The Marla Mason novels, T.A. Pratt
Sep. 1st, 2011 11:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jinianThese are notable chiefly for being an ongoing urban fantasy series with an ass-kicking female protagonist but nearly devoid of romance. Sorcerous politics, yes; angry gods, yes; Lovecraftian horrors, yes and not always where you think. And there is no way in hell that Marla would put up with an alpha werewolf.
Marla Mason is a tough sorcerer in charge of a fictional city called Felport on the U.S. eastern seaboard, and her city-affinity is one of my favorite things about her. She sees a large, beautiful, outright magical park in her city as an interruption to the proper asphalt and concrete. She's snarky as hell about everything else, too, and her banter with her interesting sidekick is one of my favorite things about the series. (Amusing turns of phrase that actually amuse me, and nerdy pop culture references: Bonus points.)
I'd picked up the exact wrong one of these books a couple of years ago and been almost uninterested enough not to finish, but when read in order and to completion these are some good stuff. Books 1-3 each stand alone reasonably well, but book 4 is firmly a middle book and doesn't work well without setup or conclusion. Of course, that's the one I happened upon originally; glad I reconsidered when I ran across book 1. You have to go online to find book 5 (available for free), but that does end satisfyingly, and the prequel at the same page is rather good. The author's Kickstarter proposal to fund book 6 has half again as much money as it asked for, so I imagne there'll be another novel before too long.
Read these if you can find Blood Engines to start with, and enjoy the actual representative cover art with only one gratuitous midriff shot in the whole series!
Marla Mason is a tough sorcerer in charge of a fictional city called Felport on the U.S. eastern seaboard, and her city-affinity is one of my favorite things about her. She sees a large, beautiful, outright magical park in her city as an interruption to the proper asphalt and concrete. She's snarky as hell about everything else, too, and her banter with her interesting sidekick is one of my favorite things about the series. (Amusing turns of phrase that actually amuse me, and nerdy pop culture references: Bonus points.)
I'd picked up the exact wrong one of these books a couple of years ago and been almost uninterested enough not to finish, but when read in order and to completion these are some good stuff. Books 1-3 each stand alone reasonably well, but book 4 is firmly a middle book and doesn't work well without setup or conclusion. Of course, that's the one I happened upon originally; glad I reconsidered when I ran across book 1. You have to go online to find book 5 (available for free), but that does end satisfyingly, and the prequel at the same page is rather good. The author's Kickstarter proposal to fund book 6 has half again as much money as it asked for, so I imagne there'll be another novel before too long.
Read these if you can find Blood Engines to start with, and enjoy the actual representative cover art with only one gratuitous midriff shot in the whole series!
