Book Review: Spiral Hunt

Spiral Hunt

By:  Margaret Ronald

Publisher:  Eos Books

Publish Date:  February 2009

Genre:  Fantasy

Format:  307 pages-Paperback, pocket size

Series:  1st book in the Evie Scelan Novels

Recommendation:  Yes, if you like lots of Celtic Mythology and mystery with Urban Fantasy, this would be a great read for you.

Book Synopsis:
Some people have the Sight.
Genevieve Scelan has the Scent.

They call her "Hound," and with her unique supernatural sense Evie can track nearly anything - lost keys, vanished family heirlooms... even missing people.  And though she knows to stay out of the magical undercurrent that runs beneath Boston's historic streets, a midnight phone call from a long-vanished lover will destroy the careful boundaries she has drawn .  Now, to pay a years-old debt, Evie must venture into the shadowy world that lies between myth and reality, where she will find betrayal, conspiracies, and revelations that will shatter all she believes about herself and the city she claims as home.

When the Hunt is on, the Hound must run...

First Sentence:
No one ever calls in the middle of the night if they have good news.

My Review and Summary:
Genevieve, or Evie as friend from school call her, works as a bike courier in Boston.  But, on the side works to help recover, or find, items for people - for a fee to help pay rent.  Evie has a special ability passed down in her family blood of years past, she can smell scents even almost taste them at times.  Evie has the nick name in the Undercurrent of Hound.  But one night, after midnight she receives a call from a friend of the past who Evie thought was gone or dead.  Frank, someone Evie had not talked to in fifteen years which didn't end on best of terms, calls to say he has found a way out and is leaving.  But the coversation changes and Evie now can taste the scent of a hunt.  She receives a warning from another through Frank.  Because Frank was once a friend, and possibly more, she feels she owes him and decides to hunt him since no one knows where he is, and there was something in his voice which she feared he would be in trouble.

The story caught my attention at the beginning.  The mystery started right off from page one.  Then as I read more questions surfaced to me.  I love mystery with my urban fantasy, and this book had it.  Fifty pages into the book I was caught up with many questions and wondering how they will tie together.  From here on out I started to get the pieces and the puzzel was coming together.

There is magic, Celtic mythology, and a dark side mixed in here.  The magic is defined in this story as three different categories and what would fall in those areas.  The Irish mythology is added in and blended with the gods and magic together to come to the end of the book.

I enjoyed reading this book, although I did at times stumble over a few words I was not sure of.  My confusion was only because I was not quite sure what some words were, ones used in the magic world, which I am sure many of you would know them.  These words did get defined in the book.

I have book two here and will be getting to it as well!




I received this book from winning a giveaway at Eos Books & Harper Collins.
This book qualifies for my Speculative Fiction Challenge at Book Chick City.