The Edge of Dawn

Richard Oort—white atheist, Albuquerque cop, and reluctant CEO—again takes up the cause of science against magic, wielding a literal sword of Reason, in the third installment of Snodgrass’s action-filled and skeptical urban fantasy series (following The Edge of Ruin). From Aztec pyramid to Hittite ruin, Richard tracks down incursions of Old Ones, extra-dimensional beings who feed on human emotions. While investigating a massacre close to home, he discovers and adopts a young Navajo girl who, like him, is genetically immune to the psychic abilities of their enemies. Double-crossed by allies and struggling against a corporate coup, Richard battles his own inner demons as much as the tentacled horrors from beyond. Snodgrass focuses on the internal struggles as effectively as the exterior action, which helps distinguish her protagonist from his enemies more clearly than the stated division between rationality and superstition, particularly when a key to victory lies in the somewhat clichéd uncanny ability of the nine-year-old Native American girl. Agent: Kay McCauley, Aurous Inc. (Aug.)