DEMONS NOT INCLUDED (NIGHT TRACKER #1).

DEMONS NOT INCLUDED by CHEYENNE McCRAY.

BACK COVER BLURB: Meet Nyx. This half-human, half-Drow private eye investigates paranormal crimes by day and is an elite Tracker of demons by night. She prefers working solo - and playing rough. So when a terrifying force starts murdering innocent humans and paranorms, leaving behind strange demonic symbols, it's a case Nyx takes very personally.

Meanwhile. Nyx's fellow Trackers are being killed one by one - and a sexy new Tracker named Torin is shadowing her every move. Torin has powers Nyx can't read, and sometimes she wonders whose side he's on. Nyx's instincts tell her something's brewing in the city's meanest supernatural streets, and that it's ready to unleash hell on Earth. Who can she trust? Now it's five minutes to permanent midnight ... and Nyx's last chance means risking everything - even her own life.

FIRST SENTENCE {Chapter 1}: Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you.

MEMORABLE MOMENT {Page 26}: I reached the Doppler bouncer and smiled as Fred grinned at me. "Decide to take me up on dinner yet?" 

No, I just couldn't. To me he'd always be that sweet golden retriever I'd first met and played Frisbee with in central park. 

SOURCE: Given to me by a friend.

MY THOUGHTS: Instantly put off by the cover (I make no apologies, I'm just one of those readers for whom the scantily clad female/bare chested, muscle-bound man just doesn't have me reaching for a novel). Despite that inner voice that told me here was a book that the odds were I wasn't going to enjoy I was talked into reading into.

Pleasantly surprised, Demons Not Included was actually OK. Nothing special but certainly readable enough even if 'some of the goo splattered my pants' (easily cleaned, one of the advantages of leather I suppose) 'and bare belly' did confirm my thoughts that the whole bare mid-riff (and no doubt, though we can't actually see them in this particular cover, high heels) look to be found on so many books of this genre are anything but practical.

Part one in a series as you might expect there was a lot of foundation laying going on - characters being described, their various 'supernatural' traits being gone into - but was there anything remotely new about the series?

No, not really. 

I did quite like Kali, a blue Persian cat, who (as we are told numerous times) has a thing for shredding our heroines underwear but apart from that it was 
the usual collection of muscle bound, sensual males and your equally stereotypical females with 'large melons' (Melons! I ask you?) as are typical of the urban fantasy/'romance' hybrid. 

As for the plot. Average is the word that springs to mind. Reading this put me in mind of several other books of this genre - all of them better done it has to be said.

The one thing I did find interesting however were the sort-of entwining of Viking mythology. Armed with several weapons, I thought it intriguing that Nyx's daggers were given names ('Thunder' and 'Lightning') even if they weren't very original.

So the million dollar question - will I be reading any more of the books in the series? Despite having received several, alas I'm afraid the Night Tracker books aren't for me. 

The third full book read for this Read-A-Thon (I did read 220 pages of a fourth book, my review of which I'll post tomorrow/Friday). Reviews of my first book (The Fourth Lad by Sydney Carr) can be read here, my second (Cranky, Beautiful Faith For Irregular (And Regular) People by Nadia Bolz-Weber) here.