Strange Practice

Somewhere between 3 and 4 stars. From the cover I thought this was historical urban fantasy, but in fact it's set in modern-day London. It's a fast-paced story about Greta and a group of monsters fighting off and outsmarting a murderous cult and its leader. It's something like a crime thriller, with a lot of action and only a very slight hint of romance.

The book didn't really absorb me until about halfway through, when we finally see Greta alone with some of her regular patients. At that point I understood why she's dedicated to helping monsters, instead of only seeing her complaints about her job. There are several point-of-view characters, including the villains, and I didn't really care much about any of them until then, although they're all intriguing.

I continued on because I wanted to know what would happen with the plot, and I did come to like most of the characters, except for August. He delivers most of the comic relief, in the form of blunt statements, confusion, etc. I guess he's supposed to be a reader stand-in, the guy who is not really a part of this world and has a normal human reaction to all the strangeness. But it's a better book than that - I did feel immersed in the second half and didn't need his perspective. Greta is also a human, and she's the character in the blurb and on the cover. And “monsters are people too” is definitely a theme here, so the other characters' perspectives are never alienating, even when they are alien. Fastitocalon is my favorite character and I love his close friendship with Greta. It's sweet and I feel it works really well as the emotional focus of the story.

Overall I liked this book, and I look forward to reading about these characters having another adventure.

A solid 3.5 star book, which could easily have been a 4+ star book with some tweaks to the writing. And by some tweaks I mean an editor should have sat down and slashed all of the self-conscious and second-guessing asides, and 99% of the qualifiers as well. A little doubt among characters is fine, but the inability of the main characters to make a definite, unqualified sentence was off-putting and distracting. It was too “look at me looking at myself”, which inevitably pulled me out of the story and, indeed, made me look at it. Examples:

“She always felt vaguely as if she ought to be draped in lace and ruffles, or possibly diaphanous peignoirs, whatever they were, in order to live up to the surroundings;” (emphasis in original) - why insert the phrase “whatever they were”, what does this aside add to the story? My suspicion is that the author believes a protagonist who knows about peignoirs will somehow alienate readers, and that the aside is meant to keep Greta “relatable”. Bad writing. Use the word with confidence or just scrap it altogether.

“She would not be the eleventh, if she had any say in the matter” (emphasis in original). This sentence is during a particularly dramatic scene, and comes at the pivotal moment in the action where Greta decides to fight for her life. Why, WHY is this moment diluted by the addition of “if she had any say in the matter”?! If someone has decided to fight off an attacker she is not going to be thinking about how much say she has in the matter, she is going to be thinking of how to survive. I think the author added this aside to show us how plucky our heroine is, but instead it creates a look-at-me-looking-at-myself moment that rings false and takes us right out of the action.

And so on and so forth throughout the book. Again, a good editor would have slashed out all the hedging and left us with a lean story that really zings along, but since that didn't happen we have to ask if the fantastic plot and characters outweigh the weak writing. For me, they did. As I moved through the book I became completely engrossed in the story, hedging asides and all, and I couldn't wait to find out what would happen next. Overall, a good read.

I'm beyond excited to have found another Paranormal London series. This book scratches the same itch for me as the Rivers of London books or the Athena Club series do.

Greta Helsing is not your traditional general practitioner. She treats the supernatural. Groomed for this job since childhood, Greta is a natural. That is, until a group of monks start killing humans and vamps. They want to rid the world of evil. Not only is Greta treating one of the would be victims, her occupation in itself is deemed evil and makes her a target. This was a fun read. Greta is a very likable character. I really liked Ruthven too. I received a copy from Net Galley.

Pros: fun characters, interesting story, quick read

Cons: repetition

Greta Helsing is a modern day human doctor who treats the supernatural. When she's called to a vampire's house for an emergency, she discovers that a mysterious group is hunting ‘creatures of evil', a group that might be connected to the ‘rosary ripper' murders plaguing London.

I enjoyed this book a lot. The characters were quirky and entertaining. I liked that a few of them were familiar from older literary works. The mythologies for the different creatures were a mixture of common folklore with a few twists to make them different and fresh. I particularly liked the interpretation of angels and demons presented. The author did a fantastic job of making the ‘monsters' feel very human and empathetic.

There's a particular scene with Greta that I absolutely loved. Most urban fantasy novels have literal kickass female characters, so it was nice reading a book with a female protagonist who doesn't know any martial arts, who's terrified by horrific situations, but who manages her fear and is able to act despite it. It was wonderful reading about a woman who didn't beat anyone up and who relied on her friends to help her when things got tough.

I was somewhat surprised that the core protagonists didn't warn the supernatural community of their danger, specifically Greta's patients and employees. I also found it strange that everyone in the group seemed to learn the same information separately - at different times - rather than pooling what they'd learned (or asking more questions of the group that had encountered the antagonists).

There's a fair amount of repetition. Several conversations simply repeated information learned earlier.

On the whole, this was a fun, fast read. I'm very curious to see what adventure Greta has next.

I really enjoyed this. I've already ordered the sequel.

This began as very promising for me. I was excited by the premise of a female, human doctor to the supernatural in modern London. At first I had no problem with the dialogue and following along in the mind of Greta, the MC, and I was interested in the “mystery.” The mystery wasn't a mystery by the halfway mark, which is normally fine, and Greta had become very bland for me. By the end, I thought everything, from characters to plot to relationships, was flat. There were 3-4 male characters and I couldn't differentiate them at all throughout the book and all the supernatural beings felt very human. I never felt the tension of the climax and convenience of the ending was an additional mark against it. I hate to say it, but the execution of all aspects of this was bland.