Title: Subtle Bodies
Series: PsyCop: Book Thirteen
Author: Jordan Castillo Price
Publisher: JCP Books
Length: 305 Pages
Category: Urban Fantasy
Rating: 5 Stars
At a Glance: Castillo Price has the boos and the wigglies down cold in the PsyCop series, delivering the chills that come naturally with the territory and that readers have come to expect over the years. In the grand scheme of “Must Reads”, this book and the PsyCop series as a whole belong right at the top.
Reviewed By: Lisa
Blurb: “It’s probably nothing….”
Usually, when Victor Bayne is called upon to investigate a ghostly apparition, the “haunting” can be chalked up to a perfectly mundane cause. When he’s sent to check out some suspicious phenomena in small-town Iowa—and no one seems unduly alarmed—he’s hoping for more of a weekend getaway. Especially since he’s bringing along Jacob as his Stiff.
He ends up finding way more than he bargained for. Women undressing in public—with no memory of doing so. A car rental agent who knows far more than she should. And a shocking discovery they must keep to themselves at all costs.
Instead of merely supporting Vic, Jacob finds himself thrust into the driver’s seat, using a talent that’s clumsy and untested. And when Vic starts acting just as strange as the stripping women, all bets are off.
Can Vic and Jacob get a handle on the situation before FPMP National storms in and shuts them down for good?
Review: Jordan Castillo Price could teach a master-class in how to keep a long-running series fresh and compelling without resorting to jumping-the-shark stunts that would cheapen the brilliance of the characters and the world in which they exist. What could become just another ordinary paranormal investigation for Victor Bayne and Jacob Marks, instead gives both agents ample material to tap deeper into their own talents, discover new sides to themselves, and gives readers all the more reason to love them.
Beginning Subtle Bodies at Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry was a fantastic means of getting things underway, especially for anyone who has had the chance to visit and wander its exhibits. That little bit of familiarity went a long way in engaging me from the get-go, but the story moves quickly into its stride when Vic and Jacob head to Beauchamp, Iowa, to investigate a series of odd occurrences. “He ends up finding way more than he bargained for” isn’t a sentence that should be in Vic’s repertoire at this point, but how could he possibly have predicted what women stripping in public, with no memory of it after, would lead to?
“What’s past is prologue” is relevant in this case when the guys make an unexpected discovery in a house with its own history that causes no shortage of issues as to how they proceed, who they involve, and, more imperatively, what to do with the find. In the midst of this, they meet a woman whose ka (soul, spirit, essence, et al) is in contact with Vic and Jacob for reasons that add another wrinkle in the case. And, of course, this is all doled out in Vic’s droll voice and awkward charm, which is impossible not to recognize as comfortingly familiar at this point.
Castillo Price has the boos and the wigglies down cold in the PsyCop series, delivering the chills that come naturally with the territory and that readers have come to expect over the years. The romance between Vic and Jacob? Well, that’s as solidly in sync as ever, and growing more so with each new installment. In the grand scheme of “Must Reads”, this book and the PsyCop series as a whole belong right at the top.
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