Blood & Ash by Deborah Wilde – A Book Review

Posted April 20, 2020 by Booksandblurbs in Reviews, Urban Fantasy / 0 Comments

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Blood & Ash

(The Jezebel Files – Book 1)

by Deborah Wilde
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Urban Fantasy
Available on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited

Down & Dirty

A brand new Urban Fantasy from the soon to be crowned Queen of Snark . It is smart, funny and truly unique, even with it’s slight ‘Buffy’ ambiance. Free on Kindle Unlimited.

What is it about?

(Blurb from GoodReads)

Cold-blooded kidnappers. Long-lost magic. When things get serious, she goes full Sherlock.

Ashira Cohen takes pride in being the only female private investigator in Vancouver. With her skills, her missing persons case should be a piece of cake.

She wasn’t counting on getting bashed in the skull, revealing a hidden tattoo and supernatural powers she shouldn’t possess.

Or the bitter icing on top: a spree of abductions and terrifying ghostly creatures on a deadly bender.

And don’t even get her started on the golems.

Reluctantly partnered with her long-time nemesis Levi, the infuriating leader of the magic community, Ash resolves to keep her focus on the clue trail and off their sexual tension because WTF is up with that?

But with a mastermind organization pulling strings from the shadows and Levi’s arrogance driving her to pick out his body bag, can Ash rescue the captives and uncover the truth or will the next blood spilled be her own?

My Thoughts on Blood & Ash

Fantastic!!!

This is well woven and well written, enticing with its dry wit and references, both pop culture and literary. It’s a gentle nod to Sherlock Holmes while not being an outright homage, preferring to go its own way through a paranormal world, while still portraying the intelligent ideals Doyle’s most famous characters embody.

I fell in love with Ash and her reluctant crew, finding myself both cheering, and laughing, aloud. There’s a pseudo enemy to lover trope and a ‘chosen one’ type ambiance, bracketed with action, friendship and personal growth. Familial struggles, lost fathers, painful pasts… it truly has everything that makes an Urban Fantasy great, without being overwhelming.

I’l definitely being reading this book again.

Favorite Lines

I was the world’s most secular Jew. I mean, I ate BLTs on challah. (7%)

Chardonnay was kiddie punch peddled to chicks who couldn’t handle decent booze. Or who believed the myth that they couldn’t. (12%)

And yes, sometimes, the truth was hard to hear, but it was always better to know. Answers, no matter how upsetting, trumped unanswered questions because they brought closure. Answers equaled certainty. (24%)

Pros:

Very well written.
Well edited.
Hysterical – seriously laugh out loud funny.
It’s a dry wit, like a dry heat… it seeps in.
The relationships are fantastic! #FriendGoals
Stand Alone adventure with an over arching meta plot.
Ash…. I want to be her when I grown up.
Character feel REAL.
The references.

Cons:

I want a solid Holmes moment, where Ash goes full fictional Brit, solving a moment with a flake of dirt….. so, not really a con, just a wish. 😉

Perspective

First Person, Single POV

Ending Type

HFN

Rating

Romantic Dynamic

M/F

Character Age Range

28+

My Final Verdict on Blood & Ash

This has all the ingredients that make an Urban Fantasy so addictive; romance, speed, mystery and action – not to mention magic, danger and plenty of blood. It tickles the senses and twists the mind, and its free on Kindle Unlimited.

Published January 14th, 2020
318 Pages