Review: GREYWALKER

Greywalker by Kat Richardson

Book 1 of Greywalker series
Genre: urban fantasy investigative suspense
Format: paperback

About Greywalker:

When Harper comes to in the hospital, she begins to feel a bit ...strange. She sees things that can only be described as weird-shapes emerging from a foggy grey mist, snarling teeth, creatures roaring. But Harper's not crazy. Her "death" has made her a Greywalker-able to move between our world and the mysterious, cross-over zone where things that go bump in the night exist. And her new gift (or curse) is about to drag her into that world of vampires and ghosts, magic and witches, necromancers and sinister artifacts. Whether she likes it or not.

Source: Info in the About Greywalker was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/140099.Greywalker on 19/01/2012.

[Image credit: Fyzgigg]

Review:

For a kick-ass heroine, Harper is just too stupid to live (TSTL) which brought the suspension of disbelief a notch down. I had to have breaks from the stupidity so I would stop reading this book until I've forgotten how stupid Harper is. But I wanted to like this series so much and the cover art for this series is really enticing so I would pick this book up again. It went on like that until I finally finished reading the book after a year. Pace-wise? Not a page-turner. The plot also partially depended on Harper acting stupid to create the drama, the dilemma, in the story. Which made the plot pretty weak. And as if that is not enough, our protagonist is the crowned Denial Queen of the century, steadfastly trying to bury her head in the sand. That brought the character development rating down to the boots. The world building on the other hand, is beautiful though it got a gaping hole in it. I'm an urban fantasy girl so I like magic, vampires, witches and whatnots. However I also like things to make sense. Just because it's fantasy and involves magic does not mean it does not have to follow a logical sense. In this book the supernatural world is hiding in plain sight. Most humans are oblivious but a few are in the know. Harper's city is chuck full of supernatural beings. You can't swing a cat without hitting one. And this is just one city. If we follow that pattern, then if this city exists then there must be numerous other cities around the world which is chuck full of supernatural beings. And nobody outed them out to the general public yet? After all these years? There is absolutely not one single self-serving, opportunistic bastard out there who thought that divulging the secret of the supernaturals would give him/her some sort of gain? Money, power, and/or revenge? Sorry, but don't buy that. Such is the nature of man that there is always one bad apple in a basket. So, is there a geas or spell which ensures that everybody keeps the supernatural world a secret? A task force which keeps everybody in line and ensures the secrecy? A governing body which imposes the secrecy rule? Nope! So why is the secret world of the supernaturals not outed yet?? Holey world building? Holey it might be, it is still beautiful though. And I found this artist rendition which perfectly captures the image of Harper testing the bounderies of the Grey. The picture is black and white but the world building there is colorfully beautiful!!

This book has a lot of promise and the premise is very good but the story building needs a lot of work.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 2.5
Character development = 1
Story itself = 2
Ending = 3
World building = 3.5
Cover art = 4.5
Plot = 1.5
Pace = 0.5

Overall Rating: 2 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Greywalker series: