Audiobook Review: Hard Magic by Laura Anne Gilman

Hard Magic
Author: Laura Anne Gilman
Series: Paranormal Scene Investigations (Book 1)
Narrator: Romy Nordlinger
Publication: Audible Studios (September 24, 2013)
Length: 10 hours and 47 minutes

Description: 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...."

My Thoughts: This was an entertaining start to an urban fantasy series. I read this one when it was written in 2010 but just downloaded the audiobook which was part of my Audible subscription in the Audible Plus Catalog.

Because this is the first book of a four book series, a lot of time is spent introducing the characters and setting the scene. It is set in the same world as her Retrievers series and her Sylvan Investigations series. The world is a bit of a twist on the real world where Ben Franklin discovered that Current is for more than electricity. Some humans have the ability to use it for a variety of magical things including translocation. 

Bonnie Torres is a twenty-one-year-old college graduate who is looking for a job. She is a Talent which means working in any sort of business with lots of technology is contra-indicated since Talents usually zap any technology near them. Bonnie is bi-sexual. She is also an orphan. Her lone jack (unaffiliated Talent) father was murdered and she was given to the guardianship of Council Talent Jay. This means that she has a foot in both camps of the magical world. It also means that she doesn't have money issues so long as she's willing to keep depending on Jay - which she doesn't want to do.

She receives a surprise job offer from an unexpected source. Two men, one lone jack and one Council, have plans to open an investigative business to look into paranormal crime. She and four other recent college graduates have been recruited for this new venture. All of them paranormal abilities of one sort or another.

After a bunch of training and lots of worry about whether or not the new business will be successful, PUPI gets its first case. A woman doesn't believe that her parents, both Talents, committed suicide. She wants PUPI to investigate. Unfortunately, there are others who want the business to fail and who want to derail the investigation. And the investigative team is making up their techniques and procedures as they go along.

The story was engaging and entertaining. I found the worldbuilding intriguing. The characters were also interesting and well-developed people. I liked Bonnie's desire to make good in her new career choice. I look forward to reading more in the series and more in the world. 

Favorite Quote:

He was wearing another of his crunchy-granola outfits today, and I was starting to wonder which was the real Stosser, the stylish-image conscious guy, or the one who didn't seem to remember that his hair was Pippi Longstocking red?

I bought this one. You can buy your copy here.