S.J. Day, Eve of Destruction (Tor, 2009)
"One day, only the strongest and the wiliest will remain.
That is who God seeks, he claims. Not the most faithful, but the most ruthless." -- Archangel RaguelWith Eve of Darkness, S.J. Day took a look at the lives of fallen humans who were "Marked" to protect the rest of the world from Infernal harm. With the second book in the series, Eve of Destruction, she begins to let readers in on what's in store for Evangeline Hollis, one of the newest Marks and the heroine of this series.
Since the first book Eve has settled down into relationship bliss with Alec Cain, or as much bliss as anyone can be in while recuperating from being brought back from the dead after a dragon attack. But Reed Able, still her handler, hasn't been able to stamp out the feelings he has for her. When Eve finally gets to head to Mark training, things seem to be settling into place. Until a student ends up dead, and all hell breaks loose.
Eve of Destruction is the rare sophomore effort that is even better than the original novel. I found myself turning the pages as fast as I could get through them, wondering what was around each corner and enjoying every turn. Having dealt with the bulk of mythological exposition in the first book, there's more time to spend on the story, so things start heating up fast. There's a whole lot of supernatural stuff going on, and quite a number of famous and infamous figures from Jewish and Christian belief come and go throughout. But Day doesn't overwhelm her story with these characters, they are necessary to the story and not simply dropped in to make her tale seem more convincing. Eve is in the middle of a war between the forces of good and evil, so she's going to be dealing with the big guns.
The supporting characters are interesting, though some are not as fully fleshed out as others, which is acceptable, since not all of them have as much page-time with the reader. My particular favorite is Giselle, an Infernal who gets pulled into the latest state of affairs by being at the wrong place at the wrong time (or could it be the wrong place at the right time?) Readers get to meet Infernals who work for the good guys for one reason or other, the crew of a paranormal reality show, and one of the creepiest hell spawn I've ever had the pleasure to read about.
Day gets deeper into her mythology of the angelic hierarchy, with a peek into the mind of an archangel, beings so distantly removed from human emotions, so in tune with God that their human charges are almost afterthoughts. Still, they are able to fight and jostle for preeminence, which seems to go against the party line in religions that accept their existence. The most well-known of all the archangels, Sammael, plays a part in this volume, but what his further plans are for Eve are still a mystery. Though seeing sinful behavior in Sammael is practically a requirement, it's interesting to see pride, avarice, covetousness, lust and greed in the angels still aligned with God. It would be interesting to see what Jehovah thinks of all that, and hopefully there will be a time in this series where Day will let us in on that.
So if this is an Urban Fantasy, what about the sex? Okay there's sex, and it's smokin' hot. But the plotline is so absorbing -- think Ten Little Indians with Satan -- that these diversions seem like icing rather than the whole cake. Day's erotica isn't the beautiful, perfect, wholly unrealistic throwdowns seen in bodice-rippers, it's a bit more like real life. Characters get turned on at inopportune moments or caught with their pants down. Rather than making it dull, these bits of real-life problems serve to turn up the heat by making them all the more believable. Now that Eve is coming into her own as a Mark, with the ratcheting up of her hormones as a result, expect more heat in the next volume.
With Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance gaining popularity by leaps and bounds, there are a lot of half-baked, rushed to publication books out there. It almost makes taking a chance on a new author in the genre a bit like playing Russian Roulette with your hard-earned cash and precious time. With a storyline and mythology this entertaining, Eve of Destruction is worth a spin.
