Ferdy's Reviews > Magic Rises

2.5 stars - Spoilers

Not impressed. I've never given an Ilona Andrews book less than 3 stars before but there was just too much WTFery in Magic Rises to rate it any higher. I loved all the earlier Kate Daniels books, they had the right balance of plot, action, romance and humour. Sadly, Magic Rises was a complete mess.

Random thoughts:

-What's what: Pack kids go loup, need medicine, loads of melodrama, Kate/Curran offered medicine and in exchange must protect pregnant shifter (Desendra), Kate and gang travel to Europe for the job, the gang wary of trap, loads of posturing from foreign packs, Curran acts like fucker, mystery monsters, Kate acts like doormat. The end.

-I hated all the focus on pack and pack politics. I'm sick of all their rubbish, the series feels more about the pack than about Kate. I miss Kate going on her solo adventures, I'm tired of her being tied to the pack and Curran.

-I was annoyed that Kate was the one who seemed to be handling all the pack bullshit instead of Curran. She was the one organising the security detail for the pregnant shifter, she was the one investigating the mystery monsters, and she was the one holding the group together. Curran left it all to Kate whilst he spent all his time flirting and getting his ego stroked by a hot young wolf princess (Lorelei). I didn't buy his silly excuses for hanging out with Lorelei - he did it because he wanted to, not because of Kate.

-I used to love Curran but after reading Magic Rises, I no longer like him. He did way too many unforgivable things — the way he treated Kate was awful.
It made no sense whatsoever that Curran didn't tell Kate that someone wanted her dead — he knew before they even got off the boat, but he still kept it from her. She was going to dangerous, foreign territory, and he didn't think Kate ought to know that someone was out to get her?! WTF?! Her life was in even more danger than she thought — how would keeping her in the dark help in any way?!
How dare Curran risk Kate's life further by not warning her of another threat! Did Curran have that little trust and faith in her? He didn't even have all the information on who hired the pirates to kill Kate until Saiman further question the pirate, so why not tell her straight away? His whole excuse at the end didn't add up.

-As soon as Curran saw Lorelei, he was all over her and that was BEFORE he even realised her involvement in Kate's assassination attempt. Curran only bribed Lorelei's uncle after he found out from Saiman that the money the pirate had was from Lorelei's country. So why was he all over her from the get go unless he genuinely wanted her?!
Curran's flirting with Lorelai was too much, actually he was basically mating with her, what with giving her food, letting her kill the animals he hunted, letting her sit next to him, standing naked next to her, going on romantic walks with her, talking about his relationship to Kate with her, and bitching about Kate. Ugh. I have no doubt that Curran enjoyed his time with her — he was probably buttering up Lorelai in case anything happened to Kate, that way he'd have a back up. The dick.
Hugh was right when he said that Curran wanted to have sex with Lorelei and that Curran must have thought about it. I don't know why Kate ignored Hugh's opinion — he was spot on about Curran.

-Not only did Curran cheat on Kate (yea, he did cheat on her in shifter terms), he humiliated her in front of EVERYONE, and then he lied about it repeatedly. I was irritated that Kate just believed Curran's lies. Why didn't she ask Curran that if he really didn't want Lorelei why the fuck was he spending so much time with her? Why didn't she question him further?

-The reason for Curran's behaviour towards Lorelei was BULLSHIT. He thought getting touchy feely with Lorelai would stop the assassination attempt but there was no guarantee of that. If the fuckers were willing to kill Kate in the first place so that Lorelai could have him then why wouldn't they decide to just finish Kate off straight away? That way Curran would be vulnerable enough for Lorelai to seduce him. None of it made sense. If he really wanted to keep Kate safe he should have told her and spent as much time with her as he could instead of leaving her all alone thus making it easier for her to be killed.

-If Curran had told Kate his nonsensical plan at the beginning, then not only would she have been more careful, she would have played along. She would still have been pissed and jealous at Curran's flirting even though she knew it wasn't real — it's not like she would been cool with seeing Curran pretending to want another women. It would have still hurt her — so her responses would have been genuine. That's why I didn't buy Curran not telling Kate his plan, him saying Kate couldn't lie and that she was worse at lying than a child was ABSOLUTE UTTER BULLSHIT.
Since when has Kate not being able to lie especially to strangers?! Curran might see through Kate but that's only because she wants him to - Kate could have easily played along and fooled a bunch of strangers! Also, Kate is actually a great liar — she spent her whole fucking life hiding who she was, she regularly has to act in front of the pack so they don't see her weaknesses or tiredness, she hid her emotions and feelings from everyone growing up. So how the fuck was she a bad liar?! I very much doubt she would have had any trouble pretending, acting and lying. Did he know Kate at all?! Curran's excuses were pure BULLSHIT. He must have just liked lying, humiliating and hurting Kate, and he must have loved getting cozy, and bitching about Kate with Lorelei. The FUCKING dick.

-The most unforgivable thing was not letting Kate know there was an extra threat, Curran knew their weren't at home, that they were outnumbered and that they had little control there. He knew that Kate could have easily been isolated and then killed but he still didn't feel the need to warn her so she could be extra careful. And he didn't even tell the rest of the pack that they needed to keep an extra close eye on Kate. It wasn't like Curran himself was watching out for her — he was too busy sucking up to Lorelai. So Kate was left on her own and she was in more danger than she knew — that just showed how little Curran cared for Kate's safety.

-Kate was decent enough until she turned into a doormat and forgave all Curran's bullshit after one conversation. I didn't expect her to dump him but she should have at least taken a step back. Curran's non-stop lies and full on flirting with another woman showed that their relationship wasn't right.
Their whole conversation at the end was ridiculous, Kate said they weren't okay and that she wasn't sure what to do, and then her next sentence was literally that everything was cool between them. WTF?!
Oh and then, Curran told her he would act the same way if he had to do it all again. Really?! So he basically told Kate he still didn't trust her or have faith in her, and Kate was okay with that?! When did she turn into such an idiot?
I really hated how Kate tried to justify Curran's reasoning by saying she would have done the same thing. There's NO WAY she would have lied, flirted with another man, and humiliated Curran like that. I hate when the hero and heroine have huge problems in their relationship and the heroine glosses them over by saying she would have done the same thing when it's so obvious she wouldn't have.
By the end of Kate and Curran's conversation, they didn't sort anything out - Curran made dumb excuses and then Kate made even more dumb excuses for him. Their relationship was a mess.

-The thing that really pissed me off was that if the situation was reversed, Curran would not have forgiven Kate straight away, he would have acted like a dick towards her and held a grudge for ages. And Kate would have had to apologise over and over again, and then she would have had to make it up to him and prove herself. Then she'd have to make several grand declarations — then maybe just maybe he would have deigned to take her back. But it wouldn't end there, because he still wouldn't trust her completely and she'd forever have to work for his trust or some bullshit. Ugh.

-Kate's attitude towards Desendra pissed me off. She was really judgmental and unsympathetic towards her especially at the beginning. Did Kate not realise that Desendra was pregnant with twins? Had a dad who wanted her dead? Had two ex's that had their own agendas? And had no-one that genuinely loved and cared for her? With Desendra's history, it was no surprise she behaved the way she did - Kate was a total cow with her judgy attitude. I did like that Kate eventually managed to get some perspective and stopped looking down at Desendra so much.

-I loved all the scenes with Hugh D'Ambry. He was the best thing about the book, he definitely had some chemistry with Kate. I was actually wishing Kate would dump Curran and instead have a fling with Hugh.

-The secondary characters were all good - I loved Aunt B, Doolittle, Derek, George, Barbaras. I still hated Mahon, his whole acceptance of Kate was a case of too little, too late. Aunt B's death was sad, I would have preferred if Mahon had died.
I was disappointed that there was no Dali at all, I was looking forward to a little interaction between her and Jim.
Desendra's character was great - I felt sorry for her not only having a bastard dad but also two uncaring, cowardly, greedy husbands. I was so glad she killed her dad — but I was left confused as to who inherited his territory.
The Christopher thing at the end was cheesy, Hugh must have known that Christopher knew how to make panacea — there's no way Hugh would have let Christopher go, he would have at least tried to kill him.

-There were too many info dumps about the mystery flying monsters. It was really boring reading Kate's speculation about what they were and their origins and whatnot.

-I was annoyed at Kate's constant crying. Okay, she cried twice but it was still annoying.

-All the sudden marriage talk irritated me. Kate and Curran were fine before, and the whole let's get married felt less a natural step in the next stage of their relationship and more a thing they forced because other people kept bringing it up.

All in all, I was disappointed. The story wasn't my cup of tea because there was too much pack nonsense, Kate was a pushover, and Curran was a dick - I don't think he's as bad as Reyes (from the Charley Davidson series) or Owen (from the Elemental Assassin series) but he's definitely well and truly ruined for me.