Fated by Benedict Jacka

2.5 Stars

I was genuinely looking forward to reading this novel, I really enjoy the Urban Fantasy genre and have been lookign to try a few new authors and I had seen people raving about this novel and comparing to the PC Peter Grant books (which I am a complete fan girl about) and the Harry Dresden books (on my wishlist to try).  Oh dear me was I disappointed.

Here's the thing, they are billed as being Urban Fantasy set in Camden.  For me they were just pure fantasy that happened to have a quasi-real world setting.  There is no real interaction between the magical folk and the regular humans and no acknowledgement of the wider implications for the two rubbing against each other.  Camden and the wider London area just seem to be there to act as a draw for the reader and make you think you are getting something you aren't.  Then throw in a stroll through a London Park to meet up with a magical, centuries old creature; a magical party in Canary Wharf and explosive happenings in the British Museum.  The settings are largely irrelevant to the plot and it may have worked better to have this set in a complete fantasy world that the author could manipulate to his desires.  As it is I did feel a little "conned" by the Urban Fantasy tag because for me it simply isn't.

Then we come to the magic and the nagical people and creatures.  The magical system just doesn't seem to be coherent.  This is sadly true of our main character, and narrator, Alex Verus.  He is supposed to be able to see all the possible futures for a course of action and then states that until a decision is made he cannot see how things will work out but he is still able to manipulate events by choosing the timeline he wants to happen.  This doesn't make any sense at all because although he has made a decision to follow one possible thread the ultimate outcome of it depends on the decisions made by other invested parties and not just him.  Yet, time and time again everything happens as he predicted it would.  I got irrationally angry at this and the more the book progressed the less able I was to let it slide.

Alex's back story was interesting but the reveal was drawn out for far too long, indeed I spent a good portion of the book wondering if I had joined part way through the series and should already know what all these asides were about.  Nope, it really is the first one the author just wants to drip feed us the information.  The "voice" of Alex Verus is actually one of the most enjoyable things about the book and along with the action sequences the only thing that kept me reading.

For me this is a missed opportunity as there are some great ideas for a magical world here but just not executed to their full potential.  I have seen reviews that say the second in the series is much better but from having read this one it would have to be a freebie before I would consider picking it up.