Goldilox and the Three Weres: Review: The Lost by Vicki Pettersson

The Lost
(Celestial Blues #2)
Vicki Pettersson
Release: March 19, 2013
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Griffin Shaw and his wife were both murdered fifty years ago. Now a minor angel, Grif's been granted permission to solve the mystery of his own death... if he helps the Pure angels guide those souls who might otherwise be Lost.

Souls like Jeap Yang, a drug addict in his final moments of life. Grif knows that death is coming, but he cannot intervene. However, Grif's mortal lover, reporter Katherine "Kit" Craig, isn't constrained by angelic protocol. If she can stop a death, she will.

But as Kit is about to find out, there are things more traumatic and evil than murder. A strange new drug is literally eating tweakers' flesh from their bones, and Kit's crusade to get it off the streets is set to propel her and Grif into a battle with a vicious drug cartel. They'll have to scramble to stay alive, stay together, and choose their own fate... before it's chosen for them.

Review:

The Lost is the second in Vicki Pettersson's Celestial Blues series, which finds itself in a difficult to define genre that I would call paranormal romance mystery noir. The Lost continues the overarching mystery from book one - the search for the truth of Grif and Evie's murders - as well as adds a new human-based mystery involving a nasty new street drug.

Grif and Kit shine together again as a sometimes happy, sometimes dysfunctional couple. Their relationship is nothing if not complicated, with Grif being a Centurion angel stuck in a part angel-part human body and still dealing with the murder of himself and his wife 50 years ago. Even though Kit is quite often her sunny and hard-nosed-investigator self, she is a little darker in this book. She seems to have realized just how awkward it can be when your boyfriend still dreams about his dead wife nightly. I understood her thoughts and feelings on the topic, of course, but I felt slightly annoyed at how often she got upset at the situation in this one, considering how open-minded and content she seemed at the end of The Taken. This conflict came up often between Kit and Grif, but it definitely made their relationship seem more multidimensional and real.

Grif and Kit work together to help the police solve the deaths of local junkies dying from a horrible drug that rots people's skin and destroys their brain. The deaths were just as gruesome and the investigation just as dark and tension-filled as those in the first in this series, and these aspects contribute to the noir feel that I love about these books. That, along with the supernatural aspect of angels and demons and the rockabilly subculture that Kit is a part of, really make this series stand out in the paranormal genre. I can't even think of another series that is similar to this one, but please let me know if there are because I would be highly interested in reading them!

Some of the predictions I had while reading book one were proven right on track with this book, such as some of the story behind Grif and Evie's murders as well as the romantic interests of a side character who I felt seemed to pay special attention to Kit in The Taken. It was nice to see the big plot of Grif's murder continue and readers will enjoy the tidbits of information that get dangled in front of them. The way The Lost ended should certainly be called a cliffhanger and I am really excited to see how this unique trilogy ends with the final installment!

Recommended for fans of: noir, old school crime books, classic angels and demons, paranormal romance with complicated relationships, and fedoras.

This review is based on an advance copy of the book provided by the publisher.