Close to the Ground

Rating:
Summary: Angel grounded by his humanity.
Review: A powerful Irish magician travels to LA where he hopes to raise the dreaded giant Balor and rule the world. A Hollywood studio head struggles to keep his job. Kate tries to track down a gang of bank robbers who have killed three people. Doyle has a brain splitting vision of a young girl in trouble. These plots are all part of a puzzle framed by fear, greed, anger and regret. And when the pieces are all fit together a new image of Angel appears more human than we have seen him before except perhaps with Buffy. Trapped by strong magics Angel must face the ultimate death.

The story moves at a fast past. The pages are heavy with demons and villians. The fastbacks are kept to a single sad incident. Hollywood and the Otherworld blend surprisingly well together.

This is an excellent addition to the Angel series. Even if a reader has never watched the TV shows they can enjoy this book

Rating:
Summary: Another really good Angel book.
Review: Angel's newest job is pretty unusual for him - he's been hired as a bodyguard for seventeen-year-old Karinna Willits, the spoiled, bratty daughter of a Hollywood studio head. Angel can't really figure out why Doyle had a vision of Karinna in trouble - she doesn't appear to be in any sort of supernatural danger. But he figures he'll stick with guarding Karinna and keep an eye out for trouble. He doesn't expect to be abducted by an ailing sorceror who thinks by killing Angel he can trasfer Angel's immortality to himself and live forever. Angel knows this all corrects to Karinna SOMEHOW, but he just can't figure out how. The connection, revealed in the end, totally shocked me, but I won't say what it is, since it would spoil the whole thing. I didn't get why the whole subplot about bank robbers was in there, but that's revealed at the end as well. Talk about a plot twist! On a side note, I really liked the brief part about Cordelia working for a short time as a tour guide. That brought a nice bit of humor to a mostly dark story (although the darkness fits the mood of the show). The ending was sad (but again I won't reveal what happens). I highly reccomend this to fans of Angel, both the show and the books. One thing I noticed: although the Angel books are classified as young adult books, they're much darker in nature then the Buffy young adult books. They're as dark as the adult Buffy books, in fact.

Rating:
Summary: Good Job, Jeff Mariotte
Review: Close to the Ground is now my favorite in the line of Angel books. Mariotte managed to combine true greed with the supernatural in a well-thought out manner. After Angel has accepted the job of bodygaurd over a hot-shot director's daughter, Karinna, weird (as usual) things began to happen. What does an ancient Celtic sorceror want with Angel? How does Karinna mesh with the Celtic man? Angel has to figure out those two questions, as well as save Kate Lockley who has become hostage to a group of nasty bank robbers. Nothing like a good old cops and robbers plot. Especially one which is splendidly done and meshed in with a supernatural tale. I do have one tiny complaint; Mariotte made Angel a bit too sarcastic during his battles with the Celtic sorceror's minions. But other than, Close to the Ground is a very good novel.

Rating:
Summary: A Great Angel Book!
Review: I just finished reading "Close to the Ground" and I must say that so far, it is my favorite. It started out as a magician named Mortractus tried to bring back Balor, the one-eyed giant, from another dimension. But he was aging with every spell that he performed and was looking for a way to live forever. Which was what brought him to LA. Meanwhile, Angel had troubles of his own: what with having to be a bodyguard to the daughter of a big movie company, whom he thought was spoiled and only helped her because Doyle had a vision. I really liked the book because even though Angel was not around Kate, the writer still had a story for Detective Lockley and her and Angel seldom crossed paths until close to the end. The best part was right after that when the whole story took a quick turn and Angel finally figured out how to save the girl from Doyle's vision. This is a great book and I think that anyone who's an Angel fan should pick this one up.

Rating:
Summary: A Great Angel Book!
Review: I just finished reading "Close to the Ground" and I must say that so far, it is my favorite. It started out as a magician named Mortractus tried to bring back Balor, the one-eyed giant, from another dimension. But he was aging with every spell that he performed and was looking for a way to live forever. Which was what brought him to LA. Meanwhile, Angel had troubles of his own: what with having to be a bodyguard to the daughter of a big movie company, whom he thought was spoiled and only helped her because Doyle had a vision. I really liked the book because even though Angel was not around Kate, the writer still had a story for Detective Lockley and her and Angel seldom crossed paths until close to the end. The best part was right after that when the whole story took a quick turn and Angel finally figured out how to save the girl from Doyle's vision. This is a great book and I think that anyone who's an Angel fan should pick this one up.

Rating:
Summary: Another great read!
Review: Really interesting story. Loved seeing a side of "Angel" that I'm not use to. Recommend to all, especially fans of the show.

Rating:
Summary: Another great read!
Review: Really interesting story. Loved seeing a side of "Angel" that I'm not use to. Recommend to all, especially fans of the show.

Rating:
Summary: Growing Old Gracelessly
Review: Somewhere in Ireland an old mage is getting older faster. He is in danger of dying before he can complete his he plans to resurrect Balor of the Baleful Eye and conquer the world. Naturally, the solution is to move to Los Angeles and make life miserable for Angel. In the meantime Doyle has a flash, and Angel finds himself defending Karinna Willitts, a beautiful young woman who happens to be the daughter of Hollywood's most powerful studio head. Trust Cordy to immediately parlay this fortunate moment into a studio job, while Angel is offered the opportunity to become Karinna's permanent guardian. The young lady has a nose for trouble, and loves to be in it.

As Mordractus (the mage) begins to weave his plans to turn the unsuspecting vampire into a health food drink there is action on another front entirely. Kate Lockley is hunting a group of bank robbers who make a habit of tunneling into vaults and popping up with the money. Only this last time they popped up the killed three people who happened to be in their way. In other words, business is as usual in the city of stars.

Jeff Mariotte is a change of pace in this fourth volume in the Angel novel series. For a change, the story stays in the present, and the plot is full of complex twists and turns. Mariotte is good at developing characters through action, which means that those characters who play big roles (Angel, Kate, and Cordelia) develop considerable dimensionality. The walk-on parts (and in this case Doyle doesn't get much of a part to play) are always a bit sketchy, but Mariotte's pace is fast enough that it never really becomes an issue.

Cordy's adventures in studio land are a characteristic satire of the countless facades of Hollywood life, as Mariotte works to build a cynical view of the industry that, after all, has provided some of cynicism's greatest moments. One has to sympathize with Cordy, who would either like to get paid or become famous, and never seems to manage to accomplish either. Angel, wizards, demons, thieves, Hollywood, and the FBI - who could ask for anything more?

Rating:
Summary: Growing Old Gracelessly
Review: Somewhere in Ireland an old mage is getting older faster. He is in danger of dying before he can complete his he plans to resurrect Balor of the Baleful Eye and conquer the world. Naturally, the solution is to move to Los Angeles and make life miserable for Angel. In the meantime Doyle has a flash, and Angel finds himself defending Karinna Willitts, a beautiful young woman who happens to be the daughter of Hollywood's most powerful studio head. Trust Cordy to immediately parlay this fortunate moment into a studio job, while Angel is offered the opportunity to become Karinna's permanent guardian. The young lady has a nose for trouble, and loves to be in it.

As Mordractus (the mage) begins to weave his plans to turn the unsuspecting vampire into a health food drink there is action on another front entirely. Kate Lockley is hunting a group of bank robbers who make a habit of tunneling into vaults and popping up with the money. Only this last time they popped up the killed three people who happened to be in their way. In other words, business is as usual in the city of stars.

Jeff Mariotte is a change of pace in this fourth volume in the Angel novel series. For a change, the story stays in the present, and the plot is full of complex twists and turns. Mariotte is good at developing characters through action, which means that those characters who play big roles (Angel, Kate, and Cordelia) develop considerable dimensionality. The walk-on parts (and in this case Doyle doesn't get much of a part to play) are always a bit sketchy, but Mariotte's pace is fast enough that it never really becomes an issue.

Cordy's adventures in studio land are a characteristic satire of the countless facades of Hollywood life, as Mariotte works to build a cynical view of the industry that, after all, has provided some of cynicism's greatest moments. One has to sympathize with Cordy, who would either like to get paid or become famous, and never seems to manage to accomplish either. Angel, wizards, demons, thieves, Hollywood, and the FBI - who could ask for anything more?

Rating:
Summary: As good as mainstream bestselling suspense thrillers
Review: This book matches and surpasses most of the big bestselling mainstream suspense thrillers. It is not just for the fans of the tv show about the vampire detective. If it had been relaesed as a hardcover with a different character's name, it would be a bestselling hardcover. SHAKEDOWN, and HOLLYWOOD NOIR are particularly great other volumes in this series. If you like James Patterson, Tom Savage, Jonathan Kellerman, Jefferson Swycaffer, Joe L. Hensley, Tami Hoag, Wilson Tucker, John Sandford, David Wiltse (or not) add this to your pile to be read.