Soul Song

A Dirk & Steele Novel, Book 6

By: Marjorie Liu

Narrated by: Emma Lysy

“If you have yet to add Liu to your must-read list, you’re doing yourself a disservice.” (Booklist)

When it comes to bold originality and pure storytelling skill, few authors of popular fiction can compare with the remarkable Marjorie M. Lui - and in the realm of paranormal romance, no one is better! With Soul Song, the sensational New York Times best-selling superstar brings listeners another marvelous tale of passion and otherworldly occurrences centered around the mysterious Dirk and Steele Detective Agency - as a tormented young woman with the precognitive power to foresee terrible futures must place her own fate in the hands of a mesmerizing prince of the sea. A master at creating unforgettable love stories featuring shapeshifters, telekinetics, and extraordinary supernatural beings, Lui has earned herself a legion of fans, and Soul Song will merely add to their ranks.

Christine Feehan, author of Dark Prince and one of the biggest names in paranormal romance, promises that “[A]nyone who loves my work should love hers”.

©2010 Marjorie M. Liu (P)2019 HarperCollins Publishers

Choppy waters in this one, but still pretty good

“Time stretched like a moonbeam through the clouds”
On the plus side, I am still digging the variety of supernaturals and this installment has more involvement by some of the Dirk and Steele regulars, particularly Coney, who brings a welcome snark. The romance felt very lyrical and poetic, fitting for a romance between Kit, a singer with pre-cognition and McCall, a merman capable of siren-like mesmerization. The ongoing thing with Kit and grandma’s spirit was fun.

“I don’t care if we’re dead; we should both be wearing clothes.”
On the down side, the world building and magical rules have yet to come together in a consistent way. So far, each book features wildly different magic systems and mythologies. For instance, book 2’s dragons and jade versus this book’s witches, demons, and merfolk. Climactic battles and epic love stories are more credible when I feel like there’s a rhyme and reason, but here, it just felt like suddenly Kat instinctively knows how wield power, or conveniently knows how to vanquish her foe, even if she’s been in denial about magic in the world.

“A gesture of apocalyptic foolhardiness”
On the odd side, there were a few things that bugged me. Why is it that each shifter/magic power only appears once in the MCs? Like, there can’t ever be two Leopard shifters, healers, or electricity wielders? Why is it that only the MMCs reappear as supporting characters? What happened to strong FMCs? Can’t we have one recurring FMC on team Dirk and Steele? What’s with the author’s thing about sexual victimization? That appears as a go-to plot device in most of these books. How come Kit and McCall keep getting it on at the most awkward/dangerous times? When they’re in mortal danger and should be planning escape … there’s hankypanky. When she’s covered in blood … they’re hot and heavy … yeesh. Take a shower, kiddos.

“Got some brown sugar here”
The other clunky thing I’ve noticed over the series is the scraps about what characters look like. In book 3, there’s one or two references to Blue being from Afghanistan on his mom’s side, and having a beard … and then it falls off the radar. Here, it’s a brown sugar reference to Kat at the start… and then five hours in, for the first time, there’s a single mention that, yes, she’s black. All details seem to be spent on the supernatural traits.

Overall, there’s a good story about a couple trapped in awful circumstances joining together to break free. I’m still entertained enough to keep going, even if I’m not convinced there’s a thought-out series arc.

Yawn

This could have been a very good book. Way too long. The narrator's voice is for a much younger children's book. But I repeated myself. It became very boring pretty quickly. I think a good editor could have cut this book in half, and that would have helped the narrator has helped the narrator also.