The “Magic” series (V of V)
Magic Bites (Kate Daniels, Book 1)
Magic Burns (Kate Daniels, Book 2)
Magic Strikes (Kate Daniels, Book 3)
As far as background characters, Crest is a good example of this issue: in the first book he’s a polite, apparently well meaning, pleasant seeming man who is romantically interested in the protagonist. He goes out of his way to be kind, interested, and non-judgmental of her rather bloody line of work — he brings her dinner, takes her out to the theatre, helps her carry bloody and unconscious bodies without hesitation. His only downsides, at least as far as I can see, is that 1) Crest isn’t more dangerous than her and doesn’t try to dominate her — as a nearby shapeshifter aggressively points out as a bad thing! -and 2) Crest takes her to a restaurant she doesn’t like — which I can’t really blame him for, since she never tells him her likes and dislikes. Seems pretty okay so far to me, you know? I mean, any man who’ll help me hide the bodies can’t be all bad! ;)
Unfortunately later in the book the Pack alpha becomes fixated on the idea that Crest is the “big baddie.” The alpha, the protagonist, and some shapeshifter friends find Crest while he’s alone and actually extort the poor man — under threat of violent assault and possible bodily murder! -into “voluntarily” donating some blood for what is essentially an illegally applied blood test — a test which clearly demonstrates Crest’s innocence. After that rather shocking demonstration of bad faith, the idiot alpha further decides this embarrassing debacle was all the protagonist’s idea — and blames her for his stupidity! He goes flouncing off in a huff after promising Crest a favor from the Pack, leaving the protagonist to further demonstrate her social ineptitude when she treats the rightfully furious Crest so indifferently that I can’t right now remember if she ever even said she was sorry.
I certainly can’t blame Crest for hastily and indignantly backing off on his budding friendship with the protagonist. My personal thought was it was no surprise the protagonist was alone and lonely, if she continued to act like she preferred the company of flaming assholes to someone who was actually generous and thoughtful to her.
By the next book, however — which occurs less than four months later — Crest has become someone so worthless that he sends his terrified shapeshifter fiancee to beg the protagonist to intercede for them with the Pack’s alpha, to allow their marriage.
Again: WTF?!
I had severe issues with this turn of events within the story, for several reasons. First, what happened to the favor promised to Crest by the Pack’s alpha? Is the much-vaunted word of the alpha really that worthless, or did the author just forget? If the former, I’d have to say it’s the alpha who’s a waste of time, not Crest; if the latter, shame on the author for not being more careful with consistency within her world!
Second, Crest is considered “pathetic” for appealing to the protagonist to intercede on his behalf with the Pack alpha. I can’t figure that out — if Crest has already asked twice for Pack permission for the shapeshifter girl to marry him, then why is trying another avenue of appeal “pathetic”? I would consider that resourceful, myself. If anyone was truly pathetic in that situation, I’d have to say it’s the alpha who is so insecure in his position that he has to torture his people with silence, and treat them like nothing more than disposable property or bargaining chips.
Thirdly, Crest is scornfully denigrated behind his back by the shapeshifters for “forcing” his fiancee to go in his place to speak with the protagonist. I have two perplexities here. One, considering how grossly he was insulted, why would Crest want to talk to the protagonist? She threatened to kill him — for no good reason! And two: isn’t the fact that Crest made no effort to dominate the protagonist precisely what was considered his “downside” in the previous book?! So why is it now suddenly a bad thing to force a woman to do what he wants?
There’s either a truly creepy message being pushed here — it’s “right” for the stronger partner in a relationship to slap around the weaker one — or the author is doing precisely what I’ve stated I can’t stand: forcing Crest into the “bad guy” categorization to maintain the false dichotomy within the stories. If the former is true, I’d have to say these books are simply vile, with a deeply atrocious message! If the latter, I hope the author did it unconsciously: basically justifying the protagonist’s atrocious treatment of Crest in the previous book, so the protagonist remains a “good guy.” Unfortunately what ended up happening for me is that I was left with no one I could really empathize or identify with.
To sum up: I didn’t really care for the protagonist — I found her physical uber-competency and her super-duper secret “power” to be dancing perilously close to being an all-powerful “Mary-Sue.” I also loathed the main “romantic” interest being a creepy stalker, and the simplistic treatment of the “bad” guys.
However, I got the books from the library on the recommendation of a friend, so I was willing to read all three of them to see if things improved over time. There were some amusing and interesting bits in the stories, and I thought the background conflict re tech and magic was interesting and would bear further exploration. I’ve heard there are more books in the series, but I don’t think at this point in time I will bother; they’re good brain candy but I can handle only so much of that.
More interestingly: what are your personal commandments for authors writing urban fantasy — or whatever your favorite genre is?
Hi, Lou! Thanks for commenting! :)
Yeah, I find it a bit creepy how much vileness the Ilona Andrews women protagonists (because they’re sure not heroines!) routinely put up with. It feels very much to me like the authors (it’s apparently a husband-wife team) don’t really like their characters, you know? Though I confess I find that a nicer thought than the equally valid one of ‘perhaps the authors in reality just hate women!’ Either way… I just don’t like any of the women protagonists… and for me that’s absolutely fatal for continued interest in a series.
I’m also not a fan of the constant deux ex machinas the women protagonists cart around with them. Like… can’t the authors write a story where the people themselves are what’s really important? It’s for that reason that I’ve no desire whatsoever to read the innkeeper series you mentioned, frex.
I have only read the first of the Kate Daniels series. I was not as impressed with it as I was the Innkeeper series, and it, too, wore out quickly for me.
I didn’t analyze them as closely as Collie did, but in the end I simply decided I didn’t care enough to keep reading. Kate’s kind of unpleasant, and the world she lives in is awful and broken, and everyone who lives there is damaged. I didn’t care about anyone in it. In the Innkeeper books, the inn’s powers were a little deus ex machina, and convenient. I actually enjoyed the fourth Innkeeper book the most, where it was not in the inn, and about the politics of the vampires and the human woman who was struggling with them.
Having read only the first of the Kate Daniels books, I can say that some of the things Collie disagrees with were there and were true, and the bigger picture of too heavy a dependence on obvious “good vs. evil” tropes existed in all the Andrews books that I read. And for books with women protagonists, they sure do seem to not like women much. And stalkers are not sexy. At least in the innkeeper books he apologized and got better.
Woot, more lovely comments — thank you, Greg!
Re your enjoying the series: all it says is we see different things, Greg. That doesn’t make you thoughtless, or me right. Take my words with a grain of salt, just like you would anyone else’s.
Keeping in mind, of course, that I’m the arbiter of the One True Way… no, really! :-)
As the friend in question, I have mixed feelings about this review. Other readers of this review won’t know: I had my own misgivings about this series, which I aired to Collie frequently. But in seeing Collie ennumerate the myriad things wrong with Andrews’s books, I can’t help but feel two things very clearly:
A) Holy cow, I didn’t know it was that bad! What does it say that I enjoyed this series at all?
B) That there were parts which Collie spoke about, that were niggling me, but I hadn’t been able to give voice to what bothered me about them. (the last part, about Crest, was one of those things.)
But of course, this review is not about me. In the end, I’m glad that Collie was willing to take a chance on the books: even when she doesn’t like a book I ask her to review, I still come away having learned something. This is very true in this case. Breaking away from the male gaze and seeing things through the eye of the feminist (or at the very least, a proper reviewer) is something that I’m still working on. But it’s clear, concise commentary like this that helps me take off the rose-colored lenses and see the problems for what they are.
I’m also glad that Andrews’s books haven’t scared her away from trying other urban fantasy (since its flag is riding high at the moment), especially since there are good authors out there, some of which she is reading even now.
As for myself, I don’t know whether or not I’ll pick up the next book in the series. Maybe I’ll just get it from the library when it comes out.