Rating: 4.5🌈
Set in the same universe as the marvelous Fantastic Fluke series, Sam Burns has a new fantastic paranormal series out, Knight and Daywalker.
The first book, Smokescreen, which ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, is an excellent read and start up.
It’s got murder mysteries, a paranormal universe with magical characters, including two main characters who are somewhat enigmatic in their precise nature and history as well as a black kitten with a bottomless appetite. It’s also just as intriguing as the other main characters.
Flynn Knight, has a very scary ,Morticia coded in looks, mother who rules the vampires of their city. Is Flynn a vampire? No, he talks to animals. That’s one of the puzzles in the story. What is Flynn? Other than absolutely engaging.
Then there’s Davin, the Irish vampire who, courtesy of Flynn’s mother, ends up being Flynn’s business partner. But the idea of another agenda seems possible. He’s got his own troubles and backstory to revealed.
The pace is quick. We meet many new and exciting characters. All incredible and with their own stories to explore.
And Smokescreen finishes with a startling dramatic flourish and cliffhanger. Which I’m not unhappy about.
I’m excited about the next story, even if it’s months away from release.
Sam Burns is an auto buy for this very reason. Definitely recommend this book.
Cover art © 2025 by Natasha Snow
Knight and Daywalker – a planned trilogy:
Smokescreen #1
Façade #2 – Jan 1,2026
Masquerade #3 – TBD
Same universe as
THE FANTASTIC FLUKE-complete ❤️
The Fantastic Fluke
Fluke and the Faithless Father
Fluke and the Faultline Fiasco
Fluke and the Frontier Farce
Fluke and the Fantastic Finale
Buy link
Book 1 of 2: Knight & Daywalker
Blurb
Flynn Knight is the only (and frankly, impossible) child of the leader of the vampires in Los Angeles. He’s also a bit of a scatterbrain, a thirty-something manchild, and a private investigator. When one of his mother’s political frenemies gets killed and she asks him to investigate, he’s put between a rock—her—and a hard place—the fact that not a single vampire in the city will believe the answers he finds without impressive proof to back him up.
Combine that with an eighty-thousand-dollar bill he has no idea how he’s going to pay, a hit and run that has landed him a victim of the cat distribution system, and his mother trying to foist a new business partner off on him, and his life is way more complicated than he likes.
At least his new partner is nice to look at, even if he’s the weirdest vampire ever, who doesn’t seem to follow any of the usual vampire rules.
Also, why won’t this kitten stop eating?
Smokescreen is set in the Fantastic Fluke universe, starring never before seen characters and a new setting. It begins to explore Flynn Knight’s relationships, and while it contains a complete story, it does not reach the slow burn romance plot, and the main overarching plot will continue in book two, Façade.
- Publication date: September 4, 2025
- Language: English
- Print length: 259 pages
- Book 1 of 2: Knight & Daywalker
Content Warning: multiple gruesome deaths described in detail, injured (but NEVER killed) animals, ableist attitudes from non-MCs, violence, fraught parental relationships.
Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words 