City of Ghosts by Stacia Kane

ISBN: 9780345515599

Downside book #3

I was given this book to review.

Spoiler Warning: This review contains spoilers for the previous books.

Stacia Kane, and her literary creation, Chess Putam have some serious balls. In the Downside books Chess is a Debunker for the Church, an absolute ruler over the world after a tragedy that involved all the ghost in the world rising up and massacring the living. Since Haunted Week the Church has taken over because they are the only ones who can guarantee the common person safety from more ghostly uprisings. Ghosts are the only paranormal creature in these books, but Kane proves that, with loose interpretation, that doesn’t have to limit the scope of the world.

Chess, the emotionally battered, drug addicted heroine, has absolute faith in two things, the Church, and Terrible, an enforcer for her dealer who hates her since he discovered she was sleeping with Lex, a rival from another drug family who would be happy to see Terrible dead. Even Chess’ faith in the Church is about to be tested when a member of The Black Squad, the Church’s elite investigation group, offers her a job on the condition that she undergo a terrifying magical binding.

It turns out an evil magical sect, the Lamaru, are back, slaughtering people and leaving their bits on the streets in Chess’ own neighborhood. In fact the Lamaru are neck deep in a plot to overthrow the church, a plot Chess must stop, despite Terrible hating her, Lauren (the Black Squad member she’s working with) ignoring her every lead and the Lamaru wanting Chess very very dead.

The Downside series so far has given readers two solid, fast paced, intrigue-filled tales in Kane’s wicked, vivid new urban fantasy world. But there’s an added effect for loyal readers–the twist of Chess being an unrepentant drug user. As a reader you know she’s going to hit rock bottom. You know she can’t continue at the pace she’s going. Someday Chess is going to crash land in a spectacular, tragic emotional hurricane, and by book three instead of watching it like a train wreck readers will be nervously wondering who will survive in the end.

It’s a very different kind of tension, an uncomfortable, tense fear, dazzling in its darkness and emotionally stunning. Kane is forging a bold new way through modern urban fantasy, and what you hear said in other stories is true in a whole new way here–all you can do is hold on, and wait to see who remains at the end.