A Vital Breath Book Review

The spirit-world around this world of sense
Floats like an atmosphere, and everywhere
Wafts through these earthly mists and vapours dense
A vital breath of more ethereal air.

—Haunted Houses, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

A With Both Hands Mini-Review

Paxton Locke is back, not much older, but hopefully much wiser than he was before. You can expect the same things out of volume 6, A Vital Breath, that you got out of previous books in the series. Paxton will approach his problems with the bigger hammer method, Valentine will sling guns and crack jokes, and everyone else will do their best to pick up the pieces afterward.

However, at the end of book 5, Paxton’s tendency to steamroll anything in front of him with overwhelming magical force earned him a magical bounty on his head, and a hunter has been dispatched to recover Paxton who is at least as stubborn as he is.

That hunter, Renaissance Gitano, will pursue Paxton anywhere and anywhen, even through a multiverse of madness spawned by one of Paxton’s friends from book 2. However, little does Renaissance know that Paxton is on a mission from God.

Not that that keeps him out of trouble. Now that Paxton has finally learned to embrace his mission, it tends to simply amplify the trouble he naturally gets in, having spent a remarkable fraction of his time in these books either in prison or on the run from some authority that wants him for “questioning”.

This book was an absolute blast, and I am glad to see Paxton Locke back at it.

Daniel Humphreys’ website

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Mini-reviews

The Paxton Locke Series

by Daniel Humphreys
Fade: Paxton Locke book 1
Night’s Black Agents: Paxton Locke book 2
Come, Seeling Night: Paxton Locke book 3
The Sacred Radiance: Paxton Locke book 4
The Dragon and His Wrath: Paxton Locke book 5