This urban fantasy was written as a five book series, and was first published under the name Cara d'Bastian. The individual installments are titled The Check Your Luck Agency, Return of the Hantu, Wrath of the Harimau, Night of the Pontianak, and Five Card Draw, Jinn are High.
THE BLURB:
After the tragic death of her parents, and with nothing left tying her to the United Kingdom, Ursula Formosa returns to her homeland of Malaysia and a job with the eccentrically-named Singapore firm, “The Check Your Luck Agency”.
What begins as an attempt to stave off boredom turns into a new way of life as the scales drop from Ursula’s eyes and she tentatively enters a realm that contains vengeful ghosts, toyol, demons, pontianak and curses, not to mention old-fashioned fraud and larceny. As she befriends bomohs, mediums and a young woman already centuries old, Ursula’s ideas of friendship expand into a fresh view of the world that surrounds her.
But she isn’t going to be left to ease into things. A criminal mastermind, who is also a powerful sorcerer, is gathering mythical creatures to help him possess every living soul in Singapore, and he isn’t about to let the members of The Check Your Luck Agency stand in his way!
MY THOUGHTS:
This wasn't bad, but in the end it failed to excite me.
There's an interesting premise here, about an agency who investigates cases of "bad luck" to see if the cause is paranormal in nature, or simply boils down to a jealous relative or plain old fraud. The protagonist, a fairly likable character named Ursula, at first denies the existence of the supernatural world, before eventually admitting to herself that she in fact has an affinity for the arcane herself. She can see the spirit world, can even communicate with ghosts better than many other practitioners of the art. In the face of unnatural enemies, and enemies who use unnatural means for their own gain, she learns to hone her new craft. All of this is set against the backdrop of a colorful part of the world I was not very familiar with before.
This sounds like the making of an intriguing story. Unfortunately, it kind of fell flat for me. None of the ghost stories really spooked me or thrilled me, the romantic interest did not make me swoon. Nothing in particular was bad, by any means, but I found myself reading on just for the sake of finishing it.
My favorite parts would probably be learning about the staples of southeast Asian ghost stories, and the specter of Simon Oakland. Simon was definitely my favorite character of the bunch.
There's an interesting premise here, about an agency who investigates cases of "bad luck" to see if the cause is paranormal in nature, or simply boils down to a jealous relative or plain old fraud. The protagonist, a fairly likable character named Ursula, at first denies the existence of the supernatural world, before eventually admitting to herself that she in fact has an affinity for the arcane herself. She can see the spirit world, can even communicate with ghosts better than many other practitioners of the art. In the face of unnatural enemies, and enemies who use unnatural means for their own gain, she learns to hone her new craft. All of this is set against the backdrop of a colorful part of the world I was not very familiar with before.
This sounds like the making of an intriguing story. Unfortunately, it kind of fell flat for me. None of the ghost stories really spooked me or thrilled me, the romantic interest did not make me swoon. Nothing in particular was bad, by any means, but I found myself reading on just for the sake of finishing it.
My favorite parts would probably be learning about the staples of southeast Asian ghost stories, and the specter of Simon Oakland. Simon was definitely my favorite character of the bunch.
MY RATING:
3 booksies
Author's website: http://www.ksaugustin.com/
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