UF Book Review: Devil and Thieves by Jennifer Rush

Title: Devils & Thieves

Author: Jennifer Rush

Series: Devils & Thieves #1

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Publisher: Little Brown Books for Young Readers

Pub Date: October 3. 2017

Pages: 336

My Copy: Courtesy of NetGalley and Little Brown

Book Summary:

Eighteen-year-old Jemmie Carmichael has grown up surrounded by magic in the quiet town of Hawthorne, New York. In her world, magic users are called "kindled," and Jemmie would count herself among them if only she could cast a simple spell without completely falling apart. It doesn't help that she was also recently snubbed by Crowe, the dangerous and enigmatic leader of the Black Devils kindled motorcycle gang and the unofficial head of their turf.

When the entire kindled community rolls into Hawthorne for an annual festival, a rumor begins spreading that someone is practicing forbidden magic. Then people start to go missing. With threats closing in from every side, no one can be trusted. Jemmie and Crowe will have to put aside their tumultuous history to find their loved ones, and the only thing that might save them is the very flaw that keeps Jemmie from fully harnessing her magic. For all her years of feeling useless, Jemmie may just be the most powerful kindled of all. 

Book Review:

An awesome book that I couldn’t put down. For a first book in this series, it delivered in a way that was spectacular. The main character is someone who just shines in this book as they grow in a lot of ways. 

Jemmie Carmichael has some issues when this book starts. I like how we start off with her hanging with her friend, Alex. Alex and Jemmie are doing typical female things and see someone that they don’t like, Katrina belongs to the Sixes, which is an ally of the Black Devils. Alex is the sibling of Crowe, who is the leader of the Black Devils.  They pull a prank and it makes them both laugh, but Katrina is not happy and this causes both Alex and Jemmie some problems.

So of course, Alex’s brother Crowe makes Jemmie use her magic to bind Alex’s power so that Alex learns not to disrespect him or his decisions in a way. Jemmie doesn’t like to use her powers. She really hates them and feels sick when she is around magic. It’s like she grew up around magic, but it doesn’t work for her. Everyone tells her to practice it. No one knows Jemmie’s secret. She has kept a lot of things. We also learn that Crowe and Jemmie had a thing or almost did. Their relationship is complicated to say the least. Not to mention things get iffy as Jemmie is kind of seeing someone else that Crowe doesn’t know about. Derek is a Death Stalker and that is the rival gang of the Black Devils so this is not good. Yet we learn that Derek doesn’t have magic or so we are led to believe.

We learn that when certain people go missing, every group is blaming one another. This is causing some major issues between the groups and no one is looking for the people in a calm and organized way. Plus people are claiming to have seen certain others with other people, even though they claim that isn’t true. Lady Jane, who’s gift is to tell the future and your death,  tells Jemmie that she is more important than she realizes. She has a gift and not to be afraid to use it. Plus we learn that what people are seeing could be an illusion.

Also in the book, we learn about Blood Magic and how bad it can be used. Jammie’s father also comes back to investigate for the Syndicate. He fears for Crowe. So of course Jemmie has to deal with her own issues with her father.  Jammie’s father and her have a conversation about things that he should have talked about to her a long time ago. This conversation was so good, as it illuminated a lot of things that she thought were not the truth, but sometimes things happen in life to people that change them and he was changed by it. So this makes things so much easier for the two of them to move forward.

This book had a lot of twists and turns. We learn that Darek is the one who has abducted people for his own sick, twisted purpose. He wants to become the most powerful Kindled of all. He is actually the son of a very bad Kindled who died many years ago. His true identity was concealed for his own safety. He actually is stealing other people’s Kindled Magic via some very old spells and a certain object. He almost drains Jemmie at one point of her magic, which is bad, but she certainly regains it when she tells Crowe about what she has seen and grabs them back. Her magic is to sense Aura’s and this makes her different and more powerful than she thought.

What happens next is utter craziness and more people with different kindled abilities get kidnapped. So now the stakes get higher and a wild crazy fight ensues between Darek, Crowe and Jemme. They are doing everything they can to win. What happens during this crazy fight scene which was wonderful by the way to read, is that Jemmie and Darek have some intense dialogue and Jemmie almost dies, but comes back to life and is different now that she absorbed what Darek had taken from others. She is now the person that she never thought she would be. This young woman finds herself staring at someone she doesn’t even recognizes. She killed Darek to save everybody else.

A great start to what looks like an awesome series.

Rating:

Five Hearts