Declan Finn's Blood Country
A Book Review
Doooood. I mean seriously, buddy. Listen, friend, don’t get on the train with the psychotic killer and his vampire wife. If you do, something will find you and kill you till you die to death. It’s probably gonna hurt, too. Like, a lot. Although maybe not. You might be dead too quickly to feel the pain. But, uh, yeah. You’re busy that weekend. I dunno what you’re doing. Not dying sounds like it’s good enough though, right?
Declan Finn’s Blood Country (Honeymoon from Hell Book 2) is an orgy of violence and mayhem with enough story left over to make it fun. Seriously, it’s like a game of Super Smash Brothers with a plot. Now, some of the weapons used in said violence may not, technically speaking, be possible to create in the real world. That’ll happen. I mean, who needs a real gun that fires normal bullets when you can have zombie guns? What fun is Urban Fantasy if the Urban doesn’t Fantasy? Fortunately, Finn’s Urban Fantasys hard and I got to reap the benefits of it doing so.
Before I get too far into the hard-hitting analysis that Jimbo’s in known for, I do have to say this much: Blood Country is not a standalone novel. It is part of a series which starts with The Neck Romancer. That’s where you need to start this series. I mean that seriously. This is definitely a case where you need to start the series where the series starts.
Of course, a polite and mature reviewer may be tempted to avoid pointing out that the title The Neck Romancer was inspired by a corny joke somewhere in Finn’s Saint Tommy NYPD series. If I ever meet one, I’ll remind him of that. As for me, I cackle evilly every time I see it.
Blood Country, for its part, starts early and doesn’t stop. The action continues throughout the book. It seemed like there was always something going on and I was never quite sure what was going to happen next. And it’s weird because I never really had time to wonder what was coming or look forward to it really, because there was already something going on.
Marco Catalano may or may not be going through some major changes based on certain aspects of his ancestry and his exposure to magic. We’re not sure yet. I know what day I’m betting and totally expect to win, but I could still be wrong. Marco is pretty sure he’s doing something too. It was awesome to see him try to figure out if I’m right or not.
If these changes are happening, the may have been noticed by Marco’s wife Amanda. Amanda is a vampire. She really consumes blood and can be killed by sunlight. She’s young by vampire standards (not much over a century has passed since she was turned) but is gaining in power and is already being talked about in vampire circles. I like this woman. Finn, being Finn, has written Amanda as a Catholic vampire and that is a bit of a twist but it works. A praying vampire is a new thing and I like it. Okay, so maybe Finn has written about Amanda before, but no one else has done it. I like it.
I’ve said a lot about the amount of action in Blood Country already, but I have to say that it’s not just ubiquitous. It’s also well done. Finn’s mind for violence would be fascinating if it wasn’t so terrifying. He seems to know more ways to kill than there are to die. The thing is the fights move quickly, they make sense and they’re as entertaining as it gets. I don’t just read a fight scene by Declan Finn, I go through each move in my mind and I can see it happening. It’s like watching a movie on my Kindle app.
Of course, no Finn book is complete without strange and whacky ways of killing people and breaking things. Whether it’s guns that turn people into zombies, pistol with exploding ammunition roughly equivalent to that fired by a sixteen inch naval cannon, or dragon drones there’s a surprise around every corner. If the world ever takes a turn toward the weird, think Rifts Role Playing Game, I’m going to need Finn to report to my location immediately so that we can find an artificer immediately and start producing the weapons that fall out of Finn’s brain. I’d love to know where he comes up with the inspiration for some of this stuff.
Check that. It’s probably safer for all involved if I don’t.
At any rate…
My only caveat to anyone who would think about reading Blood Country, or quite frankly any of Finn’s work, would be to know what it is going in. If you’re the type of person who is offended by Christians being Christians and doing things like praying, or wearing crosses, or attending church this is not the book for you. I mean that sincerely. Now I’m not saying that you have to be a churchgoing Christian to enjoy Finn’s work. I’m just saying that it’s not for the anti-Christian bigot types who run around screaming “WESTBORO!!” Although, at the risk of stating the blatantly obvious, the religious theme is not as strong in Honeymoon from Hell as it was in the Saint Tommy, NYPD series.
Blood Country is an amazeballs book even by Finn’s standards and I’m an unabashed fan. I mean that seriously. Finn gave me a free copy of this book to review and I bought a copy anyway. I like this guy’s work that much. And listen, if I can break down and use my hard-won cash to support a guy simply because of how well he can write, then you can trust me when I tell you that his work is worth your time and money.
I already have copies of the next two in the series, Wyverns Never Die and Cross Over. I’ll be picking up a copy of the final book, Fae’d to Black before too long as well, but it’s in pre-order right now and I don’t pre-order anyone’s anything. That’s a Jimbo thing. You’ll be seeing reviews of all of them eventually. The life of a book reviewer is a hard one, and I don’t review authors two in a row like, ever.
Bottom Line: 5.0 out of 5 “Exotic” Arms Dealers
Blood Country (Honeymoon from Hell Book 2)
Declan Finn
Self Published, 2024
Blood Country (Honeymoon from Hell Book 2) is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and buy literally anything from Amazon I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.