spell. She can “crack” the spell, thereby destroying both the spell and the object, or she can absorb it into herself, which carries its own problems. As the story begins, a celebrity vampire stands accused of murdering his girlfriend, Melissa. The vampire’s father hires Genny to examine Melissa’s body for evidence of magic. His theory is that someone killed Melissa with a spell and then made it look like a vampire attack.

Or at least that’s the ostensible plot. As it happens, Genny never does examine Melissa’s body, instead becoming embroiled in a tangled power struggle among several powerful vampires. Any of them could be a suspect, and all of them crave the rare, tasty sidhe blood that runs in Gen’s veins.

The Sweet Scent of Blood has a promising beginning. Suzanne McLeod introduces several original concepts. One is her version of the vampire creation myth, which is unique and yet slots so neatly into classical mythology that it feels like it was always there. Another is the connection between magic and diet. If a witch eats too much salt, it blocks her powers, but eating sugar enhances them, to the point that many witches gain large amounts of weight trying to boost their abilities.

Unfortunately, it then devolves into a middle that is both sagging and extremely confusing. One (lengthy) scene in particular stands out, in which a huge number of just-introduced characters engage in a posturing contest using magic that isn’t clearly explained to the reader. Just trying to figure out what’s actually happening is hard enough. When trying to keep track of all the new characters at the same time, it becomes a huge headache. One is left with the feeling of having picked up book three by accident, rather than book one. In fact, I have started series in the middle and been less confused than I was by The Sweet Scent of Blood. I spent much of this book not knowing what was going on, or how Genny drew some of the conclusions she did.

Some — but not all — of the confusing elements are explained at the end. It was too little too late for me, though, and didn’t quite make up for the feeling of being lost for several hundred pages. Sadly, I cannot recommend The Sweet Scent of Blood.  —Kelly Lasiter

The Cold Kiss of Death

Sidhe fae Genevieve Taylor is in trouble again. Hannah Ashby, whom Genny met in the last book, has shown up again — this time wielding powerful magic and demanding the priceless Fabergé egg Genny received from the Earl. Genny’s also being haunted by the ghost of a young girl. Worst of all, she finds a friend murdered and is framed for the crime. Now she needs the help of the manipulative vampire Malik al-Khan, which never comes for free.

Much like the first Spellcrackers book, The Sweet Scent of Blood, the plot of The Cold Kiss of Death is intensely convoluted. Plot points that seem at first to be central turn out to be peripheral and vice versa, as Genny discovers a complex web of schemes underlying what she thought was going on. Events that seem unconnected — aren’t. People turn out to be double-crossing each other. People turn out to be secretly related.

Suzanne McLeod does a better job this time of pulling it all together, though. While The Cold Kiss of Death is sometimes confusing while you’re in the middle of it, it’s all pulled together really well in the end and makes sense when it does come together. There’s one thread that looms huge at first and then is given a disappointingly simple resolution, but I wonder if that’s a situation whose real import will become clear in a later book.

In addition, we get answers to many of the questions raised in the first book. We learn more about Genny’s past, about Malik, about Rosa, about the other fae in London. Genny learns a new, powerful use for her spellcracking ability.

The writing itself is particularly good for this subgenre, and then the epilogue packs a terrible punch. We’re led to believe McLeod has forgotten a particular loose end — and there are plenty of writers who really have forgotten something like this — but then we learn in poignant fashion that no, she didn’t forget it at all.

The Sweet Scent of Blood was somewhat frustrating to me, but The Cold Kiss of Death has sold me on Spellcrackers; I’ll eagerly read the next book and see what new revelations McLeod has in store for Genny. —Kelly Lasiter

The Bitter Seed of Magic

Up until this point, reading Suzanne McLeod’s SPELLCRACKERS series has often been an exercise in frustration. The novels were often confusing, but were well-written enough that I couldn’t dismiss them and always felt there was huge potential for the series. With book three, The Bitter Seed of Magic, McLeod finally strikes the right balance between clarity and obfuscation.

The Bitter Seed of Magic focuses on the curse laid on the lesser fae of London by the sidhe queen Cliona. The curse is introduced earlier in the series, but McLeod recaps it in the prologue, a refresher for which I was grateful. Among other things, it has blighted the lesser fae’s fertility, which causes problems for Genny Taylor as the various fae races see her — specifically, impregnating her — as the key to saving their people. The other main plot thread, though the two are linked, is a series of murders of female lesser fae. Genny investigates these crimes and learns more about the messy history of Cliona’s family tree and how it relates to the curse.

I was briefly worried that this book would be confusing too, especially since the fae and the vampires often give Genny cryptic information instead of straight answers, but as I mentioned above, this time the balance is right. The Bitter Seed of Magic is mysterious without being confusing. I didn’t always know how the pieces fit together, but I always felt confident that they belonged to the same puzzle. Heck, I feel like the first two books make more sense now too, after finishing this one.

Also especially satisfying is Genny’s character growth. In this installment, she grows a stronger spine against the powerful vampires and fae who seek to manipulate her, striking hard bargains to give her leverage against them. I also love her determination to not let magical forces control her sex life. Her emotional reactions to revelations about her personal history are compelling. And the ending is fantastic, bringing a touch of lightness into the dark world of SPELLCRACKERS and dealing with the fertility issue in a refreshingly non-cliché manner.

I was worried about The Bitter Seed of Magic, but ended up really enjoying it. I look forward to The Shifting Price of Prey, scheduled for US release in June 2012. —Kelly Lasiter