A Madness Of Angels: A Matthew Swift Novel

A Madness of Angels: Or The Resurrection of Matthew Swift and millions of other books are available for Amazon . Book 1 of 4 in the Matthew Swift Series.
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Fortunately or unfortunately , there are certain concerned citizens who want Bakker dead and his organisation, The Tower, destroyed. To do so, this group of warlocks, wizards, magicians, weremen and other magical beings recruits Swift and tasks him with killing Bakker. The pursuit of his revenge involves pranking large corporations, fighting shadows, recruiting The Beggar King and the Whites, an underground clan, and entering into a very reluctant alliance with a religious order that hates the angels. What exactly happened the night Matthew Swift died?

Who or what exactly is The Shadow? And how is Matthew Swift alive? Urban fantasy can make a traveller squeal when describing the magic of places they have been to. And there are so many ways magic can be drawn from it. The deepest, darkest secrets of London are the magic that is pulsing all over the place. The main character, Matthew Swift, died while on the phone and as a result, the angels entered into a symbiotic relationship with him.

Since this is the first time angels are experiencing life as a non-celestial, corporeal entity, they are overwhelmed, confused and fascinated. Swift and the angels are written as one and the same, but there are constant switches between first person singular and first person plural narrator — at first, it is unclear as to why this is done, but if a reader is immersed and invested, it makes for an interesting literary device.

Obviously, as Swift approaches the end of his pursuit, an internal conflict begins to form. Young people never do. The entire novel is split into three parts and two interludes, no chapters. Admittedly, that does make it harder to follow. This novel requires concentration and full immersion into the magical London.

Some pages were just one lengthy paragraph, which was a bit of a turn-off.

Fantasy Book Critic: “A Madness of Angels” by Kate Griffin (Reviewed by Liviu C. Suciu)

It can honestly be said that London is the central character of the novel. In this book, however, the capital of the United Kingdom steals the glory — Kate Griffin also known as Catherine Webb is clearly a London aficionado like myself and is not afraid to show it. The plot is not too complex — revenge stories are rather common, as are the tropes of religious fanatics and several rivals banding together to overthrow a villain — and the side characters have more potential than explored in this installment of the series, so it is fair to say that the city including The City of London is both a setting and a player in the novel.

I do love that kind of thing! And honestly — this cover really reminds me of Khan! You are commenting using your WordPress. You are commenting using your Twitter account. You are commenting using your Facebook account. Oda, who despite having no magic of her own in any form managed to outlive some of the most powerful people in the series. They mutilate themselves to increase their power. Beware the Nice Ones: Kelly Big Brother Mentor: Matthew to Dana and Penny. Black and Grey Morality: With the number of bodies he leaves in his wake and his utter ruthlessness when he dedicates himself to a cause, Matthew would probably the bad guy if his enemies hadn't already well and truly crossed the Moral Event Horizon.

In the first book, Matthew uses his blood to keep Sinclair alive and convinces everyone to sign a blood oath which kills The Mole when he betrays them. And it's an oft-repeated point that the blood of the blue electric angels would go for huge prices on the black market, presumably to cast all kinds of magic.

She becomes part of the Order and devotes her life to it. She uses magic once , to save her and Matthew's life and basically has an Heroic B. She finds out her little sister was alive all along but the Order had lied to her to make her their weapon, and that her sister is The Chosen One. When she refuses to kill the kid the Orders kills her , forcing Oda over her Despair Event Horizon again and ultimately resulting in her being possessed by Blackout. Then Matthew doesn't kill her , which indirectly causes her sister to be Killed Off for Real.

In the end, she is utterly broken and just wants to die. See " Break the Haughty " above. Played straight with Chaigneau, who had the brilliant idea of kidnapping Matthew, beating the crap out of him and blackmailing him yes, the guy who happens to be a sorcerer and to channel beings of pure energy. It's not like he can curse him. Not that Matthew Swift the brown-eyed sorcerer was a weakling, but Matthew Swift the blue-eyed-sorcerer-cum-blue-electric-angels is something else again. Oda in The Neon Court.

Many people think this happened to Matthew as well, although he and the angels disagree. What Bakker's original intentions for the Electric Blue Angels was. Khan told Matthew he was going to die, but Matthew didn't believe him. To be fair the prophecy was "You're It's after when it gets complicated. Matthew makes a pretty big deal about how there's no such thing as a Chosen One, and in fact it was all designed to make the Neon Court and the Tribe wipe each other out. Templeman in The Minority Council. The whole Order, actually.

Spectres can be trapped in a beer bottle because people believe you can drown anything in a beer bottle. The Angels in the first book are drunk on life. When Matthew decides to take a day off from slowly but surely destroying the Tower, he lets the Angels go to a movie theater, play on a kids' playground, and eat ice cream, all to their amazement and extreme pleasure. The very few times Matthew and them do very subtly disagree on something, it's usually a throwaway line along the lines of "We wanted to -insert doing something not particularly appropriate to the situation at hand- but I didn't think it was the time.

The Last Train, which will never stop and never takes any passengers, unless they already know about it. It also, depending how you look at it, qualifies as Nightmare Fuel. Cruel and Unusual Death: Mr Pinner skins you alive with paper. The ME is baffled as to how someone could apparently get ten thousand paper cuts at once. Also counts as a Spirit Advisor. There's also the walk in The Midnight Mayor.

When people get too old and ugly, they tend to die horribly.

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It's a world full of them. Bakker claims this is what happened to Matthew after his death. In reality, this is a subversion , since Matthew isn't so much possessed as brain-melded. Department of Child Disservices: Matthew talks about his mother and grandmother, but never says a word about his father.

What happens to Mo and the other kids in The Midnight Mayor. Generally speaking, stealing someone's hat doesn't warrant dissolving into ink or being torn apart by ten thousand paper cuts. Seah cheerfully accepts that Matthew probably isn't going to stop showing up broken, bruised, and bleeding on her doorstep, so to make up for it she gives him stern orders to take it easy which she knows he won't do and pain meds.

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Lots of pain meds. Matthew was killed because he didn't want to drag the blue electric angels into this world, and ends up sharing a body with them. Seah is a doctor working out of what is technically a hospital. Drunk on the Dark Side: The angels , while under the influence of fairy dust. Until The Minority Council. Not that Bakker really seems to mind it. What the Angels were before Matthew's resurrection.

Bakker is this to Dana Mikeda. Exactly What It Says on the Tin: The Death of Cities. On the other side, it might be exactly what it says on the cover. A walking talking thing in a pinstripe suit who is, quite literally, the death of cities. Also the Midnight Mayor, protector of the city. The city , not the citizens. Fairy dust in Minority Council is a super-addictive drug that enhances the magical talent of the user ten fold.

It's also made out of the ashes of previous users, as prolonged use turns you into dust. An updated version with the Neon Court. The Pit in A Madness of Angels. Matthew and Oda zig-zagged it most of the time mostly because Oda kills sorcerers to make the world a better place but their friendship is confirmed in The Neon Court , in the most traumatic and heart-breaking way ever. With the subtitle The Resurrection of Matthew Swift , how could it be anything else? Robert James Bakker The Dragon: Dana Mikeda The Evil Genius: San Khay The Brute: Guy Lee The Dark Chick: Hunger Fluffy the Terrible: Jeremy the Troll; the Fairy Godmother.

Penny's reaction to Nabeela's technological medusa hair. That is so totally fucking awesome. I'd, like, kiss her if my heart wasn't already given to a guy called Femi. Gods Need Prayer Badly: Since the current set of urban "gods" are there because people believe in them and pray to them, presumably there were others before. The Neon Court also exists because the old Fair Folk weren't getting the power they needed once life moved to the cities.

Go Out with a Smile: Vera, who while dissolving into paint smiles and smashes an Alderman over the head with a teakettle. Nabeela in Minority Council. While her grandmother had traditional snakes, she was born with living wires and cameras instead. The Litterbug sent after Matthew in the first book is a golem made of garbage and refuse. Gotta Kill Them All: The plot of A Madness of Angels.

The three women with a cauldron. Like everyone else in the world, they've been updated for the modern age; the Maiden now has spiked streaked hair and the cauldron is full of tea. The blue electric angels. A golem made of spilled trash, against whom a garbage can lid is a shield, is called a litterbug. While the Angels are high on fairy dust the narrative gets split in a somewhat literal sense. In Minority Council, while the angels are super charged from the fairy dust and destroying everything in sight, Matthew's narration is him giggling in the back of his head, going off on tangents about furniture and unaware as to what is actually going on.

Matthew So, yes, I think I might be a little stoned. I mean, not in a bad way, just you know Robert Bakker, all the time. Alan, the creator of the culicidae in The Minority Council. Snottiest summoner on the face of the planet. In The Minority Council , Matthew never said the dead fairy dust junkie was female.

One of the people responsible tips his hand by referring to her as "she". It seems minor, but he explains that people, when they don't know the gender of someone they're speaking of, will use "they" or "he or she", or, if they're old-fashioned, default to "he". Matthew's mother and grandmother have it too, though different and they're both untrained. It Sucks to Be the Chosen One: They're both literally chosen, by other humans, since in this world there is no such thing as a cosmic-level chosen one. Although Matthew and the Angels are normally almost-kind-of-mostly the same person, when they disagree it usually looks like this.

Jerkass Has a Point: Chaigneau, on the dangerousness of the angels. You know nothing about life, its rules, norms, laws and understanding, and probably care less. Why should you not set the field on fire for the prettiness of its burning; why should you not kill wherever you go, simply because you can; why should you understand anything that the rest of humanity can?

In Minority Council we see for the first time what happens when the Angels aren't under Matthew's control any more.

Kill It with Fire: The Angels' basic strategy? Burn it to death. San Khay, thanks to magic. Implied between Matthew and Elizabeth Bakker, by Vera. Post-resurrection and fusion, the angels' persistent curiosity and childlike nature make Matthew frequently appear to be one of these. San Khay Master-Apprentice Chain: Bakker trains Matthew, who trains Dana and Penny; as of the end of The Minority Council , it's suggested that Penny might be getting an apprentice of her own.

Running with the series' theme of modernized magic, instead of traditional snakes, she has a headful of living wires and cameras. Although people generally assume Matthew is possessed, his relationship with the angels is really closer to this. Blackjack in A Madness of Angels.

A Madness of Angels

Anissina in The Midnight Mayor. Apparently Sinclair is one to the Order. Some characters imply that Matthew is one to the blue electric angels. God, if there wasn't a fucking sorcerer still in that skin, they'd have ripped the city apart just for kicks. Morality Chain Motive Rant: Matthew uses "I" as a narrative pronoun; the angels use "we". Matthew after the angel's go Ax-Crazy at Kramb's place. Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Hunger; Death of Cities; Blackout. A few pop up. Their MO is that they tend to try their hand at immortality by swallowing papers with the traits they wish they had in a golem-esque way.

They die as soon as the paper is taken out, but in the meantime, they "live" exactly to the constraints of the paper meaning if you forget to, say, write down that you still want to see colors or actually feel things , your life undead won't be very pleasant. Never Found the Body: After Matthew died, his body disappeared; he was only known to be dead because his coat was found in a giant puddle of his blood.

Never Mess with Granny: Just leave her alone, really. Nice Job Breaking It, Hero! Turns out destroying the Tower was this, as Bakker was the only thing keeping Death of Cities away. When you killed Bakker, you made my life so much easier.


  • A Madness of Angels by Kate Griffin.
  • The First Environmental Engineers; Ham, Pork and Chop.
  • Hardback Editions?

I would not have come here had he still be alive. I should thank you for that, sorcerer. This is what the Order thinks about magic. It's also what most people think about the angels. No Sense of Humor: Oda, Charlie, Jean the nurse. The Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital for Women seems abandoned, but it's the hospital for magicians.

Not-So-Omniscient Council of Bickering: The eyes are actually the angels' see Our Angels Are Different below. Omniscient Council of Vagueness: