Rating: 
Summary: better than I expected
Review: After reading City Infernal, I was reluctant to pry open the covers of this one, but I did and was quite surprised. It was a much better read than City, though I think Lee could have toned it down a bit on the vast variety of species that lurk in the city of Hell. Too many to keep track of and they only confuse the reader, in my opinion. But Lee also has one of the most inventive minds in the horror field. For the gore lovers out there, this book contains scenes sick enough to curl your stomach. Like when Cassie has to eat a creature's large eye to see what it has seen. I nearly gagged, but man, I loved it.
After all of the plot strands come together in the end, you are not disappointed. Satan's plan, which I won't reveal, is very disturbing. Will Cassie and her angel spoil his plot, or will there be another book in the series? I know the answer, but I'm not telling. Read the book. I think you'll like it.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Series
Review: Infernal Angel is the sequel to City Infernal. I loved City Infernal, it was a fun read and have been waiting rather impatiently for Infernal Angel to come out. Can't wait to get started on it.
Rating: 
Summary: HELP ME PLEASE?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
Review: I just received this book from a book club I am in. I hope this does make me seem stupid, but I can't figure out if this is a series. I just finished Richard Laymon's Beast House series & I made sure to read them in order. I can't figure out if this is the second part to City Infernal and I don't want to read a second part first. The reviews for these books seem the same but nobody has said this is the second part and I also checked his website which also says nothing. I would really appreciate so I can start my book. I am almost finished with the book I am reading now (The Rising) and I would like to be able to start this right after. Thank you
Rating: 
Summary: I don't know why, but it was fun.
Review: Edward Lee, City Infernal (Leisure, 2003)Edward Lee has been around, it seems, just about forever as far as horror authors go. During the eighties, he was considered one of the rising stars, going so far as to get some of his stories in the then-groundbreaking Night Visions anthology (and "Doing Colfax" will never be erased from my memory). Then the horror market died. Lee, unlike many of his brethren, continued to publish in small specialty presses. Those books are now worth a small fortune. And he still continues to publish; his newest novel, as of this writing, is City Infernal. And a typical Edward Lee gut-churner it is. Cassie and Lissa are identical twins who are enamored of the early nineties goth scene in DC. Lissa catches her boyfriend kissing Cassie, at which point she kills both him and herself. Their mother is long gone, so Cassie and her father are left on their own. A couple of years later, the two of them move out to the country. The house they move to just happens to be a gateway to hell, inhabited by three of hell's outcasts, Xeke, Via, and Hush. Through them, Cassie may finally get a chance to do what she's wanted to since the incident: apologize to her sister. Okay, so extreme horror is no longer the shock that it was when Lee published "Doing Colfax," the characters have only a shade more depth than cardboard cutouts, and the whole thing is really kind of predictable (though he does throw in a few twists, some explicit and some implied, at the end that will catch the reader off-guard). So why, then, is Ed Lee's stuff such a fun read? Good question, and one to which I really don't have an answer. City Infernal is more Ghouls than it is The Bighead; you're not going to find anything groundbreaking, and in the harsh light of day this will likely end up being considered one of Lee's minor novels rather than a piece of the classic Lee canon. But still, it's a ball. He creates the Mehistopolis, the major city in hell, as lovingly as China Mieville creates Perdido Street Station's New Crobuzon, and has just as much fun describing it. The Mephistopolis is what Dickens could have done with his place descriptions in A Tale of Two Cities if he hadn't been so stultifyingly verbose. I will warn you, a good number of horror fans will probably be bored off their butts with this book. But as Adam Parfrey said of the music of NON, "to the chosen few, it is pure balm for the soul." *** ½
Rating:
Summary: Culinary delights at the Alferd Packer Room
Review: I'm a bit torn on this Edward Lee.
Cassie and Lissa are identical twins, both city goth girls sneaking out to do the club scenes and party. Both are virgins, though Lissa is not a puritanical one. When Lissa catches Cassie kissing her bartender boyfriend Radu, she first shoots him then shoots herself, killing them both.
Cassie falls into a pit of self blame and despair, and to ease the burden on both her and himself, her father quits his job and moves from D.C. to the suburbs of Virginia into an old and odd mansion called Blackwell Hall. Here is where Mr. Lee's real vision begins. Cassie has no idea she is an Etheress, a living mortal with the ability to enter hell, until she befriends three dead people who are living in the occulus room of Blackwell Mansion; Via, Xeke, and Hush. Part Two of this book is Cassie's journey into hell with her new friends, as she tries to find her sister to tell her how sorry she is. Part Three of this book is where Cassie has a confrontation with Lilith, meets the second Fallen Angel Ezoriel, and uses her Etheress powers to invade the Constabulary to attempt to rescue her sister. The weak parts of this novel are the dialogue, and to an extent the characters. But, and this is a very big BUT, Mr. Lee more than redeems himself with this utterly unique and diabolical vision of hell as a vast city, The Mephistopolis. I was literally blown away by the detailed visualization of this city; from transportation to power plants to nightclubs to policing to restaurants, Mr. Lee leaves nothing out from this hellish excursion. It is truly in and of itself worth reading this book to travel with Cassie, Via, Xeke, and Hush into hell. Very cool and unique concept expertly described and fully fleshed out. Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: Fan-damn-tastic!!
Review: This is a great novel. Even wonder what hell is like? Think it's all flames and fiery brimstone. Cassie get's a first hand look at Hell. Cassie's sister kills herself, as that's a sin, she goes there. Cassie feels guilty over her sisters death, and then she meets 3 people who can take her into the depths of hell so she can tell her sister how sorry she is. But can Cassie's sister forgive her? Read this and find out. Lee gives a lot of wonderful descriptions on hell, and how it became a city. Along the way, Cassie meets a lot of interesting people. Some are funny, others we meet are just there...and yet some are down right scary. I can't say enough good things about this book. I highly suggest you give it a chance.
Rating:
Summary: A wild, entertaining ride.
Review: City Infernal is one of the most enteratining novels I've read in quite a while. The concept is pure genius: Two twin sisters get into an argument over a guy while at a D.C. goth club. When her sister Lisa commits suicide right in front of her, Cassie(and to a certain extent her dad) enters a state of semi-depression. To help forget these horrid events of the past, Cassie and her dad move to a secluded mansion in a quiet hillbilly town. As Cassie learns from a local redneck who is well versed in the town's folklore and legends, the mansion she has moved in has a very dark past and a history of violence. There is also a portal in the mansion that leads straight to hell, where Cassie embarks on a mission to locate her dead sister(people who commit suicide go straight to hell, you see). Lee's vision of hell is not vastly different from our world. Hell is not a pit of flames but a modern city with bars, public transportation, and people who work to make a living. But instead of peace and justice, chaos is enforced and encouraged. Lee does not spare any details (or pull any stops) when describing his vision of hell. It is all done in very imaginative and gruesome fashion. I was also impressed by what Lee wrote about the goth scene. He really nails it when describing the kind of mood and music (Bauhaus, Killing Joke, Front 242, to name but a few)that permeates from this subculture. It's obvious Lee spent a lot of time researching the goth scene while writing this book. Just so you know: This is not a novel of 'big thinks'. It's more like the last movie of a triple-header at the drive-in. Fast, cheesy and fun. Hey, nothing wrong with that!!
Rating:
Summary: Interesting plot and setting...
Review: I felt that the joking and bantering between Xeke and Via were too much at times. also that hell has game shows and cooking shows were a touch on the silly side. otherwise, an interesting look at the Underworld.
Rating:
Summary: It's Weird
Review: It's Weird. I really don't think Lee is that great of a writer. The entire time I was reading "City Infernal" I was aware of the fact that I could write a better horror novel. Most people could. Lee has a limited vocabulary and there are times when he fails to write with thrust and economy. There is absolutely no tension or suspense in "City Infernal" at all. This novel has one character that is developed beyond a mere skeleton. And Lee barely achieves this. The plot is crude. We can usually figure out (approximately) how episodes will resolve well before we get there. When Lee faces his heros with problems that should allow him to wrack his brain and develop a necessarily complex solution that relates to the rest of the story and developes over the course of the story he instead wimps out and uses a contrivance to avoid grappling for ideas. I could probably list many other complaints. But why bother. I liked "City Infernal". It's brisk and it has plenty of violent imagery to make up for what it lacks. We're so inundated with gore that we become oblivious to it. But here and there Lee succeeds in being genuinely disturbing. This is a book I liked a lot even though it's not really that great. I like stupid, easy to read gore fests. This is the literary equivalent of a slasher film. If that's what you like, you'll like this.
Rating: 
Summary: You can easily find a better book than this.
Review: There are some mildly amusing concepts in this book - but to have to wade through dull writing to find them is just no fun. Mr. Lee's done better before. I couldn't even finish the book - I mean there's too many books better than this to waste time on it - and I love the horror genre. But I like good writing even better. Maybe you're better off with one of Mr. Lee's more explicit novels if you're into that.
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