Uncertain Allies

Uncertain Allies (2011) Mark de Franco

This is the fifth book in the Connor Grey series. Boston–especially the Weird–is still reeling from the events in the past book (and seemingly doing little to recover from the destruction). Connor is now infamous for his participation in several catastrophic events, and doesn’t seem to receive much of a warm welcome anywhere he goes.

His girlfriend Meryl is in a coma, the family of his friend Lou Murdock hates him, and he doesn’t have many allies left, which for a man who has lost most of his druidic capabilities is not a good position to be in.

First things first, the story arc begin at the start of the book is completed, however, overarching events are starting to catch up with him, and it is quite obvious there will be another story (or several). But it was well done, with no cliff hangers, so I don’t mind.

There were, however, some things that bothered me throughout the book. On several occasions I had to stop and reread sentences and paragraphs to make sense of them, something I don’t remember having to do in previous books. Nothing large, just multiple cases of, “what did that say?”

I’m also not certain about the actions of the powers that be. There was an awful lot of destruction that almost walked the edge of the perpetrator running their hands and cackling in glee. It wasn’t quite that, but I wasn’t sure that motivations would cause people to act quite as badly as they did.

And as a major positive, Connor STOPS hiding things from the people that are trying to help him, recognizing that he needs to share his problems if he’s going to get through this alive.

But all in all I am still enjoying the series, and although I do not recommend diving in here, I do recommend going back and working your way forward. The first few pages has one of Lou Murdock’s brothers almost shooting Connor, something that seems pretty inexplicable for a cop in uniform. I’m still not sure that scene wasn’t a little too over the top, but with the background it makes a little more sense.
Rating: 7/10

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