Paper & Blood by Kevin Hearne
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

While the first book was a bit of a globe-trotting UF mystery with funny fae, the second leaned into giving us a big, fat taste of the Iron Druid. Indeed, he kinda took over the story.

I loved the original Iron Druid series, but I was equally on-board to have all new adventures and curses and especially a lot more of Gladys Who's Seen Some Shite. Let me just say, I love Gladys Who's Seen Some Shite. As a front desk girl or an employee on her own vacation or ANYTHING. I love Gladys Who's Seen Some Shite. The main story was fine, too.

Here's where I'm a bit wishy-washy: Atticus, for all that I love him, had his time in the sun. His taking over was both a blessing (because I had fun) and a curse (because I was just getting to like the new core characters). Is it bad? Hardly. But I feel sorry for them getting upstaged. The humor, tho? Wonderful. A truly delightful callback.



I'm continuing with my little experiment of writing synesthesia reviews:

This book was VERY much a distinctive flavor and texture. I swear I was eating some of those tiny, fluffy vanilla-flavored cupcakes, with VERY rich vanilla frosting. So white. So fluffy. Every time the humor hit (and it hit very well), it was a taste explosion in my mouth. I was giddy with the nearly overflowing vanilla.

I need to point out that this is not vanilla in the sense of boring. Far from that. It's vanilla as in OMG that just kicked me in the palate and I could feel the sugar rush all the way down to my lung-area, spreading out in a little sunburst.

I admit, I have a rather big literary sweet-tooth.



Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to DM requests. I think it's about time I get some eyes on them.

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