I’m away at a 3 day dressage show from Monday to Wednesday this week, so my usual Monday blog is a tad early – but that’s better than missing it altogether, right?

This week I’m reviewing a book by one of my recent favourites – Deborah Blake. You can find my reviews of a couple of her other books here at Wickedly Dangerous and Wickedly Wonderful.

Veiled Magic is not in the same series, but was the book that gained Deborah her agent. It was published recently as an ebook.

Veiled Magic by Deborah Blake
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

In a world where witches have ‘come out’, the supernaturals are tolerated but not really trusted. Donata Santori is a witch cop, a ‘Witness Retrieval Specialist’, which means she gets the ‘fun’ job of interviewing victims. Dead victims.
To her not-so-trusting colleagues, she’s known as a ‘Ghost Yanker’ – incredibly useful because the fact that a victim is dead no longer gets in the way of a damning witness statement – but that doesn’t make the other cops any more comfortable about being around her. Her office is a windowless basement and she doesn’t get out much, so when she’s asked to attend a murder scene in person, Donata thinks things are looking up. Unfortunately the whole case goes sideways, developing the potential to ignite a second Inquisition.
Donata is a great fun character, and the two hot men in her life spice things up a treat. All three of them have major issues twisting their private lives, mostly family relationship problems, just like regular people only skewed by their paranormal natures. The supporting cast of Ricky the Kobold, Grimalkin the feline familiar, and Elmyr the French bulldog, are all great additions to the mix, as are the odd family members that turn up from time to time. Blake’s writing, as always, gives a smooth and flowing read with some delightful descriptions and dialogue, plus some interesting imprecations: ‘Crap on toast,’ springs to mind.
This book sets up what is clearly going to be an ongoing mystery about a ‘lost’ paranormal race. I really enjoyed it right up until the end, where I was a touch disappointed in the climax. Don’t get me wrong, there is a climactic fight, a sacrifice, and a resolution (of sorts) to the current problem, but it left me with rather a ‘was that it?’ feel, a bit like a balloon deflating.
There are certainly plenty of juicy threads to take forward, and I will be reading the next book to find out where they are taking us, I could just a wished for a more fulfilling ending to this individual novel.

View all my reviews

You can find out more about Deborah at her website:

Writing the Witchy Way