Review: Counterfeit Magic by Kelley Armstrong

Goodreads Description:
The first rule of a supernatural fight club? Don’t kill your opponent. When the fighters come with lethal spells, werewolf strength and half-demon powers, that can be a lot tougher than it sounds. It’s hard to attract talent if they know they might not leave the ring alive. So when fighters at a California club start dying … it’s bad for business. Witch detectives Paige Winterbourne and Savannah Levine take the case. Going undercover in the power-heavy arena of the fight club is a welcome change of pace for Paige, relegated to the role of The Wife as her husband struggles to find his place in his family’s Cabal—the corporate Mafia of the supernatural world. As Paige is drawn deeper into new and dangerous corners of her world, she quickly discovers the greatest threat isn’t the killer in her sights. It’s something much, much closer to home. And this is one fight she can’t afford to lose


My Review:
This was a quick but satisfying read. A lot of times when authors make novellas, they piss me off royally, because either the plot stinks, or the novella is really just one scene that could have been(or will be) a full book. The conspiracist in me seems to think that the evil publishers just want to make me pay more of my hard earned cash for not as good of a book. But of course, I am just paranoid...especially in the case of Counterfeit Magic.

Somehow, Kelley Armstrong managed to cram a good plot, a mystery, cute quips, occasional flirting, and a resolution in under 100 pages. That seems like quite a bit to most people, but it is a little less than 1/3 of Kelley's normal books. I really enjoyed the glimpse into the lives of the characters that I love. As always, whenever I read a Kelley Armstrong book, I want to re-read the whole series...and maybe I will since I finished the series before I started blogging so I don't have any of their reviews up...The only thing that rubbed me the wrong way was the illustrations before every chapter. A lot of them were really sex-hyped and I felt like they belonged more in a mens magazine than a book whose readership is probably mostly women. (See:picture of a boxing Savannah with belly out, back arched, boobs heaving, thong showing, and "I want you NOW" bedroom eyes...

Characters: As much as I love the characters, you probably should read the rest of the series before you pick up this novella. The characters are still well-rounded and fully developed, but you won't get a lot of the background info and there are a lot of details a new reader wouldn't understand because they are built upon by the rest of the series. I LOVED seeing older Savannah. Her first tentative, or should I say explosive, steps out into the investagative world were fun to watch. I have liked her character ever since she was introduced as a girl in Taken, and I kind of wanted to hear her story even while she was a teenager. I was hoping that we would hear from her as the MC before this,but Kelley wanted to wait until she was an adult before using her in her own book. The newest ACTUAL book in the Otherworld series, Waking the Witch, was about Savannah and was fantasticly amazing and I am SO excited for the next book, Spellbound, to come out! Kelley is one of the authors I will go out and buy the day they come out, and I will drop everything in my TBR pile in order to read it...come to think of it, that is probably why my TBR pile is so huge...lol

Plot: OMG I practically had an attack when I read the premise and realized that this was about a SUPERNATURAL FIGHT CLUB. How freaking sweet right??? One, Fight Club is one of my favorite movies, Two, this is one of my favorite series, and Three...Hot Supernatural Boys fighting each other?? HOT. The plot was interesting and kept you guessing, despite being so short. I wanted more detail and more description, but I suppose that is to be understood with such a short novella.

Rating:
I wish I could give it a 10/10 but there just wasn't enough story, depth,and general length to warrant that. I think I will give it an  8 1/2 out of 10 boxing gloves. It was an excellent read for any fan of Kelley Armstrong's Otherworld series. :)

Well, I am happy to say that I am taking a long weekend away from work and heading out to my lake house. Or...my parent's lake house, but since my dad has to work until Friday evening, I will be alone with my books and blog for two whole days! I should be able to get a TON done :) SO excited! Therefore, you will probably seeing a lot more of me and quite a few changes to the blog as I learn more and more HTML and such.

XOXO,
~Andra~