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Harmony Black  By  cover art

Harmony Black

By: Craig Schaefer
Narrated by: Christina Traister
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Publisher's summary

Harmony Black is much more than your average FBI special agent. In addition to being a practicing witch, she's also an operative for Vigilant Lock, an off-the-books program created to battle occult threats - by any means necessary. Despite her dedication to fighting the monsters threatening society, Harmony has become deeply conflicted about her job. Her last investigation resulted in a pile of dead bodies, and she suspects the wrong people are being punished for it.

While on a much-needed vacation, Harmony gets pulled back into action. This time, though, she's gone from solo work to being part of a team. Their target: the Bogeyman, a vicious and elusive figure...and the creature that destroyed Harmony's childhood.

Surrounded by quirky, fascinating characters as dedicated to one another as they are to their new partner, Harmony must learn to trust her team - and a new romantic interest - on a dangerous and deadly mission that conjures up memories she'd much rather forget.

©2016 Craig Schaefer (P)2016 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

What listeners say about Harmony Black

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Good FBI crime novel

There are some paranormal/fantasy aspects to this novel, but they are not overwhelming. The narrator has an incredible voice range. Some listeners will likely feel she over performs. There are too many great audiobooks available to justify the time this one takes. NOT recommended!

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12 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

An Truly Entertaining Story

I enjoyed the story highly. I also found narrator very good. Her take on the different characters was very interesting, especially Jessie. I look forward to the author's next one!

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Couldn't listen to Jesse's voice

I just couldn't get past the performance of Jesse's voice, it just ruined the story for me. If you like magic and intrigue it's actually a pretty good story if you don't mind the performance.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

best to just walk on by.

i hated harmony black in the faust series, a series which i loved. i actually came in trying to keep an open mind. this book has done nothing to help with that, though its helped the hate plenty.

in the faust series harmony black is a fucking moron who wastes peoples time and live, almost literally if she had been allowed to do what she wanted and thrown a bunch of men at a goddess to be hopped up on cancerous eden. and even worse she is suppose to be "the good guy" to counter fausts "villian" aspect. cept from what ive seen faust has done WAY more good then her, gotten more results, and been more effective with his rule breaking then her "strict following of proceedure" ... which she throws out the window in a hummingbirds heartbeat the moment she feels like it and is convinent for her. though not to actually help other people.

the other characters come off as bland or just loathesome, like her partner is an almost stereotypical sassy black woman who is an fbi agent with some wolf demon spirit thing, and a borderline psychopath and sadist. the other two team members are more bland then someone in a ketamine coma.

and for some reason we are suppose to beleive that harmony is just this so very empathic person that people just instantly like and trust, though there is nothing to show that.

its all some crap of "strong female character!" but it isnt. kaitlynn, jennifer, mama margu, pixie, and the others in the faust series are easily a thousand times the better character then the ones here, even if they are a demon enforcer, drug selling mafiaso kingpin, voodoo priestess from a very checkered past family, and a straight-edge tumblerina blackhat. even if you changed those aspects the characters are such they remain SFC, but harmony its all "oh yeah. she is totally a strong character" being repeated like the mst3k mantra.

its weird, but its almost like the book was written by someone else entirely, the story structures, character styles, and even world aspects being different then how they were in the faust books, someones shitty fan fiction that the author ghosting this out and going with the lowest bid that was submitted on an old stained napkin.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Empty

WALK AWAY!!! RUN AND FIND SOMETHING BETTER CONCEIVED TO READ! Sorry to the author but that's how I feel. Its not that the story isn't an OK one. Its just missing those things that help a reader be transported to the time and setting of the story. The author left out very important elements of narrating, descriptions. the is lots of words about how the character is feeling. But very little about the environment, area, scenes, and reasoning. without this, your left wondering what the point is and why the characters are doing what they do. She misses all of the lead story making you feel like your reading book2 instead of 1. And frankly it was boring. The reader has no investment, curiosity, or hope when reading this book.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

UF that rocks and aces the Bechdel test

I liked the author’s Faust series and got the first four books in this spinoff series on sale, expecting a solid, but ultimately average listen. Instead, I found myself enjoying this series much more.

With the Faust series, I liked that Daniel Faust had foibles and friends, a welcome change from the single, white Gary Stu’s that glut urban fantasy (Dresden, Iron Druid, Sandman Slim …). I also liked the gritty noir vibe of Faust. However, that series still left the spotlight on the male MC, relied on plots connected to female victimization, and stuck with a femme fatale love interest. Plus, there wasn’t enough action and fun to balance the grit and Grimnoir. Finally, I wanted more detail on setting, world building, and explanations of the magical rules.

This spinoff takes all the things I liked, and fixes almost all of the things I found lacking, in the Faust series. In this book 1, Harmony Black is a fair to middling witch and a tie-wearing, by-the-book cop. At the start of this book, she’s dipped her toe into the supernatural battles between good and evil (courtesy of he Faust series), but she’s still trying to play by the mundane police procedural playbook. Only she gets teamed up with Jesse, a black lady werewolf as she joins Vigilant Lock, a secret paranormal federal police team. Thus begins my favorite aspect of this series: the buddy buddy police procedural with Harmony as a modern Joe Friday and Jesse as her mouthy partner. Indeed, I think I like Jesse’s character best, in part due to the outstanding narration by Ms. Traister.

The mystery was clever, the supernatural menace deliciously creepy, and finally we get an urban fantasy without a “save the damsel/love interest” climax. This wasn’t cheapened with gratuitous language, gore, or violence. There’s the start of a romance, but no worries, this doesn’t devolve into a romance series.

I was super impressed that a man wrote a story that breezed through the Bechdel test … and then looked up the author bio and discovered the author’s actual name is Heather. I’m still giving Heather props, though. Like the Faust series, I was left wishing for more details to picture the scenes and people. Jesse is black, and I’m assuming Harmony is white, but tall, short, lithe or athletic? How do the in-the-know tell themselves apart from those out of the supernatural loop? The setting, characters, world building and magic systems only get filled in where necessary to the story. I also wouldn’t have minded more magic and more supernatural creatures. Quibbles aside, this was a fun, engaging listen.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Good work, but shitty character.

What would have made Harmony Black better?

Geee I dunno, make her pay for her dumbass naive view of the world that she doesn't grasp.

What could Craig Schaefer have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

Not having dumbass character that throws away all the established knowledge from Faust series and rehashes everything with the most annoying stupid dumbass bitches of a characters. I wished and begged for Harmony and Jessie to die or get maimed by demon and things they don't understand.

What about Christina Traister’s performance did you like?

Realllly good. I usually don't like female VA doing male voice and vice versa, but her and Tess Irondale might be my new favorite female VA.

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

Great performance.

I am willing to chug through this dumbass's off shoot side storyline so I can get all I can with main series.

Any additional comments?

Fucking make all characters suffer for their stupidity.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

🙃

I loved the story, was really great. But the narrator was a lil hard to like.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Don't waste your time

I only made it a quarter of the way through. awful banter and irritating narration

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Over the top

The narrator put way too much energy into the various voices. They were all too loud no matter what volume your device was set.
If it weren't for that it would have been enjoyable.

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