Eighth in Armstrong's Women of the Otherworld series. The main character in this book is Hope Adams. Adams is a debutante with the exotic looks of her Indian mother. She learns as a young woman that she is a half-demon, and her power is detecting and feeding off of chaos (strong emotions). Not knowing how she was reading strong thoughts and being drawn to them earned her some time in a mental institution. Now she feeds the chaos as a tabloid reporter chasing down alien abduction stories and working for the interracial council of the supernatural races. She accepts an assignment that takes her to Miami to go undercover into a gang that wants to challenge the cabals. She is greatly attracted to one of the young gang members, Jaz, while still trying to deal with her strong feelings for the werewolf Karl.
After reading so many books in this terrific series, I've decided Armstrong should take as her motto, "Writing rationally about the irrational". Her plots are well thought out, and so are her characters, who mostly behave like, well, rational adults. They plan things out, yet act when they must, using all their intelligence, talents, and more. The supernatural characters all have powers, and there are consequences to those powers that are often difficult to deal with, and that shape the characters and their destinies.
The purpose of all creative writing, in my mind, is to define what it means to be human and explore its limits and strengths. Armstrong does this well in her series by showing the limits of power, and the choices that power forces on us. And along the way she is darned entertaining. Highly recommended.
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