The Sweet Scent of Blood (Spellcrackers Series #1)

a SWEEEEET novel

Suzanne McLeod (from England for those of us in the U.S.) has written a refreshing book about sidhe, vampires and witches, along with some wonderful side characters that are trolls, satyrs, brownies and goblins. Pixies and gremlins are also mentioned in this book. But it all works. In this alternate reality, England has the works. Vampires have used public relations to present themselves as celebrities, even putting out calenders, (Mr. June, Mr October, etc).

The main character, Genevieve Taylor has been coerced into trying to find out the real cause of death of a young woman. From the beginning, complications arise in the form of vampires and witches. They lead Genevieve (Genny) through twists and turns until she gets to the truth. Genevieve has some secrets of her own, that gradually are revealed. Even though I thought I knew what would happen next, I was always surprised. Even at the end, a character that I thought was one person, ended up to be someone else. Nice work. And Genevieve is no shrinking violet. She's tough, though not invincible, and usually uses her head- though there are two times that I wanted to say, come on Genny, think before you run into those wards! She can see spells and wards, though twice, in the heat of the moment, she neglects to look first.

Ms McLeod's writing is excellant, with great dialogue between characters {one of my pet peeves while reading books is "sucky" dialogue. I could rant for a while on that, but what for? Although bad dialogue is enough to make me put a book down for good}. Througout the book we learn bits and pieces about this world, I didn't notice any large info-dumps that interrupts the flow of the book. Although, usually I don't really mind the insertions of that kind of thing, as long as it doesn't take pages, inserted right in the middle of a conversation- where, when the conversation resumes, I'm going "huh", and have to find where the conversation last left off. hehe. I liked the way Ms McLeod handled the giving of information here.

There's quite a few secondary characters, and they are interesting characters, that I enjoyed reading about. You can get a little taste of The Sweet Scent of Blood by reading chapters one or two. {this is from Suzanne's website} I love when authors are willing to put up a taste of their work on their websites. That's how I became so interested in this book. I stumbled on Suzanne McLeod's website (following comments) and saw she writes, then saw her excerpts and loved the writing. I waited as long as I could, hoping to see her books in Borders here in America, but finally just ended up ordering both (there's a sequel-just released) from the Book Depository {no shipping charges!}.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Delicious!!

Every time I move on to a different genre, I always forget how much I love books about faeries. I love this one, it is my new favorite!! It reminds me of Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake series. I haven't read any Meredith Gentry yet but, since Meredith is Fey, I imagine Genny is like Anita and Meredith mixed together.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

A Must Read

I have thoroughly enjoyed Suzanne McLeod’s Spellcracker series so far. I had first read one of her short stories of Genny in “Home Improvement: Undead Edition” as I am a fan of Charlaine Harris and Patricia Briggs and can say that I will add Suzanne McLeod to my list. If you enjoy the writings of the above authors than you will enjoy this series, a definite must read! Enjoy

Great!

This is a wonderful book. I loved it. Highly recommend. I want more!!

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