There are books that I love and books that I hate. The same can be true for authors as well. In the very rarest of circumstances, as has happened with Blood and Silver by James Ray Tuck, I have a book that I love and an author that I absofrickenlutely hate, seriously and with every bone in my body. Tuck is someone now nearly at the top of my hate list, because I simply cannot stand someone that makes it all look so damn easy.
How in the hell does this guy write like this?
Blood and Silver is the second book in his "Deacon Chalk, Occult Bounty Hunter" series, as well as being the second book that Tuck has ever written. His first, Blood and Bullets, was a book that knocked me flat and impressed the hell out of me with how well it was written…but I thought it was a fluke.
Nobody is that good that soon.
Sure of myself that he would disappoint me as many other writers have eventually disappointed me, I picked up Blood and Silver and immediately started cursing his name. Not only was Blood and Bullets not a fluke, but it seems as if it was nothing more than Tuck merely flexing his muscles, cracking his knuckles as he tossed off a quick "warming-up" novel before he really got down to business and started writing.
Bastard.
Blood and Silver opens up about a year after we first meet Deacon Chalk and the challenges and dangers he faces are no less imposing than they were the first time around. Actually, now that I think about it, they are considerably worse.
Kick-started from the simple and urgently negative reaction of seeing someone beating what appears to be a dog, Chalk is immediately drawn into an adventure - though adventure is not the word when as many nasty things are trying to kill you as happens to be the case throughout this book - where the decision to stop the man and save the dog turns out to be a much more intense situation than might have first appeared.
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