Hard Magic Audiobook By Laura Anne Gilman cover art

Hard Magic

Paranormal Scene Investigations, Book 1

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Hard Magic

By: Laura Anne Gilman
Narrated by: Romy Nordlinger
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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...."

©2010 Laura Anne Gilman (P)2013 Audible, Inc. Classics Contemporary Fantasy Paranormal Paranormal & Urban

Editorial reviews

Performer Romy Nordlinger is pitch-perfect casting for urban fantasy Hard Magic's narrator Bonnie Torres, a smart, feisty scryer who can read electric currents for clues to solve crimes committed by other magic-wielding talents. Nordlinger brings to life Laura Anne Gilman's ragtag team of lovingly crafted characters at once colorful and credible, from Bonnie's old-money mentor, J, to her intense, lonejack boss, Venec.

Gilman's high-concept parallel world weaves together political intrigue, the mysteries the mercenary agency is charged with investigating, and Bonnie's coming of age story as she strikes out on her own.
All stars
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I struggled with this novel in the beginning as the character building is necessary but lacked...not sure what..but I didn't connect with the characters or their struggles. I like the paranormal investigative side of the story but the one problem I did have was.....no one likes to be asked/told to do something without a rational understanding or reason and the fact the 2 bosses aren't above board doesn't promote safety or team building but what felt like "shifty" characters to me.

I liked how each of the paranormal investigators had different powers but were limited which gave dimensions to the characters but the secrets each one kept irritated me more than captured my interest. I think there was supposed to be love interests in denial but this part of the story was poorly generated as it came off more like a 4th grader with a crush on their teacher.

So why did I give it 4 stars ? I liked the creativity of personalities, and the reason why the paranormal investigation team was created. Overall it was an ok book, I'm hoping book 2 captures me with the ground work covered from book 1.

Hoping for more

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nice world building, good 20ish heroine with appropriate thoughts/feelings. looking forward to the next book

Fun Urban fantasy romp

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The writing in the first couple chapters was very repetitive and the narrator made it so much worse. I can usually stick it out, but no.

Terrible narration

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Awesome read lots of action and mystery,magic with plenty of humor good characterization and enjoyed the reading

Current Magic

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While the use of magic and the environment the author created was very interesting, it was hard to stay focused when the character rambled on and on about how it all worked. The author seems so preoccupied with explaining everything that the story gets lost along the way. I had listened to 3 chapters and had to stop, came back to it later in the day and I had to start over because I couldn't remember a single thing. I fell asleep during chapter 7, and turned it on the next morning and still had trouble remembering what is going on.

I wasn't thrilled with the narrator either.

Too much rambling

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I enjoyed this book, which is saying something for me right now because so many books have bored me enough I haven’t finished.
One big disgruntled point: this is twice now a book just stops before story is finished. Just cuts off. The ending of this book even admitted the story continues in the next book. I beg that if this is to be a trend PLEASE say Part 1 and Part 2. Cliffhangers are one thing. But just flat stopping the action without any resolution is plain irritating. So I think I’ll take a star off just for that. Narrators voice is lively. I have to admit at the beginning I was confused as to who was who and had hard time figuring out”the world” Bonnie lived in but it became clearer quickly. I also prefer a bit more variance in voices of characters to know who’s talking but that has to be hard and don’t want to criticize narrator for that.

Novel ideas, world and enjoyable

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I loved this. It was suspenseful and romy nordlinger was spot on with her narration. Looking forward to the next!

Great all round and terrific narrator!

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The whole story seemed like preparation for something to happen. When I did happen it was at the very end, and the killer was not identified; though the next book talks like it was solved.
I do not like to diss anything but I didn’t get hooked on this one.

Kept waiting for something of interest

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fun book. They are investigators who present the evidence & have no control over what happens next. With that in mind the ending was perfect.

electricity & magic

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The readers voice is so annoying she sounds like the switchboard operator from the office

annoyance

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