Canyons of Night
The Looking Glass Trilogy, No 3
Jayne Castle

Jove Books/Penguin
August 2011 / ISBN 978-0-515-14988-3
Paranormal Romance
Amazon

Reviewed by Leslie Halpern

Set in the futuristic world of Harmony on the small island of Rainshadow, an injured cop and an antiques dealer attempt to solve a string of mysterious happenings. This isn’t a typical cop or antiques dealer, however. Slade Attridge is a former special agent recovering from a PSI injury that damaged his special talent for night vision. Charlotte Enright is a rainbow reader, whose ability to see color auras has had limited usefulness until now. Together Slade and Charlotte combine their PSI talents to determine the purpose of a magical snow globe and to track down the violent thugs terrorizing the island.

Aiding in their investigation – and at times being more of a hindrance – are two teenage boys and Slade’s unofficial deputy dust bunny: an otherworldly creature with a voracious appetite. Rex, the name Slade calls his dust bunny, chortles happily most of the time as he snuggles in for a nap, chomps down on some homemade zucchini bread, or scampers out for the evening with his fancy clutch purse stolen from Charlotte’s antique store.

The “canyons of night” referred to in the title represent an ominous threat coming from a privately owned woods called the Preserve. Inside these woods a dark unknown energy force pulses with life. The locals are forbidden to venture into the Preserve, although a few – including Slade, Charlotte, the boys, and Rex – slip past the fence to explore the mysteries within.

As with her other book series about the “Arcane Society,” Jane Castle creates in this third book of the Looking Glass Trilogy another look inside a fantastical world filled with passion, humor, sci-fi adventure, and danger. Although the romance is exciting and the mystery intriguing, it’s transporting us into the actual world of Harmony again – with its magical properties, mysterious history, curious residents, and PSI-talented individuals – that should prove most intoxicating to readers.