Rating: 2.75

“I considered the Arcana, wondering if it had some healing properties. Decided to not try or suggest such a thing. I didn’t know what was inside me, what it could do. Just because it whispered things at me, we weren’t joined at the hip.”

— Night Tricks (Midnight Magic Book 1) by Richard Amos

If reading that made your brain hurt, you’re not alone. That’s Clayton or Clay as he prefers to be called, warlock and the POV of the novel and series.

This novel has some promising elements to its plot, and overall series arc. It has some interesting secondary characters like the button-eyed demon. But to get to those and others, the reader must have an either a love for certain clichés story elements, a character that’s so unbelievably dimwitted, that he repeatedly does the wrong thing , leaps into sex, hides who he is but doesn’t really know who he is, does amazing things NO One can do but has basically a meh , that’s sorta neat, attitude.

Anyway see below:

Cliché:

🔹Rift in universe caused by magical war. Literally called The Rift. Soo many books with exact element down to that name. Please find another name, someone.

🔹Billionaire Vampire with black rose tattoos, because dark beauty with thorns. Yep. Complete with alabaster glowy body.

MC is hard to read as the book is from his POV and he often comes across as someone with the emotional maturity of a tweenage valley girl. There’s a lot of EEKs everywhere! In that exact manner.

As in “I mean…EEK!”

At the end of the first quarter of the book, I was seriously thinking of not finishing.

Tae Frost and Clayton Christmas’s relationship is along the lines of I want you, let’s have sex. Oh, no, it’s you, not me. Let’s have sex. More woe is me. More, sex. Oh , no. Look what we did. More woe. Rinse , repeat. Add lies, weepy history, lies.

You get ready at one point to say to any villain “have at them”.

By the end, the author has telegraphed who or where the villain of the plot is. And they are on the run with the hero still lying his brains out.

If I continue on, it will be only to flip through the pages to the end to see if I’m right.

No more EEK for me.

For fans of this author, I’m sure you’ll already have found this book and series.

For other lovers of magic and Urban Fantasy Romance fiction, I’ll leave it up to you.

Midnight Magic series:

Night Tricks #1

Night Troubles 2

Night Trials #3

https://www.goodreads.com › showNight Tricks (Midnight Magic #1) by Richard Amos – Goodreads

Synopsis:

They say warlocks are lesser beings. I’m about to prove them wrong.

The streets have been my home for as long as I can remember. To get by, I use my magic tricks, bringing smiles to the faces of adults and children alike.

As a warlock, my powers are limited. Nothing like a witch’s magical skills. Basically, I’m a glorified magician as well as a second-class citizen. Fine. It doesn’t get me down. I have my cat Fizz and Kylie Minogue’s music to keep me going as I dream big.

I know there’s a better life out there for me.

When I accidentally summon the lost magic of arcana, something not even a powerful witch can do, my world is turned upside down.

Enter Tae Frost. Mysterious billionaire vampire. Deliciously handsome and brooding. Able to set my pulse racing with just one look. A man who offers to change my life for the better. I just have to move into his penthouse and help him hunt demons first.

Hmmm. I have a big decision to make. Do I take this Cinderella-like opportunity? Especially with the dangerous secret I’m hiding from the world. And if the witches discover I’ve summoned arcana… Well, it won’t be fun to be me if they do.

There’s a demon making a big impression—a creepy, button-eyed man spilling blood across London. Seemingly uncatchable, as well as unhinged. The city is trembling in the wake of his shadow.

With my new powers, I’m the only one to stop him.

Damn.

Night Tricks is the first book in an Urban Fantasy Romance series packed with magic, demons, action, and steamy moments. Step into the world of a warlock who always tries to see the sunny side of life, and the sexy vampire who makes his knees go weak.