Review Tuesday: Splendificent 2 by Dacy Alex -- #UrbanFantasy #Humor #ReviewTuesday

 

Splendificent 2 by Dacy Alex 

Roxy Kitten Press, 2020

Meet the Hot Squad – four bounteously endowed beauties who just happen to have supernatural powers!

Dusty Blackwood is a tough-as-they-come country gal with a chip on her shoulder and a mean left-hook, who just happens to be a pixie. Her tendency to violence has held her back from graduating to full-fledged fairy status, but she doesn’t care. With her pixie dust and her control of natural forces, she’s ready to take on any and all comers.

Fleur Flanagan is a unique creature, half-vampire and half-succubus, able to walk in the daylight and suck the blood or the spiritual juice out of anyone she pleases. As it happens, she’s the daughter of Lazarus the Undead, and granddaughter of Satan himself. Talk about a pedigree!

Sofi Poe, red-headed fashion plate and social media junkie, is actually a kitsune, an immortal Japanese fox shapeshifter. When she’s not modeling bikinis for her Instagram followers and making her her fans drool, she’s flinging fireballs from her fluffy fox tail and frying bad guys to a crisp.

Princess Tristabelle Elvrina is a pure elf from the shadowy realm of Golden Land. She and her elvish siblings are charged with protecting the human realm, but their family squabbles and political double-dealing have a tendency to distract them from that task. With her golden locks, violent eyes and voluptuous dancer’s body, Tristabelle could well be the most gorgeous creature on the planet. But in truth, Dusty, Fleur and Sofi are formidable competition.

Then there’s Giselle Nyfall, the clueless, blonde, game-addicted California girl who finds herself sharing an apartment with these four extraordinary young women. She’s in awe of the Hot Squad, and often wonders why she was assigned to room with them by the authorities of exclusive Hemera University where they’re all freshmen. Despite her lack of coordination and her less-than-brilliant intellect, though, there is more to Giselle than meets the eye.

Splendificent 2 is the second volume in Dacy Alex’s outrageous and entertaining urban fantasy series featuring Giselle and her squad of super-roomies. I loved the first book in the series, but this sequel is even better. There’s the same crazy characters, the same wild sex, even more threatening evil forces from the underworld, and enough mammary extravagance to hypnotize anyone who happens to be looking.

This book is a bit less chaotic than the first, with a plot that actually sort of makes sense. Apocalypse, of course, is on its way, and the Hot Squad and their allies – university employee and accomplished witch “Big Sis Anika”, nerdy but devoted Stuart, Tristabelle’s brother Prince “Charming” Krisdane, even Giselle’s bodacious mother Dawn – are doing everything they can to save the University’s students, the city of New York, and the known universe.

I really enjoyed the new characters whom the author introduces, while at the same time reveling in the familiar glories of the fantastically pneumatic foursome from the previous book. I also liked the fact that the novel has some real conflict and darkness. This makes it more than just a silly, sexy romp, placing it solidly in the urban fantasy genre.

And did I mention it’s hilarious?

Here’s a fun snippet, a conversation between Giselle and her mother.

"But, mom? Wake up, Giselle, this isn’t a video game. You don’t get to hit the reset button when things get bad."

"Video game consoles don’t have reset buttons anymore and haven’t for a long time."

"Who cares about that? Honestly, Giselle. Why would you even want to be in a world where you are in danger of being attacked by demons, werewolves, vampires, and who the hell knows what else? What could be the benefit of you, Giselle, living in this world?"

Giselle took a sharp intake of breath before stating in the softest of tones, "I defeated a demon. I mean, he was just the principal demon of Sloth, so I’m guessing he was pretty lazy but I beat him."

Now it was Dawn’s turn to take a sharp intake of breath.

"I threw Big Stense pills into his mouth and choked him back to hell."

For a moment Dawn blinked in astonishment, "The erection pills they sell at the gas station?"

"Anika says I shouldn’t have been able to defeat him, but I did."

Dawn didn’t move an inch. Not her grey eyes. Not her clasped hands. Not her mouth. Nothing.

"It was at the carnival the school had. He was trapped in the mirror universe but was reaching for me. I was scared. But I beat him."

"And you think you can beat this Prince Gorick? Because you have penis pills?"

"I’m not going anywhere near that guy! I’m helping to get the Dark Objects we need to magically imprison him."

"Why does a girl who wet the bed until she was twelve—"

"Eleven!"

"Twelve. Why does she need to help the gold standard of supernatural do anything?"

"Because I’m resourceful, mom. I got the two Dark Objects we have, and it was my idea that got them working. The pure elves are like, uh, what’s a reference you would get. They’re more like The Hulk; they wreck things. They don’t figure out things. They break things and people."

"So we as humans are at the mercy of an all-powerful country of omnipotent pagan elves?

"Fleur says to be glad it’s not an all-powerful country of radically Islamist elves."

This had me laughing so hard, everyone on the train was giving me peculiar looks.

The ending of Splendificent 2 is a huge surprise. It sets up the plot framework for a really dynamite third book.

I can hardly wait.