Review: "Unholy Ghosts"

One of the things that I really love about my Kindle is getting to try out new authors and novels for such cheap prices. For instance, I bought Cherie Priest's "Boneshaker" for $3. Even better is "Unholy Ghosts", which I looked for after seeing high praise for it on one of the websites I read religiously. Low and behold it was 99 cents! So I yanked it up. I'm always pleased to try out new dark urban fantasy authors, it's sort of a guilty pleasure of mine. My only regulars are Kim Harrison's "The Hollows" series and more recently, Jim Butcher's "Dresden Files". On to "Unholy Ghosts" itself....

As I mentioned earlier, I'm not familiar with Stacia Kane's work. I have to say though, this first novel in her Downside series left me quite impressed. I found it to be very inventive and compelling. The world is a little different from our own. In 1997, the Earth became overrun with ghosts and almost didn't survive the invasion. The Church of Truth was the only one able to defend the people, thus killing off all of the old religions. Imagine knowing there is no God. There is only Fact and Truth. Magic exists, but only employees of the church are allowed to use these magical rites. Now the world is ruled absolutely by this church. Our heroine is Chess Putnam, a Debunker for the Church of Truth. It is her job to see if people claiming to be haunted are telling the truth, and if they are, to banish the ghosts.

However, our heroine has a problem. A big problem. She's secretly a drug addict. At first I thought I was going to have a real problem with this, because I'm very much anti-drugs and Chess is pretty much all about them. However thanks to Kane's writing, I still found her very likable and even relatable. Props, Ms. Kane.Chess has had a very difficult life. She doesn't remember her parents and was brought up by the social system. Chess has a lot of strength but her Achilles heel is definitely her affinity for drugs. This is where I hope to see growth from her in subsequent novels. Most of her motivations come from this need for drugs. Her relationships are primarily drawn around how people can be of use to her, whether for drugs or other things.  She now lives in the Downside, a part of Triumph city filled with drug dealers, pimps, and gangs. What's interesting is the slang they use, it's so distinctive that you can usually tell exactly who is speaking with no other indications.

Back to the plot: now she's in deep trouble with her dealer, Bump. She is in serious debt to him and he wants his payment now. They strike a deal that Chess has to get rid of the nasty ghosts at an abandoned airstrip so he can pursue operations there, and her debt will be paid. So Chess has to team up with Terrible, Bump's hired muscle. I'll tell you right now, I love his character. Love it. At first he seems to be a flat character but over time, you really get to see who he is and how he got that way. What seems to be a relatively simple task for Bump becomes increasingly complicated and dangerous. She stumbles into a number of things: black magic, a sexy rival drug enforcer, human sacrifice, and corruption within the Church. A lot of the book reads like a creepy mystery novel, with a little bit of romance thrown in. One of the things I especially liked was that magic takes TIME here. It's not like you have a wand and BAM! Fireball an enemy. It takes time, precaution and preparation. As a consequence, when you have a bunch of baddies after you, it's a lot more suspenseful. I don't want to give away much more of the plot, I'll just say it's quite fast paced. As a warning though, there were some graphic scenes that sort of grossed me out.

"Unholy Ghosts" is a fast-paced read in an inventive world, I highly recommend it.