Malin’s #CBR4 #50: Grave Dance by Kalayna Price

This is the second book in the Alex Craft series, and I’m yet again resorting to a plot synopsis from Goodreads because while I love these books, I apparently suck at making them sound exciting to others:

After a month spent recovering from a vicious fight with a sorcerer, grave witch Alex Craft is ready to get back to solving murders by raising the dead. With her love life in turmoil thanks to the disappearance of Fae Investigation Bureau agent Falin Andrews and a shocking “L” word confession from Death himself, Alex is eager for the distractions of work. But her new case turns out to be a deadly challenge.
The police hire Alex to consult on a particularly strange investigation in the nature preserve south of Nekros City. The strange part: There are no corpses, only fragments of them. A serial killer is potentially on the loose, and Alex has no way to raise a shade without a body, so she’ll have to rely on the magic of others to find leads. But as she begins investigating, a creature born of the darkest magic comes after her. Someone very powerful wants to make sure the only thing she finds is a dead end—her own. 

Looking at it, that still makes the book sound a bit lame. It’s not. It’s really very exciting, and if I hadn’t had to do actual work, I would probably have read the whole book in one sitting, having the husband bring me food so I didn’t have to waste precious reading time acquiring nutrition.

I really liked Grave Witch, where Alex Craft was introduced. In the sequel, Kalayna Price expands on the world she created, and lets the reader find out more about Alex’ family and friends, the complicated hierarchy of the Fae, more about the soul stealers and complicates Alex’ love life a whole lot more. Love triangles tend to either frustrate or bore me, but in the case of Alex, Falin and Death, I’m actually struggling to see who she should pick, as both guys are deeply intriguing and clearly care greatly for Alex, to the point where they will both do rather ill-advised things in order to prove their love for her.

This book is even more action packed and tense than the first one, and because I’ve already come to care a lot about all the central characters, the suspenseful scenes affected me even more. I now eagerly anticipate the third book in the series, which is out at the start of July.

4 and a half stars out of five.