Covid-19 Day 15

The Unicorn Crisis
(The Hidden Academy #1)
by Jon Rosenberg (2011)

Someone has summoned a Unicorn to a field south of Stratford-upon-Avon causing David Ash’s day to go straight to hell.

Now he has to confront shotgun wielding drug dealers, murderous strangers and psychotic fairies and all to find out who stole one of Oberon’s personal pets. He better do it soon, or it will mean an all out conflict between The Fairy Court and The Hidden Academy.

When I started this book, it seemed to be a comedic fantasy, given the sharp dialogue and absurd situation. However it turned out to a an urban fantasy, similar to Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files or Mike Resnick’s ‘Fable of Tonight’ series.

The writing is good and engaging. However it does drag in the middle and bringing this 102k words down to the 70-80k mark would have helped with the pacing.

So an OK read, but a very familiar story structure and resolution.