This is the second in a new series written by Kim Harrison that is based in an alternate world where magic happens and a vampire can be your best friend - during the day. The premise is that a runaway virus brings about The Turn, and when it runs itself out, half the world is occult - witches, fairies, pixies, vampires, etc. And the other half is human, and scared to death of tomatoes. The premise is the same as the old Shadowrun series, but the world of Turned Cincinnati is almost as cozy and familiar as the one we live in. Well, almost.
Our heroine is Rachel Morgan, an independent runner (as in trouble shooter/maker), who almost lost her life to a demon disguised as a vampire in the previous volume. That story established Rachel as a freelance investigator, living with an almost undead vampire (Ivy), in an old church. In the garden live her trusty assistant, Jenks (a pixie), and his family. This would be almost normal if Ivy wasn't in a perpetual struggle with her desire to eat people and her obvious affection for Rachel, if Jenks wasn't a potty mouthed mischief maker, and if Rachel didn't have a knack for careening from one deadly mess to another.
This time Rachel's problems start when she accepts a contract to help with the investigation of a series of serial killings that is leaving the city's ley line witches in a bad state of disassembly. Her task is to play a college student in the local University to spy on a particular professor. Rachel, however, believes she is watching the wrong person, and that Trent Kalamack, the man who once turned her into a ferret and dropped her in a rat fight. With Rachel compulsively chasing Kalamack and Ivy trying to desperately avoid her own fate, this is a story that is in perpetual crisis.
The publisher will tell you that Rachel is a combination of Anita Blake and Stephanie Plum. But even though the telling has a dash of Anita Blake's sexual follies the story lacks the high drama of Laurell Hamilton or the perpetual slapstick of Janet Evanovich. If anything, the stories are more like Jim Butcher's work. Rachel is interesting, but she as an underlying illogic which creates crises that could be avoided that only get in the way of her real goals. Despite some momentary displays good manners she is primarily a woman who does whatever she wants regardless of consequences, which can be bad news for Ivy and Rachel's human boyfriend Nick. And for Rachel as well, who finishes this book in trouble on all planes.
If you disregard the improbabilities and the complexities of yet another version of vampire life this is an entertaining book. All this disregarding would be easier if Harrison paid just a bit of attention to the consistency of her characters. As it is, I enjoy her books until almost the end, which is where people tend to step out of character to get the plot to a proper hiatus. If you are finicky (and I'm not) this may bother you. But the story is more than adequate for entertainment.
