Review: Discount Armageddon by Seanen McGuire

Discount Armageddon is InCryptid #1. It was published by DAW on March 6, 2012.

The Blurb

Ghoulies. Ghosties. Long-legged beasties. Things that go bump in the night…

The Price family has spent generations studying the monsters of the world, working to protect them from humanity-and humanity from them. Enter Verity Price. Despite being trained from birth as a cryptozoologist, she’d rather dance a tango than tangle with a demon, and is spending a year in Manhattan while she pursues her career in professional ballroom dance. Sounds pretty simple, right? It would be, if it weren’t for the talking mice, the telepathic mathematicians, the asbestos supermodels, and the trained monster-hunter sent by the Price family’s old enemies, the Covenant of St. George. When a Price girl meets a Covenant boy, high stakes, high heels, and a lot of collateral damage are almost guaranteed.

To complicate matters further, local cryptids are disappearing, strange lizard-men are appearing in the sewers, and someone’s spreading rumors about a dragon sleeping underneath the city… [Goodreads]

The Review

I found this such a refreshing, engaging read. Verity Price is my kind of girl… Well, except for that whole ballroom dancing thing. Very is an independent woman with a long family line who’s trying to balance her family’s expectations with her own wants and dreams. She’s tough and smart, but also human. No crazy powers, no desperate flaw in her character. In fact, she’s just a nice, normal girl. Not counting the excessive weaponry, jumping off of buildings, slutty work uniform, and chanting religious mice in her living room, that is.

So like I said – she’s my kind of girl.

I also love that Very’s family is a group of hereditary cryptozoologists. The combination of supernatural and science is a new and enticing allure. Each chapter also includes a wise quote from one of what I believe is Very’s ancestors. They include such anecdotes as:

A lady is never truly embarrassed. And if she is, a lady is never gauche enough to leave survivors.

As well as:

A proper lady should be able to smile pretty, wear sequins like she means it, and kick a man’s ass nine ways from Sunday while wearing stiletto heels. If she can’t do that much, she’s not trying hard enough.

This is on top of Verity’s own astute – and hilarious – observations of city life. She’s warm, she’s personal… She can hide a gun in a tango dress. She’s more fun than an entire New York subway system full of dragons! I recommend you run out right now and get this book. I can’t imagine a world where you’d regret it.