Hard Magic

Paranormal Scene Investigations, Book 1

By: Laura Anne Gilman

Narrated by: Romy Nordlinger

Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins

Publisher's Summary

Welcome to P.U.P.I. - Private, Unaffiliated, Paranormal Investigations. A handpicked team trained to solve crimes the regular police can't touch - crimes of magic.

"My name's Bonnie Torres. Recent college grad, magic user, and severely unemployed. Until I got a call out of nowhere to interview for a job I hadn't applied for. It smelled fishy, but the brutal truth was I needed the work - so off I went. Two days later I'm a PUPI - me and Nick, Sharon, Nifty, and Pietr. Five 20-somethings, thrown into an entirely new career in forensic magic.

"The first job we get is a doozy: proving that the deaths of two Talents were murder, not suicide. Worse, there are high-profile people who want us to close up shop and go away. We're sniffing out things they'd rather keep buried. Looks as if this job is gonna get interesting. The only problem is, we're making it up as we go along...."

©2010 Laura Anne Gilman (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Novel ideas, world and enjoyable

I enjoyed this book, which is saying something for me right now because so many books have bored me enough I haven’t finished.
One big disgruntled point: this is twice now a book just stops before story is finished. Just cuts off. The ending of this book even admitted the story continues in the next book. I beg that if this is to be a trend PLEASE say Part 1 and Part 2. Cliffhangers are one thing. But just flat stopping the action without any resolution is plain irritating. So I think I’ll take a star off just for that. Narrators voice is lively. I have to admit at the beginning I was confused as to who was who and had hard time figuring out”the world” Bonnie lived in but it became clearer quickly. I also prefer a bit more variance in voices of characters to know who’s talking but that has to be hard and don’t want to criticize narrator for that.

Great all round and terrific narrator!

I loved this. It was suspenseful and romy nordlinger was spot on with her narration. Looking forward to the next!

Not A Romance

Struggled to finish. There was little to none romantic plot, and what could have been an interesting magic theme, was overdone.

annoyance

The readers voice is so annoying she sounds like the switchboard operator from the office

Couldn't Finish

Listened to all but the last two hours. I wanted to like this story, especially after investing such a large amount of time in it, but just couldn't go any further. It was boring, tedious and droned on forever going nowhere. The story had potential but the plot was bogged down and buried. The narrator also mispronounced a number of words, which was painful.

Couldn't listen, too much rambling

Sorry couldn't make it past 30 minutes. once the girl started rambling I had to quit.

Hoping for more

I struggled with this novel in the beginning as the character building is necessary but lacked...not sure what..but I didn't connect with the characters or their struggles. I like the paranormal investigative side of the story but the one problem I did have was.....no one likes to be asked/told to do something without a rational understanding or reason and the fact the 2 bosses aren't above board doesn't promote safety or team building but what felt like "shifty" characters to me.

I liked how each of the paranormal investigators had different powers but were limited which gave dimensions to the characters but the secrets each one kept irritated me more than captured my interest. I think there was supposed to be love interests in denial but this part of the story was poorly generated as it came off more like a 4th grader with a crush on their teacher.

So why did I give it 4 stars ? I liked the creativity of personalities, and the reason why the paranormal investigation team was created. Overall it was an ok book, I'm hoping book 2 captures me with the ground work covered from book 1.

Kept waiting for something of interest

The whole story seemed like preparation for something to happen. When I did happen it was at the very end, and the killer was not identified; though the next book talks like it was solved.
I do not like to diss anything but I didn’t get hooked on this one.

Interesting story, unfortunate voice acting...

The voice acting is bad. Period. Ms. Nordlinger isn't able to perform male voices at all, her breaths sound almost exaggerated they're so loud and prevalent..... and the worst is that she incorrectly emphasizes words so that entire sentences change meaning. I forced myself to listen all the way through, but there's no way I'll listen to the next one. I just can't.

fun new angle

explores an angle on magic users it a mixed population as a cultural norm is still evolving. fun and well paced.

Overall good

I didn't know what to make of this at first but it pulled me in. I think the ideas were fun and exciting and the author is pretty good. Overall good listen and fun. I must say the narrator Romy Nordlinger is exceptionally good and made the experience for me.

Forensic magic...

I liked Bonnie, she's finding herself and trying to stand on her own two feet away from her loving albeit overbearing mentor. After a very unusual interview she becomes part of a team called P.U.P.I 'Private Unaffiliated Paranormal Investigations'.
The general magical community is very much against this new organisation and the fledgling force knows it will struggle to survive.
Each in the team have something to contribute and must get over their ego's to be able to work together. Ian their boss will have it no other way.
There are some gaping holes in the world and I found it very difficult to believe why the magical community would have such an aversion to a team specializing in magical crime without being affiliated to any one else bar themselves, plus I could not understand why Bonnie never really confronted the enigmatic Vasic, no spoilers here just saying.
Despite this the magical world L.G has created is intricate and clever, the characters fully fleshed out and engaging, it's magical C.S.I with bells on.
Looking forward to how this series pans out.
Mustn't forget to mention Romy Nordlinger, great narration.

Hard magic

I loved this book from start to finish, great character's that will leave you to want to find out more about them, looking forward to the next book

I just couldn't get into it

I don't know why exactly, some combination of the narrator & the constant description of EVERYTHING just really put me off. It just felt super uncomfortable

Hard Magic: Paranormal Scene Investigations.

I bought this in the sale at a really good price and enjoyed it enough to buy the series, also on sale. The best thing about the book is that it has a good plot, like most of the detective fantasy novels you come across. A new organization of talent {magic users) are put together, in the face of strong opposition from the magical communities, to investigate talent related crimes. Their first case is the mystery of an elderly couple whose death has been ruled as joint suicide. It took me a while to get into the story but it is overall an enjoyable listen. The narrator was good, not brilliant and a little belabored at times but one I would be happy to listen to again.

Overall I would only recommend this book, if like me you listen to several audio-books a week and you could buy it at a low price on sale. There is a childishness to the writing, the characters are far too stereotyped and overall it felt like this was a trying to be a teen novel for twenty somethings, which really didn't work. There are so many brilliant books on Audible of this type that I'd suggest instead:

Anne Bishop's Written in Red: A Novel of the Others
Michelle Sagara Chronicles of Elantra
Jim Butcher Dresden files
Sergei Lukyanenko The Watch Series
Ben Aaronovitch The Rivers Of London series.

Great idea but poor delivery

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

I really loved the concept of paranormal investigators and the book started well but then failed to deliver against my expectations. In the second half of the book the plot grew weak, there was little progress and frankly I had grown bored then all of a sudden the end arrived.

What will your next listen be?

Tom Rob Smith

Do you think Hard Magic needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

Not if it's as disappointing overall as this one

Any additional comments?

Pity. As I say imaginative and original idea could have been great

Disappointing

What disappointed you about Hard Magic?

I expected a bit more from this series. I am glad I bought it in the sale at a low price, otherwise I would be grumbling about a waste of a credit that could by me something more worthwhile.

What was most disappointing about Laura Anne Gilman’s story?

The plot seemed to go in a good direction then just up and leave, dragging on for ages. Ideas and thoughts repeated quite often, but worded maybe slightly differently.

Would you listen to another book narrated by Romy Nordlinger?

Yes, the narrator wasn't that bad. Though I've listened to plenty so far, none by her, apart from this series.

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Hard Magic?

I think it needed a bit of toughening up and direction. So many parts of this book were unnecessary and a bit too straightforward. How many times do we need to hear about Bonnie's hair?

Any additional comments?

Overall I am glad I hadn't wasted valued credits and picked up this series on the cheap. It's filled a few hours of listening before I found something more appealing :)