The Death of Magic — Daniel Black

KIRKUS REVIEW

From author Black (Be Careful What You Wish For, 2013, etc.) comes the second installment in an urban-fantasy series about a group of young people with magical powers.

A group of college students has gone from unleashing the magic of Dungeons and Dragons into the world to dealing with the resulting chaos. After a wild adventure in Book 1involving a misplaced wish, unrelenting supernatural changes, and the federal government, Book 2 finds the same main characters in an altered landscape. Though their magical abilities have matured, the world around them has become even more barbaric. In an area around New Orleans, there are monsters in the streets eating each other. One character observes, “We did this, you know….I thought everything would be better with magic, and it could have been, but it's not.” The reader soon learns that this is an understatement. From a group of Minotaurs raping an elf girl to the torture of a cat named Mr. Mephistopheles, the new world is a vicious one indeed. How will characters like Michelle, “with blue fire for eyes and mouth,” and “Mage Lord” Tim respond to a land in which many regular people have been turned into monsters and a shadow begins to spread over the nation? Combining sources as diverse as the World of Warcraft and Norse legends, the novel blends many fantastical creatures and possibilities. Every bit as violent as the first book in the series (“The poor people were raped repeatedly until -- battered and bloody -- they joined their friends and relatives on the spits”), it's not a narrative for the meek. Part fantasy adventure, part post-apocalyptic future, this volume keeps the reader guessing in a world full of potential. Though portions of dialogue are mundane (“Fine, you can have it; we will find someplace else,” a goblin comments after he and his cohorts are asked to leave a school gym), the story as a whole is creative, dark, and entertaining.

A riveting postmodern world infused with myth, cruelty, and heavy doses of magic.