Grave Visions (Alex Craft, Bk 4)
Author:
Genre: Science Fiction & Fantasy
Book Type: Mass Market Paperback
Author:
Genre: Science Fiction & Fantasy
Book Type: Mass Market Paperback
This was an okay continuation of the Alex Craft series. I was very excited to read this book since I was loving this series back in 2013 when I read it. Maybe it's because it's been so long between books (4 years is an incredibly huge gap between books) but has I had tough time engaging with the story and characters.
I listened to this on audiobook and the audiobook was decent. I am not a huge fan of the narrator's voice, but she does a good job of distinguishing between characters voices and of conveying emotion, so I don't really have any strong complaints.
As in previous books Alex continues to run herself ragged; this time her big issue is that she is fading because of not being part of any faerie court (or being declared independent). This leaves her exhausted and sick. Additionally there is a new drug on the streets called Glitter which seems to have it's origins in faerie and is causing the deaths of a number of humans; so she gets involved in tracking that down.
I just felt like the story was a bit stagnant. Alex finds yet another way to delay making any decisions about her ties to faerie. The love triangle between her, Death, and Falin continues without any progress. Death is in the story only a very small bit and, although Falin is in the story more, Falin and Alex are trying to distance themselves from each other.
The whole plotline of having a faerie drug wreaking havoc in the human world has been done before. The first urban fantasy series that comes to mind is Seanan McGuire's October Daye series, in that series there is a book about Goblin Fruit being sold as a drug to humans. There are have other urban fantasies that have used similar plotlines as well. The plotline for this book just feels very unoriginal.
Overall it's an okay book but in the end I just mostly wanted the story to be over. There isn't a lot of progress made in the over arcing story and the contained mystery Alex is dealing with feels like something I've read about many times before. The characters felt stagnant as did the world and story and I had a lot of trouble staying engaged. I have felt like this about a few other urban fantasy series right now (Chicagoland Vampires, Elemental Assassins) which makes me wonder if I am just burnt out on the genre. However I have still been enjoying both the Incryptid series and the October Daye series by Seanan McGuire as well as the Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews...so maybe there are just a lot of urban fantasy series that are kind of fizzling right now. I don't plan on reading anymore of this series because I just don't care about the world or the characters any more.
I listened to this on audiobook and the audiobook was decent. I am not a huge fan of the narrator's voice, but she does a good job of distinguishing between characters voices and of conveying emotion, so I don't really have any strong complaints.
As in previous books Alex continues to run herself ragged; this time her big issue is that she is fading because of not being part of any faerie court (or being declared independent). This leaves her exhausted and sick. Additionally there is a new drug on the streets called Glitter which seems to have it's origins in faerie and is causing the deaths of a number of humans; so she gets involved in tracking that down.
I just felt like the story was a bit stagnant. Alex finds yet another way to delay making any decisions about her ties to faerie. The love triangle between her, Death, and Falin continues without any progress. Death is in the story only a very small bit and, although Falin is in the story more, Falin and Alex are trying to distance themselves from each other.
The whole plotline of having a faerie drug wreaking havoc in the human world has been done before. The first urban fantasy series that comes to mind is Seanan McGuire's October Daye series, in that series there is a book about Goblin Fruit being sold as a drug to humans. There are have other urban fantasies that have used similar plotlines as well. The plotline for this book just feels very unoriginal.
Overall it's an okay book but in the end I just mostly wanted the story to be over. There isn't a lot of progress made in the over arcing story and the contained mystery Alex is dealing with feels like something I've read about many times before. The characters felt stagnant as did the world and story and I had a lot of trouble staying engaged. I have felt like this about a few other urban fantasy series right now (Chicagoland Vampires, Elemental Assassins) which makes me wonder if I am just burnt out on the genre. However I have still been enjoying both the Incryptid series and the October Daye series by Seanan McGuire as well as the Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews...so maybe there are just a lot of urban fantasy series that are kind of fizzling right now. I don't plan on reading anymore of this series because I just don't care about the world or the characters any more.
