Bull - Book Reviews

***** - Excellent
**** - Good
*** - Okay
** - Bad
* - Terrible
+ - Half-star

Finder
Emma Bull
Tor
Fiction, YA Fantasy
****

DESCRIPTION: Bordertown stands between the mundane world and the recently-returned magical world. Humans, halfbloods, and full Trueblood elves come to Bordertown when they don't fit in anywhere else... and when they don't have a choice. Here, magic and technology exist in a peculiar balance, but the rules of urban survival are still the same. It is here that the human Orient, gifted - or cursed - with the power to find almost anything people want found, has made a new home.
A dark new drug threatens Bordertown. It promises to turn humans into Trueblood elves, thus allowing them to cross the border into the untold wonders of the magical world... only nobody has ever survived long enough for it to work. It is spreading like wildfire among humans despite the death-toll, and is triggering some serious problems in the delicate racial balance of Bordertown in its wake. Orient soon finds himself searching for the one thing he never wanted to find: a killer.

REVIEW: This was a well-written urban fantasy in what is evidently a "shared world" (one used by multiple authors), a little off the beaten path. I didn’t feel that I’d read about these same characters in slightly different guises before, as sometimes happens in fantasy works. Enough is hinted at here that I wonder if the author has plans for more books. This is pitched at the older end of the young adult market, just as a warning: there is some sex and violence.

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