cover image Blood and Silver

Blood and Silver

James R. Tuck. Kensington, $7.99 mass market (304p) ISBN 978-0-7582-7148-8

A Nephilim—half-angel, half-human—killed Deacon Chalk and his family; an angel resurrected Deacon as a superhuman. Five years later, he’s a self-appointed monster hunter. Deacon’s just about gotten his life back together when his impulsive rescue of a beaten dog sets him against a pack of were-animals. The dog is actually an abused and pregnant were-pitbull girl, and only Deacon and his friends from the Polecats bikini bar can save her from burgeoning war among the weres. Shamelessly ridiculous and gleefully over-the-top scenes include a Catholic priest slaying monsters with a heavily modified rifle and a waitress getting the better of the Lord of the Forest with her concealed weapon. The fun is diminished by the depiction of many black characters as evil drug addicts and abusive were-beasts, and many of the women as sex slaves and sex workers. This is urban fantasy as men’s fiction—Sookie Stackhouse meets the Dresden Files by way of Maxim. (Aug.)