[LISTENED TO: November 2022] Sinister Magic
I’m not sure what attracted me to this author. I suppose she came up on my Chirp Audiobook suggestions and I was looking for something a little different.
I like fantasy, but sometimes it gets too much up its own world building of for me to get into the story. I hadn’t really read much urban fantasy, but from the little I’ve read, I rather like it. The stories feel contemporary and feature alternate-reality takes on things we already know. And I rather like that.
Linday Buroker is a self-published author. This typically raises a red-flag, but this book has almost 10,000 ratings on Goodreads, so it’s not like no one is reading her. She is also absurdly prolific as you can see by the massive chart down below.
But what hooked me on this series was narrator Vivienne Leheny. I don’t know much about her, but I absolutely loved her voices, her tone and her ability to really get sarcasm across (Buroker’s characters are very sarcastic). And, amazingly, Leheny seems to read most if not all of Buroker’s books.
So, in summary, the main character is Val Thorvald. As she says, “I’m an assassin.” But she’s not that kind of assassin. She only goes after “magical bad guys.” When magical bad guys come to earth, she takes care of them. Permanently.
This doesn’t make her popular with the rest of the magical community. But thanks to her half-elven blood, a powerful sword named Chopper, and a telepathic tiger with an attitude, she’s always been able to deal with any threats that come her way.
What makes the story even more fun is that Val is a contractor for the government. So the government knows that there are magical creatures in the world, but they don’t acknowledge it publicly. So they need someone like Val who is aware and capable, to do their work. Val’s boss, Willard, is a bad-ass Army sergeant with a really snarky sense of humor.
As the summary summarizes, this story gets complicated
when my boss is afflicted with a mysterious disease, a government agent starts investigating me, and a godforsaken dragon shows up in the middle of my latest job. I’ve taken down vampires, zombies, and ogres, but dragons are way, way more powerful. Worse than that, he wants to use his magic to compel me to do his bidding, as if I’m some weak-minded minion.
The dragon is Lord Zavyrd (since I listened to the audiobook, I had no idea how that was spelled), a powerful dragon with no concept of human ways (although he can transform into a–very, very hot–human). Buroker’s tone as Zavyrd tries to puzzle out human ways and behaviors is pretty great (and Leheny is perfect at it).
In sum, Lord Zavyrd proves to be something of a dragon-cop, coming to earth to hunt down ne’er-do-wells from his own world.
They meet because Val was tracking down a wyvern who had killed some humans. Zav is tracking her down for crimes on their home planet. Val is contracted to kill the wyvern, but Zav wants to bring the wyvern back home to face trial (he is very moral, you see).
At first he and Val are enemies until he realizes that they are working toward the same end. He agrees to use her for his purposes. But she’s cool enough to say things like this:
“And try to keep them distracted. Keep saying arrogant things.”
Zav looked over his shoulder, pinning me with his glare.
“I do not take orders from law-breaking mongrels who do not acknowledge the supremacy of dragons.”
“Yeah, say stuff like that.” I gave him a sarcastic thumbs-up. “You’re a natural.”
One of the funny things in the book is one that others have cited as a massive character flaw. And I suppose realistically it is a huge unbelievable flaw, but it was too funny for me to care. As a critic posted
I don’t understand how a 41 year old mercenary has not yet learned how to hold her tongue, be prepared, and listen to warnings. These seem like basic life lessons that are eventually pounded into most people, except the supremely dense. If this were a YA or she were in her early 20s I could forgive her stupidity, but no, she is unapologetically in her 40s with a 14 yr old daughter and an ex-husband she walked out on.
So, yes, Val has an ex-husband and daughter. She has left them so that they will be safe. Her ex-husband kind of understands, but her daughter doesn’t want anything to do with her.
There’s is some anguishy torment to the character about that but I didn’t find it overbearing.
And since Val has no real friends, she relies on her magical tiger companion, Sindari, for companionship and some great banter (he knows what’s what). She “won” Sindari in a battle. I enjoyed that she is ethically conflicted about “owning” a tiger, but Sindari seems to like her, so I guess it’s okay. Sindari lives in some other realm but comes when she calls him through a magical charm.
So there’s a lot of snark, some good fighting and a lot of set up for future stories. There’s also some other characters who are enjoyable
Val’s mom is a cool hippie (who once married an elf) with a dog and a guy who lives in a trailer on her property. That would be Dimitri, a large, imposing dude who make delicate wood works (which can also be used as defensive weapons). There’s also Zultan a vampire with a massive YouTube presence. And then there’s Nin, a woman who runs a small food truck and makes magical weapons in her spare time. She’s awesome.
I don’t know how I would have responded to reading the book, but with Leheny narrating, I thought it was great and really looked forward to book 2.
Buroker must spend all of her time writing as all of these items have come out in roughly the last fifteen years. I’m not going to listen to everything she’s written I don’t think, but here’s what I’ve started.
| Death Before Dragons almost all written in 2020!
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Legacy of Magic 1-3 written in 2022, the rest in 2023 this is a spinoff series set in Death Before Dragons world. It features a new heroine with a new mystery and threat that she must deal with, but it also brings back some of the characters from the original series.
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Tracking Trouble 2023-2024 (#5 not out yet) Another urban fantasy series set in my Death Before Dragons and Legacy of Magic world!
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Key to this Linday Buroker audio-verse
Red means I’ve listened to it
Green means I’ve downloaded it
Blue means it’s available on Chirp
Black means it’s not available or is a short book
| Dragon Gate 2021-2022 (these books are HUGE)
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A Witch in Wolf Wood 2021-2022 Set in the made-up town of Bellrock, Washington bookish introvert heroines and surly werewolf heroes.
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Agents of the Crown 2018
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Haven’t decided on these series yet
| Swords & Salt [3] 2013
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Chains of Honor [4] 2015 You may want to start with the Chains of Honor Prequels, three novellas that were originally published as the Swords & Salt series.
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she also has these series: The Emperor’s Edge Series (9 primary works). Forgotten Ages /Encrypted series, set in the same world, approximately eighteen years earlier. (2 primary works) PLUS:
also Dragon Blood Series (8 primary works) Heritage of Power (5 primary works) is a sequel a few years after this series AND THESE SCI-FI SERIES Fallen Empire Series (8 primary works) SCI-FI
Sky Full of Stars (3 primary works) sequel Fallen Empire Universe Series (13 books for kindle only) same world also Star Kingdom Series (10 primary works) SCI-FI AND THESE STEAMPUNK SERIES Flash Gold Chronicles Series (5 novellas) AND THIS SERIES TOO Rust & Relics Series (2.5 books) |
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