Maybe?

Kat Mandu says...Ravirn is in trouble again – imagine that! Feeling badly for leaving Cerice’s AI familiar in Hell, Ravirn and Melchior, his own AI, plan a trip to Hell to get her back. Bad trouble follows.Fantastic setup. I found I could understand some of the things I’d misunderstood in the first one better once they were summarized in this book. The same with the third one. I like the idea that Ravirn’s a bit shy of his new identity.Cerberus is introduced in this book! I love it. I love that the author portrays the three-headed dog as three different species of dogs when it comes to their heads. Three different personalities as well, driven towards one ultimate goal. One of my favorite new characters. The take McCullough has on Persephone and Hades was neat too, giving Hades a very bad mojo and Persephone a very sympathetic vibe.Although the computer lingo was a bit better in this one, I still had some difficulty understanding some of the things. I do love the virtual bit where he stabs himself in the hand to become virtually part of the environment. I think that’s such a cool thing to do. If not a little gruesome.Ravirn is learning stubbornly what it means to be the Raven and interacting with the Furies and other gods on a whole new level. I love it that he’s growing even though he doesn’t want to.Oh, and of course, the innuendo and teasings. You can always tell a person loves you when they tease you like that and poke fun at your faults without doing it in a mean way. Poor Ravirn. The goddess of chaos gets him every time. And the relationship with Cerice became interesting, especially after the tidbit with Tisiphone in the elevator.I love this series. Four hearts overall.

Half-devil and miles from anything resembling heroic, perpetual underdog Frank Triggaltheron Trigg is the last man standing against Armageddon. As the favorite nephew of the Devil, Frank has led a troubled life, but he'd always had his uncle's influence to fall back on. Now, with God and Lucifer coming to terms and leaving existence to fend for itself, his once exalted status of Anti-Christ-to-be does little to endear him to the hordes of angels and demons running amok in the Godless world. With help from the members of DRAC, an organization of wizards, psychics, telepaths, and low-end supernatural beings, Frank must thwart the pro-Armageddon forces and rescue an angel in whose life rests the fate of humanity. Better luck next time, humanity.

Children are missing. The police are stumped. Halloween is coming, with an ancient evil on the horizon. The vampires are the good guys. This is not your ordinary fall weekend in Charlotte, NC. Vampire private detectives Jimmy Black and Greg Knightwood have been hired to keep a young client from being cursed for all eternity, but end up in a bigger mess than they ever imagined. Suddenly trapped in the middle of a serial kidnapping case, Jimmy and Greg uncover a plot to bring forth an ancient evil into the world, and enlist the help of a police detective, a priest, a witch, a fallen angel and strip club proprietor to save the world. This unlikely band of heroes battles zombies, witches, neuroses and sunburn while cracking jokes and looking for the perfect bag of O-negative.

Sister murdered, best friend dead, married to the patron saint of death, Santa Muerte. Necromancer Eric Carter's return to Los Angeles hasn't gone well, and it's about to get even worse.His link to the Aztec death goddess is changing his powers, changing him, and he's not sure how far it will go. He's starting to question his own sanity, wonder if he's losing his mind. No mean feat for a guy who talks to the dead on a regular basis.While searching for a way to break Santa Muerte's hold over him, Carter finds himself the target of a psychopath who can steal anyone's form, powers, and memories. Identity theft is one thing, but this guy does it by killing his victims and wearing their skins like a suit. He can be anyone. He can be anywhere.Now Carter has to change the game -- go from hunted to hunter. All he has for help is a Skid Row bruja and a ghost who's either his dead friend Alex or the manifestation of Carter's own guilt-fueled psychotic break.Everything is trying to kill him. Nothing is as it seems. If all his plans go perfectly, he might survive the week.He's hoping that's a good thing.

It’s hard enough for Alastair Stone to keep his two lives—powerful mage and mundane Occult Studies professor—separate without an old friend asking him to take on a new apprentice. Especially after a university colleague wants him to investigate a massive old house for things that go bump in the night. Still, Stone figures it’s an easy job: just turn up, put on a little show, and announce that the house is clean.Only it isn’t. A malevolent spirit is reawakening in the basement, imprisoned between dimensions and intent on escape. If it succeeds, countless people will die. Worse, a trio of dark mages want to help it break free so they can control it for their own sinister purposes. They’ll do whatever it takes—including seducing Stone’s young apprentice and using him against his master—to get what they’re after.With time running out, Stone has to stay alive long enough to uncover the spirit’s secrets. But even if he does, he fears that his own power won’t be enough to send it back.

Alex Verus faces his dark side in this return to the bestselling urban fantasy series about a London-based mage.To protect his friends, Mage Alex Verus has had to change--and embrace his dark side. But the life mage Anne has changed too, and made a bond with a dangerous power. She's going after everyone she's got a grudge against--and it's a long list.In the meantime, Alex has to deal with his arch-enemy, Levistus. The Council's death squads are hunting Alex as well as Anne, and the only way for Alex to stop them is to end his long war with Levistus and the Council, by whatever means necessary. It will take everything Alex has to stay a step ahead of the Council and stop Anne from letting the world burn.

This fairy godmother's got claws. When someone kidnaps the last surviving descendant of the Grandmaster of the Knights Templar, it's bad news. When the baby is the key to the tenuous alliance between a large werewolf pack and the knights, it's even worse news. They're at each other's throats before they've even begun to look for baby Constance. But whoever kidnapped Constance didn't count on one thing: she's also the goddaughter of John Charming. Modern-day descendant of a long line of famous dragon slayers, witch finders, and wrong righters. John may not have any experience being a parent, but someone is about to find out that he can be one mean mother...IN SHINING ARMOR is the fourth novel in a series which gives a new twist to the Prince Charming tale. The first three novels are Charming, Daring, & Fearless.

With a sly blend of fantasy, humor, and paranormal adventure, Kevin Hearne is the trickster god of action-packed mash-ups. In The Iron Druid Chronicles, Atticus O’Sullivan is a folk hero for the twenty-first century, battling legendary beasts, shadowy mystics, and demonic demigods from around the world. Now get Hounded, Hexed, and Hammered all at once in this eBook bundle, a triple dose of mayhem straight out of Hearne’s genre-smashing imagination.  Includes a preview of the fourth book in the series, Tricked, as well as two bonus short stories set in the world of The Iron Druid Chronicles: “Clan Rathskeller” and the eBook exclusive “Kaibab Unbound.”  HOUNDED   Atticus O’Sullivan, last of the Druids, lives peacefully in Tempe, Arizona, running an occult bookshop and shape-shifting in his spare time. A handsome, tattooed Irish dude, he looks like he’s about twenty-one years old—actually, he’s twenty-one centuries old and he wields a magical sword known as Fragarach, the Answerer. Unfortunately, a very angry Celtic god wants that sword, and now Atticus will need all his power—plus the help of a seductive goddess of death, his vampire and werewolf team of attorneys, and a sexy bartender possessed by a Hindu witch—to kick some Celtic arse and deliver himself from evil.  HEXED   Atticus doesn’t care much for witches, but he’s about to make nice with the local coven when suddenly the witch population in Tempe quadruples overnight. And the new girls are not just bad, they’re badasses with a dark history on the German side of World War II. But with a fallen angel feasting on local students, a horde of Bacchants blowing in from Vegas, and a dangerously sexy Celtic goddess of fire vying for his attention, Atticus is having trouble scheduling the witch hunt.  HAMMERED   Thor, the Norse god of thunder, is a blowhard and a bully, and Viking vampire Leif Helgarson has asked his friend Atticus for help taking down this Norse nightmare. As a rule, Atticus generally tries to stay away from the guy with the lightning bolts. Soon, though, Atticus and Leif are off to the plane of Asgard, where they team up with a werewolf, a sorcerer, and an army of frost giants for an epic showdown against vicious Valkyries, angry gods, and the hammer-wielding Thunder Thug himself.

Everson Croft here, professor of mythology and … nervous as sin. Tonight’s the night I tell Caroline the truth: about my feelings, my magic, everything. So why am I surprised when Detective Vega calls me to a new case? An elusive creature is chewing up residents in a housing project run by rival gangs. One more mangled body and the place will explode into warfare. Problem is, someone’s protecting the killer. All signs point to the vampire Arnaud—who’s just upped the stakes. If I don’t send Detective Vega down a trail of bad leads, he’ll snatch her child. But is Arnaud trying to derail the investigation or twist it to his own ends, ones that could reshape the city? Worse, Caroline has disappeared, and I’m under suspicion. No one believes I last saw her with Angelus, a mysterious hunk and full-blooded faerie. Dangerous no matter how you slice it. Two cases: one personal, one professional, and both going to hell in a hurry. Time to wizard up.

Three titles in this series together for the first time in one huge volume.Monster Hunter International: With the clock ticking towards Armageddon, Monster Hunter Owen Pitt must face down legions of undead minions—and the cursed family of the woman he loves.Monster Hunter Vendetta: Accountant turned monster hunter Owen made himself the enemy of the most powerful beings in the universe. Now an evil death cult is after Owen for revenge.Monster Hunter Alpha: Earl Harbinger, leader of Monster Hunter International, is also a werewolf. Now Earl's greatest foe, an ex-KGB werewolf, has surfaced. But Harbinger is an alpha wolf for a reason, and he's not about to roll over and play dead.At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).

The universe needs a reboot in this WebMage novel from Kelly McCullough.In the twenty-first century, magic has advanced with the times and gone digital, and Ravirn, a direct descendant of one of the three Fates, is a talented sorcerer--and computer hacker extraordinaire. Now that Ravirn has come into his own as a minor chaos power, he's partying with Zeus, playing hard-to-get with a gorgeous Fury...and trying to stay one step ahead of Nemesis, the unstoppable goddess of vengeance.But now Necessity--the sentient computer that runs the universe--has caught a virus that crashes most of the magical internet, and Ravirn is tasked with fixing it. And Ravirn hasn't missed the fact that whoever repairs Necessity will, for that moment, run the universe, able to remake the worlds (and everything else) to their liking.Unfortunately for Ravirn, some very dangerous beings have figured that out, too...

I let it go—all of it. Everything I’d been saving up all my life, building and growing inside me, too much to hold in one half-human body. It pushed and fought to be free with a force that turned me into a bomb with a timer vibrating on zero. I was free.But so was everything I’d fought so hard not to be…Brothers Cal and Niko Leandros know trouble when they see it—and then proceed to wipe the floor with it. But now it seems their whole world is falling to pieces. Cal’s nightmarish monster side is growing ever stronger, changing Cal physically as well as mentally. Which is exactly what Grimm—Cal’s savage doppelgänger—wants. And when a covert supernatural organization decides that it’s time to put Cal down before he threatens pretty much everything else in existence, the brothers find themselves in a fight they actually might lose. But the dark temptations Cal has denied all his life may prove to be exactly what can save them.Even if he must fall forever…

Rating 5.0 starsRe-read January 2020 - Still think this is an excellent book. I like the relationships and the emotions the author is able to elicit from the reader. Then to add on top of that the supernatural world. Cindy and Alex are definitely couple goals. Original review below. I was surprised at how much I like this book. I have gotten a little burned out with urban fantasy, werewolves, vampires and then I recently read the Demon Accords series which I really liked. This book was recommended based on that series so I thought I would give it a chance. I am glad I did. First off, I feel this was more of a story about a young boy and his best friend and family with a supernatural component then a supernatural story. What I mean by that is that the supernatural part was slow to be introduced. (view spoiler)[ The story starts with Alex as a 5 year old boy that just started school and how he became best friends with Cindy. He tries to help her when a bully picks on her at school and they became best friends right away despite the fact she was a girl and black and he was a boy and white. Then the story shifts to them in high school and explains about the first time he notices he can hear and see ghosts. Next the story shifts to the present day when he is 23 years old and Cindy is living right next to him. It had been 5 years since that last experience with the ghost and he thought it might just have been a dream. After that, the supernatural component really kicks in, but through it all the foundation of the story is still the relationship between Alex and Cindy (as well as the relationship with his sister and Cindy's family). They have been best friends for their whole life but maybe they both have feelings for each other more than friends? Neither one of them wants to ruin a friendship and they both give off clues that they might want more, but each one is too afraid to bring up this topic. This went on for a very long time in the story and it could have become frustrating because it was so obvious that they should be together. They did get together at the end, which I am very happy for, because if the author tried to milk this thing any longer or come up with some excuse why they can't be together just so he can change his mind 3 books later, I would have been pissed. As it stands it was a very endearing storyline. While this was happening, we go along with Alex to find out he has more powers than just being able to see and speak to ghosts. We also learn how this happened. We also get a sneak peak into other supernatural creatures after he meets Victoria and she turns out to be a vampire. It turns out that Alex was adopted and didn't find out till he was 23. Then we find out that his parents were cult leaders and he was born just so he could be sacrificed to demons and they could take the demons powers. Something went wrong and his parents and the cult died, but somehow Alex ended up with the demons powers. He is not a demon, but he does have their powers. (hide spoiler)]

A short story in The Iron Druid series that occurs two weeks before the events of the first book.*Short story bundled with "Clan Rathskeller" (another short story) at the back of the ebook "Hounded," Iron Druid Chronicles Book 1.

Ravirn is not your average computer geek. A child of the Fates—literally—he’s a hacker extraordinaire who can zero in on the fatal flaw in any program. Now that twenty-first-century magic has gone digital that makes him a very talented sorcerer. But a world of problems is about to be downloaded on Ravirn—who’s just trying to pass his college midterms.Great Aunt Atropos, one of the three Fates, decides that humans having free will is really overrated and plans to rid herself of the annoyance—by coding a spell into the Fate Core, the server that rules destiny. As a hacker, Ravirn is a big believer in free will, and when he not only refuses to debug her spell but actively opposes her, all hell breaks loose.Even with the help of his familiar Melchior, a sexy sorceress (who’s also a mean programmer), and the webgoblin underground, it’s going to be a close call...

Pretty good closure for this part of the story. It leaves Ravirn and Mel with an almost clean slate to begin messing around in other places.An excellent thing about these books is that Kelly never uses Ravirn (or Mel) to move the plot along. Things happen in spite—rather than because—of Ravirn's best intentions, quick thinking and appropriate action. In other series, you find out what's happening immediately and have to suffer page after page watching the character with all the clues in front of them while they fail to put two and two together. Here, Ravirn solves the mystery, finds a way to fix the problem and yet, the bad guys are always on his heels complicating things. It's nice because you get all the excitement of an action-packed book without the all too common accompanying frustration that comes from reading the main character making stupid decisions to trigger said action.Another great achievement is that the author manages to update the heroes' powers in every book without writing himself into a corner. I'm tired of ending a book with a character gaining a new cool power only to find out in the next that it can't be used because ::insert lame reason here::.Looking forward to reading the next one.

Eli Monpress is vain. He's cocky. And he's a thief.But he's a thief who has just seen his bounty topped and he's not happy about it. The bounty topper, as it turns out, is his best friend and master swordsman, Josef. He's been keeping secrets from Eli. Apparently, he's the only prince of a rather feisty country, and he's been ordered to come home to do his duty. This means throwing over personal ambitions like proving he's the greatest swordsman who ever lived.Family drama aside, Eli and Josef have their hands full. The Spirit Court has been usurped by the Council of Thrones and someone calling herself the Immortal Empress is staging a massive invasion. But it's not just politics - the Immortal Empress has a specific target in mind: Eli Monpress, the greatest thief in the world.This omnibus edition contains: THE SPIRIT WAR and SPIRIT'S END

From the blog at https://clsiewert.wordpress.com/2015/...There are times when a making a healthy, fresh meal seems like too much work, times when munching on white cheddar popcorn and enjoying a drink seems like an acceptable substitute for a meal. It isn’t in the long run, of course, but as an occasional treat it works. The Black Knight Chronicles are the popcorn in the UF world. To me, Hartness managed the tricky feat of creating the tension a mystery requires without negating the seriousness of the situation for the victims.Best friends James Black and Greg Knightwood IV are vampires making their living (so to speak) as private investigators. There’s been a series of seeming hate crimes in North Carolina where six gay men have been found badly beaten. Details surrounding the scenes lead Detective Sabrina to suspect a supernatural angle, so she enlists the duo to help. We meet them on the way to Lilith’s (yes, that one) supernatural strip club, but this is about as far away from True Blood’s Fangtasia as one can get. I read the first two chapters with raised eyebrow, but I was committed when the chapter ended with this giggle-worthy toss-off:“I slid into the backseat and lay down as best I could. Greg had a towel behind his seat, because he’s a hoopy frood that way, so I tried to put the bloodiest parts of me on the towel to save the upholstery.”Characterization is decent, especially given humorous overtones. Greg and James have been buddies for most of their lives, along with Mike the priest, and their banter has the fond familiarity of classic bro-mance. I also appreciated that James is aware he’s the muscle of the group and doesn’t resent the others for their direction or help. James admires Greg even as he mocks him, and the respect–for the most part– for Greg’s ethical code helps elevate the story’s tone at the same time it goes for laughs:“Sometimes my partner is really perceptive, something that’s easy to overlook when he wraps himself in black spandex, which happens more often that it should.”The storyline takes an unusual turn with the crime. Per the genre norm, Detective Sabrina becomes personally involved when one of the victims is her cousin. A backstory is revealed that makes the connection even more personal. However, a major plot twist develops that takes the story in initially pun-ishing directions when another supernatural group becomes involved. At first, I rolled my eyes. I had scanned a review or two before reading, but had forgotten that detail, noting only that I may not appreciate the direction it took. It turned out, once the pun-ish idiocy (pardon me) was left behind, it became a reasonably interesting story. There’s a bit of fantasy world-building that seems a little bit oddly juxtaposed but works, as well as a modern action sequence to ramp up the tension. It’s possible that there’s a little too much of kitchen sink in the story, but what do you expect from popcorn?I frequently have anticipatory nervousness when I run into a book that tries to combine humor with sensitive issues. Gay-bashing and shaming is a very real issue, and I was on the alert for signs the author was going to be dismissive. I ended up enjoying this one. There’s a few preachy points but not overly intrusive, and it seemed Harkness was generally able to be respectful while maintaining a fun tone. I’d certainly welcome other insights and experiences if anyone want to share thoughts.Three and a half giggles.