Death Magic
A Novel of the Lupi
Eileen Wilks

Berkley Sensation
November 2011 / 9780425245125
Paranormal Romance
Amazon

Reviewed by Jan Fields

Death Magic is the eighth book in the Lupi series. Again, I'm wandering into a series after the characters and world are fairly well set. That requires a bit of mental catching up, but Death Magic really functions quite well as stand alone novel. Lily Yu is a very special kind of cop who works specifically with magical crimes, which makes good use of her gift of being a touch sensitive -- she can feel magic and the traces it leaves behind. The one thing she absolutely cannot do is see dead people -- except now. As if seeing a ghost isn't troubling enough, Lily is also having some bad side effects from being a non-werewolf with a werewolf clan's "magic mantle" inside her. She's definitely not at the top of her game, and the game turns very much against her in this novel. Lily must find a way to reconcile her life as a cop with a very new and dangerous threat.

I enjoyed all the magical bits in the book. And I always enjoy werewolves, especially when they don't automatically come with vampires. I like books where the basic premise is the difficulty of two very different kinds of people (in this case magical beings and regular humans) must learn to share the world, even if they can't totally understand one another. Plus, the book has brownies -- I'm a sucker for pixies and brownies -- and it's easy to love these guys. For a paranormal romance, this one was a little light on the romance, but I like seeing characters who can think about something beside each other. All and all, I found it engaging and compelling. I'd definitely come back to this series for more.