[Book] Mob Rules

[Asmor]

I'm currently reading Mob Rules by Cameron Haley and I'm very impressed. I've been itching for some good modern fantasy, and it's surprisingly hard to find any due to a deluge of cash ins on the Twilight craze. Seems like every fantasy novel with a female protagonist and modern setting is 'paranormal romance' these days... But I digress.

Mob Rules is about Domino, a Spanish/Irish mafioso in LA, investigating the gruesome murder of one of her gang's soldiers. The book does a wonderful job of detailing a setting where organized crime is entirely structured around the production and harnessing of magical power. The organized crime in the book looks, superficially, just like real-world organized crime, but magic is easily generated by all of humanity's vices (prostitution, drugs, etc), so the crime creates the magic and then the gangs' taggers use graffiti to claim territory and create sort of a power grid to allow their gang's members to draw on that power.

Anyone else reading this?

 

[Greg Benage]

Woohoo! Glad you're enjoying it, Asmor!

Best,
Greg
aka Cameron Haley

 

[Asmor]

Ha, crazy coincidence! And great job on the book. I just got to the big 'reveal' on the train this morning.

I do have one annoyance, which I wouldn't have brought up if not for the fact that apparently I have your attention... I'm reading this on my Kindle, and I like to take notes of passages I like in the books I read, which I can then look over on Amazon's kindle website. This book is the first I've read that doesn't allow the notes to be shown, saying...

For some books the publisher allows only a limited percentage of a book to be "clipped" and stored separately from the main body of the book, as normally happens when you add a highlight. If you exceed this limit then you will see fewer highlights on this website than you actually marked on your Kindle. Popular Highlights are not counted towards this clipping limit.

I don't know how much pull you have with your publisher, but if you could put in a word with them about the inconvenience, I'd appreciate it. I saw that you've got another story with the same character in a 3-story anthology, but I'm hesitant to purchase another book by this publisher because of such arbitrary limitations.

 

[Crothian]

Seems like every fantasy novel with a female protagonist and modern setting is 'paranormal romance' these days... But I digress.

Female protagonist doesn't fully mean Paranormal Romance. I read a lot of modern fantasy with a female main character and much of them I would not call Paranormal Romance, I save that label for things like Twilight and Anita Blake.

 

[TanisFrey]

Female protagonist doesn't fully mean Paranormal Romance. I read a lot of modern fantasy with a female main character and much of them I would not call Paranormal Romance, I save that label for things like Twilight and Anita Blake.

Anita Blake = Paranormal Romance LOL
more like Paranormal Porn when you get latter in the series.

 

[Crothian]

Anita Blake = Paranormal Romance LOL
more like Paranormal Porn when you get latter in the series.

But it's still called Paranormal Romance.

 

[Asmor]

Female protagonist doesn't fully mean Paranormal Romance. I read a lot of modern fantasy with a female main character and much of them I would not call Paranormal Romance, I save that label for things like Twilight and Anita Blake.

I speak only from my experiences trawling for books on Amazon. I'll happily take any suggestions.

 

[Greg Benage]

Thanks, Asmor, and that's weird. I don't have any control over how the publisher sets up the digital book, but I can at least inquire about it. I'm sure it's the fossilized publishing industry's usual paranoia about piracy.

As to the other subject, there's definitely been a blurring of the lines between urban fantasy and paranormal romance. This has a good side: there are a lot of romance readers willing to cross genres now, and more readers is always a good thing.

The not so good side is that readers (both those who love and expect romance and those who can't stand it) have a right to know what genre they're in when they pick up a book. Expectations are important, and unfortunately, it's not always easy to tell.

Greg

 

[Greg Benage]

I speak only from my experiences trawling for books on Amazon. I'll happily take any suggestions.

Ilona Andrews Kate Daniels series is good, though the romance tropes go from essentially absent to increasingly absent the deeper into the series you go.

C.E. Murphy's Walker Papers series is solid (and also from Luna).

Patricia Briggs Mercy Thompson is enjoyable, though again, the love triangles and such show up a few books in.

Ditto for Stacia Kane's Downside Ghosts series, but it's different enough not to count as "romance" even when there's romance.

I've heard good things about Seanan McGuire's October Daye books and she just won the John W. Campbell award for best new SFF writer, though I haven't had a chance to get to them myself.

And not a female protagonist, but if you haven't read the two books in Harry Connolly's Twenty Palaces series, you should. It's kind of a Dresden Files meets Lovecraft thing.

Greg

 

[Asmor]

Thanks, Asmor, and that's weird. I don't have any control over how the publisher sets up the digital book, but I can at least inquire about it. I'm sure it's the fossilized publishing industry's usual paranoia about piracy.

Just wanted to mention that I happened to notice today that all of my excerpts from the book are available on the kindle website now. That wasn't the case as recently as a few months ago...

Not sure if you had anything to do with the change or not, but either way, kudos!

Incidentally, I picked up the Harvest Moon collection. Shame I had to pay for the crap they bundled your story with, but I enjoyed your bit a lot. Can't wait for the next in the series!