Magic Burns: A Sizzling New Novel from Author Ilona Andrews

Rarely has an author made my skin shiver the way it did when I was reading this novel. I think I may have started in the middle of the series, too, but I don't think it matters very much. I could hardly put the book down for fear of missing something important. To me, that's the sign of a great writer. While Ms. Andrews is no J.K. Rowling in terms of the characters being lovable, the characters are definitely believable once you get past the whole existence of supernatural beings, alternate universes, and such.

The story is a typical good versus evil type of thing, but it is very well written, and much of the time, I could actually picture the events happening just as the author was describing them. The storyline becomes a very dark, spine-chilling, and exhilarating journey for the entire group of characters, right down to the Deities that are trying to use a magical flare to gain true existence in our world, versus remaining something for obscure worship, if you will. It was all a little complicated, with several plots kind of going at once, but nonetheless, it was worth the ride.

Kate Daniels, the main character, is a woman with a mysterious and powerful lineage and, surprisingly, someone to be greatly admired. She is tenacious, loyal, and willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done, short of allowing innocent people to become sacrifices for evil's victory. She is a very loyal friend, too, and having such a huge secret herself, she is not one to point fingers when another character is proven to be something that others would want eliminated. What her secret is, I didn't figure out really, so much as surmised that, if anyone else figured it out, she'd be in a lot of trouble, and whole groups of people would want her dead. The funny part is that several other male characters were continuously chasing after her, romantically, if you could call it that, lending a bit of levity to a story that would otherwise have been very dark. I would tell you more about the story, but that would take all the fun out of reading it!