The Fae's Amulet

This review is also featured on Behind the Pages: The Fae's Amulet

Catherine is a powerful necromancer working as a private investigator. She's had her share of power, claiming the title of Lady Death in a previous decade, but now she's focused on helping others reclaim what's been lost. Her latest case is to find a powerful missing amulet, one that many people would kill to claim. Its previous owner has gone missing, and the new one might just cause the end of the world. But Catherine isn't immune to the allure of power the amulet can bestow. She will find herself not just tempted by the amulet, but the handsome man that brought the case to her as well.

The Fae's Amulet was an ambitious book. It incorporated all the pieces needed to make a great urban fantasy but fell short. There was quite a bit of heavy world-building done way too fast. The reader is introduced to a wide array of supernatural creatures and their politics with little description and time to familiarize themselves. There were also many names introduced that tied into each supernatural group, and it was hard to remember them all. It would have been a wiser choice to incorporate a few different creatures and fully develop their politics and history with Catherine. Then in later books, others could gradually be added in to create a layering effect for readers to better see the world as a whole.

There was also a lack of conflict between Catherine and the supernatural power sects. They all seemed to either appreciate her cruelty and let her be or were already cowed into submission by previous acts. During her investigations, I would have liked to see her struggle to obtain information from the vampires, or even the werewolves because they didn't see eye to eye. Instead, they acted like chums and cracked jokes. Catherine always seemed to get her way, no matter what situation she ended up in.

Now let's talk about Catherine herself. She entered the scene as a 300-year-old experienced necromancer with a large amount of power. Magic didn't take much effort and she had a wide variety of resources. Aside from learning how to fall in love again, she didn't go through much character development. The romance was well done, incorporating believable doubts and feelings that a person feels when they're falling for someone. She also ended up with conflicts revolving around her relationships which made it interesting, but it wasn't enough to carry her character. She needed to have more flaws, more struggle to make herself a character worth following and watching grow.

I'll have to pass on future books in this series.