Midnight Blue-Light Special

I liked this book even more than the previous, even though I still hate this kind of YA. Why is that? It's light, it's fluffy, I especially made the shelf "candy-floss-squeeeee for this series, because it's sweet and fluffy and ultra girly and, well, frankly, just 'squeeeeeee'. That's a lot of fluffies in there, by the way.

On the surface, it looks like a thirteen a dozen romantic diabetes-inducing YA urban fantasy. But it isn't. The woman are actually strong. Not 'damaged-and-therefore-strong'. Not 'mysterious-past-therefore-strong'. Not even 'hey-let-s-become-the-man-hating-abuser' strong. They have personalities, quirks, and yes, pasts, but quite regular, logical ones (not really regular, I mean... well, the Price family and all). They are persons.

Of course there's the mandatory romance. I hate romance in YA, but I could stomach this one. There's tasteful fade-to-black sexy times in this book. Which is refreshing after the current fashion of zoomed in shots of sex in YA. The romantic part stays light and more importantly, balanced. There's some damsel-in-distressing, but not entirely. There's a lot of damsel-prodding-buttocks.
There's some tasteful torture as well, while keeping everything still light and sweet. Gods, my teeth are going to fall out with all this sweetness. Fortunately, it never became cloying nor too sticky.

Frankly, I enjoyed every bit of this light little book. It was far less complex than I expected, which was both unfortunate and a good thing. The author avoided using clichés (mostly) even though there was too much opportunity for many of them. Well done for that.

I fully recommend this novel for everyone who loves wholesome YA fantasy with strong characters, interesting take on urban fantasy and YA with a plot that really doesn't matter much (as usual), but at least doesn't hurt the real story.

I was hoping to read more about Verity and Dominic and instead suddenly I am in a zoo watching basilisks sleep with Alex. After a transition period I mostly enjoyed the new characters. Also we've moved from NYC to Columbus and even though both locations are never described in much detail ... still NYC feels more exciting. And: not a lot of new and interesting cryptids like in book 1 mostly same old.

Alex comes across a little too nerdy - even though with him carrying all those weapons he probably isn't supposed to be. Verity is definitely the more interesting character. And while Sarah - who I really liked in book one - makes an appearance she's still suffering consequences so ... not much there either.

Dominic makes for an interesting character with some inner conflict, and Shelby ... once it is clear who she is not so much except in how serious she takes the relationship compared with Alex. I don't like Shelby much for some reason. The antagonist also seems kind of random and elusive throughout most of the book. It takes until the very end that they have some idea who they are up against. And the reasoning behind it is not fore-shadowed at all it seems to me.

However the final few scenes were an extremely well written text-book culmination of the plot upping the ante until there was no more up and then resolving into the end. I'd really like pick it apart sentence by sentence for analysis.

In case you haven’t been reading McGuire’s InCryptid series, here’s what you need to know so far: A cryptid is a creature whose existence has been suggested but not proven. This would include mythological stories about dragons and gorgons as well as more modern stories about Bigfoot or chupacabras. The Covenant of St George is an ancient society dedicated to the extermination of all cryptids. A few generations ago the Price family came to America and left the Covenant. The Prices think that humans and cryptids can live together peacefully. And the Covenant thinks they’re all dead.

Midnight Blue-Light Special focuses on Verity Price, the young Price daughter living in NYC in order to follow her dreams of being a ballroom dancer. She learns that the Covenant is sending a team to New York. Their report could lead to the Covenant exterminating all the cryptids in the city. And things will just get worse if they learn that the Prices are still alive.

On a surface level, the InCryptid series is like most urban fantasy series. There’s a young female protagonist, who is beautiful and a badass. The story is told in first person, with a quippy narrative voice. The heroine has friends and allies who are members of exotic nonhuman species. The reading experience is fairly light and breezy.

That being said, McGuire has a secret weapon that separates the InCryptid books from the plethora of urban fantasies lining the shelves everywhere these days. That weapon is her world building. First, she ignores the popular nonhumans. There are no vampires or werewolves to be found in these books. Instead, Verity Price’s New York is populated with dragons, gorgons, boogeymen, and a wide variety of idiosyncratic species from all over the world. Second, each of these species seems to have their own elaborate social and biological histories, and best yet – we get to see how these histories influence the behaviors of the characters. So members of predatory species act like predators. Those who would be prey act more like creatures who have a history of being hunted. This sort of world building gives an underlying structure to the series, and makes it stronger than some simple sort of wish fulfillment.

That being said, I did have a couple of problems with the book. First, at times McGuire is a bit too prone to infodumps. You get the feeling that she’s created all this cool backstory, and at times just can’t resist telling the reader about it. Now I really appreciate the work and world building involved, but it’s better to let that come out in characterization and action, not in characters directly telling each other these things.

Second, the agents from the Covenant were a bit too inept. After more than a book of building up the Covenant as an incredibly powerful antagonist, these agents really didn’t cause too much of a problem for Verity or the cryptids of New York. If the members of the Covenant had caused a bit more havoc in New York then it would have increased the tension substantially.

Midnight Blue-Light Special is a thoroughly entertaining read. Its detailed world building creates a fantasy world that it rich in depth and detail. The InCryptid series is one of the best in modern urban fantasy.