The Glass God

The Glass God by Kate Griffin, Magicals Anonymous #2

Sharon Li: apprentice shaman and community support officer for the magically inclined. It wasn't the career Sharon had in mind, but she's getting used to running Magicals Anonymous and learning how to Be One With The City.

When the Midnight Mayor goes missing, leaving only a suspiciously innocent-looking umbrella behind him, Sharon finds herself promoted. Her first task: find the Midnight Mayor. The only clues she has are a city dryad's cryptic message of doom and several pairs of abandoned shoes...

Suddenly, Sharon's job feels a whole lot harder.

Kate Griffin is the penname of Catherine Webb which she uses to write Urban Fantasy. So far she has written four books in the Matthew Swift series which are just magic in itself and in 2012 she started her new series set in the same world as the Matthew Swift series, Magicals Anonymous which started off with Stray Souls last year. The second book in the series, The Glass God was released just last month.

Stray Souls re-invited us back to the same universe as the Matthew Swift novels, but this time around following a new protagonist, Sharon Li. Sharon had just recently found out that she was a shaman, able to walk through doors and connect with the soul of the city. Stray Souls had build nicely upon the foundation that was laid down in the Matthew Swift series, but still producing a fresh, interesting and quite humorous new entry. In the end of the books our main protagonist Sharon found herself from being a coffee barista to working for the Midnight Mayer and still running herself help talk group for the "magical inflicted" that don’t know how to handle their abilities and the likes.

To start off I really have to give Kate Griffin praise that even though she has written 5 books so far in this universe each and everyone just stand out amongst each other and amongst the urban fantasy genre in itself. Each time Kate manages to create a unique story that feels new, refreshing and is highly addictive, which taken together creates the perfect setting to her stories . Part comedy, part horror, part thriller. Just spot on. With The Glass God she again managed to pull me in her imagined London from the start.

Sharon thought that she had a hard time in Stray Souls, but this time around in The Glass God she is in even more than she had bargained for. The Midnight Mayor, Matthew Swift, has gone missing. The only clues she has are an old umbrella and shoes... Sharon, with only a few months of experience in being a shaman, still under guidance of Sammy the Elbow her shamanic goblin tutor, she is all of a sudden promoted to deputy Midnight Mayor. Promoted might not be the good word, more or less forced. This task of having to find out where Matthew Swift has run off too was well fitted for Sharon, from the first book you could learn that she is a natural leader, find things out and help everyone. Though she is reluctant to accept it on the first go saying she has other stuff to do like organizing bingo nights, social events for and run The Magicals Anonymous, it was good to see her jump to the occasion and take the reins in this investigation.

As for the other characters in the story so far, there were a quite few “misfits” introduced in Stray Souls, and though you still have the occasional get together of the Magicals Anonymous group, the focus isn’t necessarily on that part any more. However each of the characters introduced in the first book are still there and make their occasional appearance. One of them, Rhys the allergic druid, is now Sharon’s sidekick/ IT-manager. Rhys’ character is just quite the opposite of Sharon’s and that makes them a great duo when they are carrying out there investigation. Sharon is this peppy, let’s go do it kind girl while Rhys is more hesitant lets sleep over it kind of guy. It also seems that Rhys might have fallen for his boss... besised the recurrent cast of Stray Souls there are also a few new secondary characters and those are the Alderman that you had gotten to know in the Matthew Swift books, of which one serves as a minion for Sharon.

Like I mentioned above storywise, The Glass God is just spot on. There are some usual tropes that are often used in urban fantasy like: heaven, hell, apocalypse, gods and nefarious corporations etc. Stray Souls had a brilliant take on a nefarious corporation that was run by a wendigo. In The Glass God as the name implies, we are dealing with a God. I must say that the setting in Stray Souls, with all the introduction of the different characters and Sharon growing more into her power was more on the comedy side than the horror and thriller. In The Glass God, Kate re-introduces the horror and thriller part right, next to the humor that made Stray Souls superb. Early on the book there are several chapters where you see things happening to several characters, that just disappear leaving there shoes behind, the frequency of this increases and these chapters are alternates by a much darker storyline that focus on the group behind the God aspect of the book. Another part of the book also gave the horror and gritty aspects another spin were the introduction of The Tribe, cast offs living in the sewers of London, scarred, broken, mutilated etc though with how they communed was with a humorous twist to it. This re-introduction gave a great establishment of the direction of the story and did gave that rather gritty urban fantasy feeling back.

The Glass God was just a terrific read in all, but there are some scenes that really stand out of the rest and shows how masterfully Kate can write. The first is using Matthew Swift in her plot, if you have read his series, he is quite established already with being the Midnight Mayor and what his powers are and just how dangerous he is. Even though he is now one of the powers in London it was great to see that he is still vulnerable. Especially his separation was done in such a brilliant manner, it was so cool to read about how Kate has planned this out and just comes to show that she neatly blends both series together and let them take each other not a small step further but a giant leap.

Another scene that stands out is one at the end when Sharon together with her tribe makes the introduction to Arthur, giving around of introductions of who each and everyone was, and what directly sprang to my mind was a bit fireworks and flashing light and all the individual members striking a pose with "TADAA! here we are scum ready to kick some"... sorta like… just cool. Kate writes her stories in full color, they stand out heads above shoulders.

Hands down Kate Griffin is the voice in Urban Fantasy. All her previous works have shown this so far and The Glass God proves it once again. Her stories never get tired. The Glass God re-introduced her darker writing style which created a perfect spooky ambiance in her envisioned alternate London, however she does still adds the occasional puns and jokes just to make the story more approachable. The new direction that Kate Griffin took with Magicals Anonymous is paying off full swing. The introduction of the urban shaman Sharon in Stray Souls was fresh and she grew into her part as main protagonist and in The Glass God her character only becomes further established into the series. On her site Kate Griffin mentioned she is working on a super secret project of which she cannot tell anything. If I were you I would keep a close eye on her. You never know what’s in store for you with her books, but it has been a thrilling ride so far. I hope she does continue with either Matthew Swift or Magicals anonymous.