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Book Blog: Trick of the Light, by Rob Thurman
This is one of the author’s older books, published in 2009, only three months before the publication of Death Wish, book 4 of the Cal Leandros books. Same universe, different city – Las Vegas – and different bad guys. The other supernaturals of New York apparently banded together to get rid of “their” demons, but Vegas wasn’t so lucky. It’s the perfect environment in which a demonic sales team can operate.
The title is cleverer than I had at first realised and concentrates on a young woman named Trixa who runs a bar and fights demons in her spare time. She comes over a lot like a backup character in the Supernatural series and I can’t help wondering whether Rob Thurman is a fan of that series. Her take is definitely original, or as original as you can be when featuring demons, angels and pagan gods, but as a diehard fan myself, I kept observing echoes in this work. Tributes, almost. Trixa’s knowledge of the supernatural world is almost too good and her relationship with the local demon is uncomfortably relaxed.
Trixa’s backup are a Native American guy named Leo, who works for her, and two guys she met as homeless teenagers, with very unique problems and abilities, abilities which attracted the attention of Eden House, an organisation which fights on behalf of the man upstairs. As in Supernatural, however, angels can be less than admirable characters and demons can be deceptively sexy. There is a quest plotline into which the various characters are interwoven, containing a grail or McGuffin which they all want. Trixa is also trying to discover the name of the demon who killed her younger brother.
One of the things I like about Rob Thurman’s work is her take on family. Cal and Niko have a huge codependence thing, which makes sense in their environment and the fact that they have no one else. [Again, a lot like Sam and Dean Winchester]. Trixa also has a very close family relationship with the young men who were once homeless teenagers escaping The System. It’s actually a nice change from books, particularly urban fantasy, where the main character’s whole drive is towards a romantic relationship. Nothing wrong with that, but I enjoy seeing a plot focused on another kind of love story; between siblings, or friends.
This book has a tremendous sting in the tail, several stings, really, which I did not see coming. Some of the clues are held back so that you cannot tell, rather like an Agatha Christie, where all is murk until Poirot explains the reasoning of the little grey cells. Once told, however, it is a huge and quite satisfying, “Ah hah.”
There is one more in this series but I may go and read something else first and then come back to it.
The title is cleverer than I had at first realised and concentrates on a young woman named Trixa who runs a bar and fights demons in her spare time. She comes over a lot like a backup character in the Supernatural series and I can’t help wondering whether Rob Thurman is a fan of that series. Her take is definitely original, or as original as you can be when featuring demons, angels and pagan gods, but as a diehard fan myself, I kept observing echoes in this work. Tributes, almost. Trixa’s knowledge of the supernatural world is almost too good and her relationship with the local demon is uncomfortably relaxed.
Trixa’s backup are a Native American guy named Leo, who works for her, and two guys she met as homeless teenagers, with very unique problems and abilities, abilities which attracted the attention of Eden House, an organisation which fights on behalf of the man upstairs. As in Supernatural, however, angels can be less than admirable characters and demons can be deceptively sexy. There is a quest plotline into which the various characters are interwoven, containing a grail or McGuffin which they all want. Trixa is also trying to discover the name of the demon who killed her younger brother.
One of the things I like about Rob Thurman’s work is her take on family. Cal and Niko have a huge codependence thing, which makes sense in their environment and the fact that they have no one else. [Again, a lot like Sam and Dean Winchester]. Trixa also has a very close family relationship with the young men who were once homeless teenagers escaping The System. It’s actually a nice change from books, particularly urban fantasy, where the main character’s whole drive is towards a romantic relationship. Nothing wrong with that, but I enjoy seeing a plot focused on another kind of love story; between siblings, or friends.
This book has a tremendous sting in the tail, several stings, really, which I did not see coming. Some of the clues are held back so that you cannot tell, rather like an Agatha Christie, where all is murk until Poirot explains the reasoning of the little grey cells. Once told, however, it is a huge and quite satisfying, “Ah hah.”
There is one more in this series but I may go and read something else first and then come back to it.