Kate Daniels (Ilona Andrews)

I've started reading the Kate Daniels series (Magic Bites, etc.) by Ilona Andrews and am now firmly ensconced in the third book Magic Strikes. This has quickly developed into an obsession. Finally: a strong female character who isn't fan service or pure romance heroine. Kate is a hard ass who can be a real bitch with a heart of gold. She's perfect, and damn entertaining.

I've always been a bit iffy on the urban fantasy genre because it always seemed so cheesy to me. I mean, look at Twilight. That represents all the traps, pitfalls, and cliches of urban fantasy. "A hot-mysterious-guy-with-a-big-secret-who-tries-to-be-all tough-but-has-a-soft side who falls hopelessly in love with our normal-but-slightly-special-gal-next-door? And his secret is of a slight supernatural tint and her slight specialness plays right into it? Oh em gee, they are sooo made for each other! Aren't they perfect? Squee, squee, shriek and squeal." I mean, who hasn't seen this trope before? They're just tarting it up with borrowed (or in this case, made from wholecloth) mythos. It's kinda like Neon Genesis Evangelion: a standard mecha with random Christian symbolism that tries to pass itself off as deep because there's something different being done here. Except not.

Anyway, the above rant was supposed to illustrate that urban fantasy makes me raise my eyebrow and turn my nose up some. But when it's done right it is some of the best literature I've laid hands and eyes on. Mike Carey is a really good example of this. He writes this really underappreciated book series about an exorcist named Felix Castor. Felix (or "Fix" as he's called by his friends) is this perpetual cynic who's just trying to eke out a decent existence admist all his screw-ups in an increasingly unstable world that is becoming overpopulated by the dead, whether it be their souls or their corpses. He's an exorcist by trade as it's what he knows how to do, and he kinda tries to do right in the world as long as it doesn't cost him too much. He's a genuinely good person who life beats up on constantly and a running gag is he's always physically damaged somehow in the books. (Read: getting the shit kicked out of him.) There is some really great world building (just like in the Ilona Andrews books) that really fleshes out the melding of modern era with fantasy ideas/tropes. It's fun and yet no one in the States reads it. It took two years to get book four here from Britain. It's not like people had to translate this stuff, so what the hell? Anyway, it's great literature like this that could really validate the genre and pull in more mainstream readers that gets passed over for tripe like Twilight. America? We need to talk. Now.