“Only in Void City can a man wind up naked in the street, cornered by his undead car
while trying to stop his daughter from murdering the wife he wants to divorce.”
– Burned by J.F. Lewis
In 2008, J.F. Lewis published his debut novel Staked – the first installment of his Void City saga – and immediately differentiated his series from the multitude of paranormal fantasy sequences on the shelves. His Void City novels (Staked, ReVamped, Crossed, and the recently released Burned) have a decided darkness, an undeniable edginess to them. Yes, the intricate storyline, twisted sense of humor, and cast of fully developed characters certainly is noteworthy – but it’s Lewis’ caustic, irreverent narrative voice that makes this series so remarkable.
In a previous review, I called this series “literary methamphetamine” and with the release of Burned, Lewis continues that addictively readable storyline. It’s a unique blend of “oh-my-god-I-can’t-believe-I-just-read-that” horror, urban fantasy, and romance. Yeah, I said romance. I may be completely off base here but to me this series is fundamentally a star-crossed romance between the main character, Eric Courtney – vampiric badass antihero – and Marilyn, the love of his mortal life. To bring Marilyn back from the dead, Eric literally made a deal with the devil and now she is back, seemingly immortal, and running the cash register at Demon Heart Lanes, the bowling alley that Eric owns.
In Burned, the already complex storyline gets even more complicated when, after the return of Marilyn, Eric vows to get her back – but first he must get divorced from his current wife Tabitha. Also, as the new supernatural ruler of Void City (Eric killed the previous ruler – Lord Phillip – after he “messed with” his adopted, and quite possibly insane, daughter Greta), Eric begins the process of cleaning house by killing the crooked sheriff, Captain Stacey, and anyone else who gets in his way of completing the mysterious “Big Plan.” But after naming Greta as sheriff, things get really interesting – and by that I mean a bloodbath of epic proportions ensues.
And that’s just the first few chapters – I haven’t even mentioned the vengeance-obsessed cousin with the detachable head, the chupacabra hit squads, the demonic armies, and the supernatural dinosaur yet.
The engine running this storyline is unarguably Eric – one of the most paradoxically endearing antiheroes in all of genre fiction. He is a cold-hearted killer – he has murdered more than 10,000 people – but yet he is undeniably charming with his swagger, his twisted moral code, and his capacity to love. I dare anyone to read these novels and not come away being a fan of Eric. But the supporting cast of characters has to be mentioned as well –Talbot, Rachel, Greta, Mags, etc. – they are fantastic!
To give those who have yet to experience the Void a sense of what I’m talking about, here are a few random excerpts from Burned:
• “I walked out of the shower, drying my hair and sucking on a blood bag.”
• “His tongue split and began to vibrate, so I tore it out.”
• “I killed and ate Roger.”
And here is my favorite excerpt in the series to date:
• "There is beauty in monstrosity, wonder in diversity, and to these simple truths even the gods must confess." (from ReVamped)
These Void City novels aren’t your run-of-the-mill, light-hearted paranormal fantasy saga replete with quirky sidekick and sitcom-like humor. They’re bloody and vicious and carnal, and, much of the time, gloriously impious. The narrative is simultaneously intelligent and cool – what other author refers to Shakespeare and Motörhead in the same paragraph?
Readers looking for a truly original paranormal fantasy series will find that and more in J.F. Lewis’ novels. Welcome to the Void – but don’t say that I didn’t warn you.
Paul Goat Allen has been a full-time book reviewer specializing in genre fiction for the last two decades and has written thousands of reviews for companies like Publishers Weekly, The Chicago Tribune, Kirkus Reviews, and BarnesandNoble.com. He is a member of the National Book Critics Circle.
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