Book Review: Death Blows by DD Barant (Bloodhound Files #2)

FBI profiler Jace Valchek was pulled into this parallel realm to hunt for Aristotle Stoker, a human serial killer who preys on vampires and werewolves. Now she works for the National Security Agency of the Unnatural States of America - and her boss is a vampire.

At a bizarre crime scene, Jace finds a bloodsucker murdered by magic, fried to the bone and dressed in the costume of the comic book hero the Flash - a character who isn't supposed to exist here. Comic books have been outlawed for their powers, including crossover spells like the one that transported Jace to this world. Soon, she's following a trail of dead bodies into the sinister underworld of black-market comics - where a deranged madman gives new meaning to the term "super-villain."

My Review:
Jace has been chasing Stoker for months and wants to catch him quickly so that she can be released from her contract and go back to her own world but it is proving to be more complicated than she thought. The shaman who summoned her is no longer available to send her home and Cassius is giving her other complicated cases to work on which diverts her away from Stoker again. Someone is committing brutal murders and displaying the bodies dressed as superheroes from comic books in Jace's world. Here, comic books are banned because they have hidden power so Jace has to delve into black market comics and inter dimensional travel if she is to find out who is doing it and why.

Jace learns that the first discovered victim of this new killer was the lover of her vampire friend and colleague Gretchen and they had just committed to have a baby together. It seems that Saladin was part of a group of superheroes who stopped a cult of evil doers, immortalised in a comic book that is now illegal and Jace is sure that they may have been real life heroes too, meaning the rest of the group may be targets for the killer. Has the deadly cult reemerged or has a member of the Bravo Brigade turned on their former colleagues? Jace and Charlie set out to discover the killer but find that Cassius is again withholding vital information from them, which has Jace considering her position. It turns out that the truth is more than she expected.

There is also a side story happening that Jace gets involved in. A creepy werewolf called Tair has been hanging around watching Dr Pete and he approaches Jace to warn her that her friend is involved in illegal activities and that people in his past are looking for him. Jace wants to help Dr Pete but he vanishes before she can get any answers and again she is finding that Cassius is reluctant to do anything to help her with that investigation. I can understand her frustration. Pulled into another world against your will to become a special consultant on a case that you are being prevented from pursuing to work on a case where your boss won't help you to get the job done? 

I'm not a reader of comics and I don't really watch the superhero films so I didn't get most of the comic book references. The author goes into detail about the origin stories of a few characters in the comics, the confused timelines in the comic book world caused by countless illustrators doing their own versions of stories, bringing characters back from the dead or turning them evil...I feel that a reader who loves this world would get more out of this plot than I did. I found it a bit confusing especially the final reveal of the plot that the bad guy was following-I got a bit lost and wasn't fully invested in what was going on at that stage. I also didn't really get some of the inter dimensional stuff which was a bit over my head at times and I'd have preferred a less complex plot. I also wasn't really keen on where the Tair story went at the end.

I loved the introducting of the crime fighting golem gunslinger The Quicksilver Kid as a new character and I certainly hope that we see him again in future books. I found his back story to be really interesting and want to learn more about him. I find the golems to be the most interesting part of this world. Charlie was his usual amusing self though I do wish that Jace was a bit more appreciative of him at times. Charlie does remain my favourite character. It was also interesting to find out a bit more about Cassius and his background as the book progressed. I also liked the way that he stepped up to help Gretchen in her hour of need, showing that he does care about his employees.   

I also like some of the worldbuilding that we get which Jace gradually finds out about. In order for vampires to breed they had to gain the help of a god to grant them that power, a spell that required the sacrifice of many humans which was of course barbaric genocide. Now vampires can use magic to create a child together with each parent donating a bit of their eternal life and aging so many years each until the 'child' reaches the age that they want he or she to be, and the spell ends, leaving the parents a few years older and the offspring as a fully functional vampire. I found that whole thing imaginative and fascinating to read about. I also liked that the spell surrounding weapons was explored in more detail as Jace comes to understand why people on her new world don't take her gun seriously.

I did have niggles with this book because of my lack of knowledge about comic books and science so for me it wasn't as good as the first book, but it was still another solid read in the series and I will certainly continue with it when time and mood allows.

Read November 2019
3.5/4 stars?