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Comeuppance served cold
2022
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Library Journal Review
Deeds's (Copper Road) gas-lamp-style caper story is set in an alternate Seattle where magic users ply their trades, shapeshifters stalk the streets, and speakeasies cater to drinkers of both illegal booze and equally forbidden magical elixirs. The story opens at its end, with Dolly White leaving the scene of the final crime, glamoured to appear as the man whom she (among others) wanted to bring down from his unassailable position. As events unfold, the reader is taken backwards in time, in the tradition of the best caper stories, following Dolly's trail as her motives and her methods become clearer. Along the way, magical Seattle on the cusp on the Great Depression comes to boisterous life, stalked by dangerous and greedy men who have planned for every eventuality--except Dolly. VERDICT Readers who love heist and caper stories will be thrilled with Dolly and her quest to deliver much-deserved comeuppance to those who believed they are above the law. The gas-lamp setting gives just the right touch of magic and creeping dread to Deeds's novel.--Marlene Harris
Publishers Weekly Review
Crime, drugs, and magic rule the streets of 1920s Seattle in this captivating noir fantasy from Deeds (Copper Road). Seattle's Commissioner of Magi hires heroine Dolly White as a companion for his unruly daughter, Fiona, in hopes of taming her disgraceful behavior. Meanwhile, widowed Violet Solomon, who runs a waterfront speakeasy under the guise of a hat shop, does her best to keep her shape-shifter brother, Phillipe, out of harm's way. Dolly and Violet's lives unexpectedly intertwine as Violet seeks revenge against the Order of Saint Michael, the volunteer police force that murdered her husband and whose leader happens to be Fiona's older brother, Francis. Dolly, meanwhile, suspects the Order is responsible for the city's sudden uptick in violence against shape-shifters and sets out to investigate Francis's shady business with a local drug ring, threatening to bring to light more chaos than the city is prepared for. Deeds presents all this intrigue in reverse chronological order, spinning out mysteries that will keep readers guessing till the end. The result is a well-crafted puzzle; readers' only complaint will be that they want more. (Mar.)
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