The Undying Legion by Clay Griffith and Susan Griffith (Jun 30, 2015)

  The Undying Legion: Crown & Key by Clay Griffith and Susan Griffith (Jun 30, 2015)

Book Description:

"A thrilling new Victorian-era urban fantasy for fans of Kevin Hearne’s Iron Druid Chronicles, the Showtime series Penny Dreadful, and the Sherlock Holmes movies featuring Robert Downey, Jr. With a flood of dark magic about to engulf Victorian London, can a handful of heroes vanquish a legion of the undead? When monster-hunter Malcolm MacFarlane comes across the gruesome aftermath of a ritual murder in a London church, he enlists the help of magician-scribe Simon Archer and alchemist extraordinaire Kate Anstruther. Studying the macabre scene, they struggle to understand obscure clues in the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics carved into the victim’s heart—as well as bizarre mystical allusions to the romantic poetry of William Blake. One thing is clear: Some very potent black magic is at work. But this human sacrifice is only the first in a series of ritualized slayings. Desperate to save lives while there is still time, Simon, Kate, and Malcolm—along with gadget geek Penny Carter and Charlotte, an adolescent werewolf—track down a necromancer who is reanimating the deceased. As the team battles an unrelenting army of undead, a powerful Egyptian mummy, and serpentine demons, the necromancer proves an elusive quarry. And when the true purpose of the ritual is revealed, the gifted allies must confront a destructive force that is positively apocalyptic."

  The Undying Legion

 I tried I really tried to love this book.  It is everything a wonderful book should be, but for some reason this book isn’t.  This is the second book in The Crown and Key trilogy and I expected much, much more from this book. There is magic galore, steampunk, a ton of blood and gore and it is set in the Victorian era –except that most of the time they talk like it was much earlier in the 1800’s or even late 1700’s.  The dialogue sort of switches back and forth from those era’s. There is so much history (alternate though it may be) in this book, so many unfamiliar words and such, that I spent more time looking things up rather than simply enjoying the story. Some things are resolved from the last book, but believe me this is a whole new ball of evil! What I did love was Charlotte and the fact that she can use her werewolfishness for good. Of course everything sort of works out in the end leaving us hanging for the next and final book. This book was at times plodding and at other times out of control and making no sense I’m glad that so many others like this book.  It just may not be my particular cup of tea.  However, I have read the first book and really thought that this trilogy had a lot of potential.  I thought it had enough potential, to even make a full series out of it.  Unfortunately for me this particular book just really doesn’t move much along. So much was the same as in the first book –it just seems like names of the villains had been changed. *ARC supplied for review by publisher.