Melanie Rawn is best known for her fantasy series Dragon Prince and Dragon Star. This book is a departure from the sword-and-sorcery genre of her earlier works. It takes place largely in post 9/11 New York and is a romantic fantasy.
The subtitle of the book, A Love Story with Magical Interruptions is an homage to Dorothy Sayers’ Busman’s Honeymoon: A Love Story with Detective Interruptions (one of my favourite Lord Peter Wimsey titles). Like the Sayers book, the romantic elements of the story are as important, or even more important than the mystery/adventure.
The heroine of Spellbinder is Holly McClure, a successful best-selling author of historical fiction. She also happens to be a hereditary witch, whose major talent is as a Spellbinder. Her blood can be used to strengthen any spell or ritual. This makes her very valuable to other magic doers, both good and evil. She is romantically involved with Evan Lachlan, a federal marshal. Part of Evan’s job is to act as a bodyguard to a federal Judge who is secretly the leader of the witches in the New York area. The coven of witches, of which Holly and the Judge are a part, becomes involved in a fight with the leader of a satanic cult and his search for power. He needs Holly’s blood to achieve his ambitions.
But all of the magical daring do takes the back seat to the growing relationship between Holly and Evan. Evan struggles to come to terms with Holly’s success and independence. It is that struggle, even more than both characters’ need to accept Holly’s magical heritage and overcome the evil Satanist, which is at the centre of the novel.
I liked that Rawn’s book goes into such detail about the history and motivations of her main characters. In spite of the use of plot elements familiar from shorter and lighter romance novels, Rawn’s book goes into more depth into the conflicts and developments of the characters. Issues are not resolved in 10 pages or two weeks. In spite of the characters’ rather unlikely habit of getting into long philosophical discussions in the midst of crises, I enjoyed the richer texture of what could have been a very lightweight paranormal romance.
The subtitle of the book, A Love Story with Magical Interruptions is an homage to Dorothy Sayers’ Busman’s Honeymoon: A Love Story with Detective Interruptions (one of my favourite Lord Peter Wimsey titles). Like the Sayers book, the romantic elements of the story are as important, or even more important than the mystery/adventure.
The heroine of Spellbinder is Holly McClure, a successful best-selling author of historical fiction. She also happens to be a hereditary witch, whose major talent is as a Spellbinder. Her blood can be used to strengthen any spell or ritual. This makes her very valuable to other magic doers, both good and evil. She is romantically involved with Evan Lachlan, a federal marshal. Part of Evan’s job is to act as a bodyguard to a federal Judge who is secretly the leader of the witches in the New York area. The coven of witches, of which Holly and the Judge are a part, becomes involved in a fight with the leader of a satanic cult and his search for power. He needs Holly’s blood to achieve his ambitions.
But all of the magical daring do takes the back seat to the growing relationship between Holly and Evan. Evan struggles to come to terms with Holly’s success and independence. It is that struggle, even more than both characters’ need to accept Holly’s magical heritage and overcome the evil Satanist, which is at the centre of the novel.
I liked that Rawn’s book goes into such detail about the history and motivations of her main characters. In spite of the use of plot elements familiar from shorter and lighter romance novels, Rawn’s book goes into more depth into the conflicts and developments of the characters. Issues are not resolved in 10 pages or two weeks. In spite of the characters’ rather unlikely habit of getting into long philosophical discussions in the midst of crises, I enjoyed the richer texture of what could have been a very lightweight paranormal romance.
No comments:
Post a Comment