Hex and the City (Nightside, Book 4)

Hex and the City (2005) is the fourth urban fantasy novel in the Nightside series, following Nightingale's Lament. In the previous volume, John Taylor and Dead Boy brought Rossignol back from death and Walker took the Cavendishes away. Then Taylor found that his client has been dead for two years; hard to collect from a ghost. In this novel, Taylor is hired by the Great Auction Hall to watch over the chaos butterfly. Supposedly, possession of the butterfly means control of future events. Most of the major players, or their agents, are in the hall for this auction. Everything goes well until bidding starts on the butterfly. First everybody starts humming or singing the same song and then the wards and protections break and blow apart. Soon psychenauts show up from the Outside and Taylor takes certain corrective actions. After the auction hall incident, Taylor passes on the details of where to send his check and goes out for a dinner date with his secretary. Cathy has already selected Rick's Cafe Imaginaire, where the food comes from extinct or imaginary animals. They order dragonburgers and salads, with Cheshire Cat ice cream for desert. After the meal, Lady Luck drops by to offer Taylor a job. Lady Luck wants Taylor to find out the origins of the Nightside. She offers to tell him about his mother in return for his services. Since Taylor wants to know about the origins as much as about his mother, he agrees to take the job. Naturally, Walker tries to dissuade him. In this story, Taylor consults the wishing well in the Mammon Emporium. While the future is subject to change without prior notification, the well has a good reputation for predicting the present. For one drop of blood, the wishing well tells him the present location of the Madman. The Hotel Clappe is very willing to provide Madman's room number if Taylor will only take him away. The desk clerk even says please. Madman sees reality in all its terror and strange things happen around him. Madman agrees to accompany Taylor in his search. Next Taylor recruits Sinner for the search. Sinner had sold his soul for true love, but Satan cheated. Sinner didn't care and went to Hell still loving Pretty Poison, the succubus of his dreams. Satan wouldn't have a happy Sinner in the nether regions, so he threw him out and Pretty Poison went with him. Rejected by both Heaven and Hell and not really alive nor dead, Sinner is impervious to just about any form of attack. Taylor interviews residents who have been in the Nightside for a long time; first Merlin, then Herne the Hunter and finally the Lamentation disavow all knowledge of the origins. So he searches back through time. Eventually, he discovers his answer, but the information is more than he really wants to know. This story involves Taylor's mother. After three volumes filled with allusions to his mother, we finally learn something about her nature and even a little about his father and his friends. Maybe the inf

The Nightside series centers around a private investigator named John Taylor. John is powerful but hunted and really a bit too nice for the Nightside, underneath his hard outer persona. The Nightside is a dark part of London where the sun never shines and where most anything goes. In _Hex and the City_, his client has asked him to find the origins of the Nightside - but his mother's identity is tied in with that, so by the end of the book he is told her identity as well. While John's past and parentage have played a part in the previous books in the series, this book is about John more than any of the other novels. It is about his search for his mother, who his parents were before he was born, and how things changed after he was born. Shotgun Suzie is not part of this novel, but John does get some new traveling companions: Madman, Sinner and Pretty Poison. The identity and background story of each of these is unique and interesting and . . . fascinatingly weird. Green's dialogue and interaction among characters were some of the things I enjoyed most about this book. Similar to the end of _Agents of Light and Darkness_, there is also a theme of hope and redemption running through the background that comes to light near the very end. One caveat: I would seriously recommend that anyone new to this series read the first three books BEFORE this book. Otherwise, the reader will miss the significance of the information in this book about things such as the Harrowing, Shotgun Suzie, Merlin, John's mother and a possible future timeline of the Nightside. Overall, a very good book. I couldn't put it down once I had started it.

No matter how bad something seems, it can always get worse. After finishing three tough cases back in the Nightside after he had been away for years, John Taylor is hit with a case that dwarfs the other three: find the origin of the Nightside. Taylor has a sinking feeling that the beginning of the Nightside may also have something to do with the mother he never knew. It might be easier if there weren't so many people trying to make sure Taylor doesn't succeed in his quest... Simon R. Green does it again. The originality of these books is absolutely amazing and this fourth installment is no exception. The reader finds out more in this book about John Taylor than maybe even the other three combined. 'Hex and the City' still has the Nightside's trademark noir atmosphere. More and more 'major players' are introduced and Taylor teams up with some more colorful (if not clearly mad) characters. Read this book and enjoy. It was leave you salivating for the fifth installment which comes out this fall. I can honestly say this will be one of the best books I will read all year and it's only March!

The Nightside is a dark, seedy place. It's a magical place--always 3 in the morning, where monsters walk among men, where ideas such as love and lust not only run rampant, but actually have personifications. The Nightside is where people go to escape the rest of the world, or are sent because damnation isn't harsh enough for them. Such as Madman, who has witnessed the truth behind the world, and gone insane by it. And Sinner, who was rejected by both Heaven and Hell. And John Taylor. John has taken on some rough assignments in the past. Hell, he's battled angels and demons--actual angels and demons. He's seen hell is all its glories. But never has John taken on a case like this. He is up against his deadliest and closest enemy--himself. For John has been hired to find the origins of the Nightside, and his quest is a personal vendetta--to find out just who (or what) his missing mother was, and determine if he really is the bringer of destruction, as many seem to think he is. Can John Taylor, a man with a gift and an unbearable curse, really bring about the destruction of the Nightside? And just who is willing to stop him--by any means necessary? "Hex and the City" is easily the most gripping Nightside adventure yet, because it helps to wrap up many unanswered questions--while creating even more. Simon R. Green has found a superlative narrator in John Taylor, a sympathetic hero up against insurmountable odds. This is a book you will not be able to put down, I guarantee it.

John Taylor lives in the Nightside, an alternative London, where it's always 3 AM and the sinning and magic never stops. You can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant. At Rick's Cafe, they serve Dodo and Dragonburgers--but carry a piece of unicorn horn to detect poisons---just in case. John Taylor was born in the Nightside. He tried to leave a few years ago, but a missing persons case brought him back. Can't say anyone would blame him for leaving. He was orphaned early. His father drank himself to death when he discovered what his wife (John's Mother) really was. Some folks call John Prince, while others make the Evil Eye sign whenever he approaches. More than one person tried to kill him when he was growing up. He has a Talent. He can find anything in the Nightside. Folks hire him as a Private Investigator. Lady Luck made John Taylor an offer he couldn't refuse. Find the origins of the Nightside. If he succeeds, she'll tell him who his mother is.... "Hex and the City" is another fast-paced dark fantasy story full of quirky characters and places. "Hex" is the fourth in the Nightside series. So far, I haven't been disappointed by any of them. They're so hard to put down, my techie husband who never reads anything but tech manuals and history picked one up when I was in the doctor and has read the whole series. I had to hide "Hex" from him til I was done! The books are a blend of Raymond Chandler and Glen Cook's supernatural detective novels. Taylor's a likeable character who despite his hard edges, falls hard for a damsel in distress, and will do about anything to help a kid. For the most part, the "Nightside" stories stand on their own, but I strongly recommend that you read all of them: "Something Good from the Nightside", "Agents of Light and Darkness" and "Nightingale's Lament".