I went into this without knowing anything other than it was written by an actor from Black Sails. (I'd seen a few episodes, but not enough to know Luke Arnold) I was actually pleasantly surprised by the amount of thought that went into this urban fantasy world, our character Fetch Phillips, his less-than-noble past, and the changes in Sunder City. Add to that Luke Arnold narrating his own audiobook (he has a smooth voice and does solid accents), and I was sold.

Most fantasy novels, even urban fantasy like this, tend to deal with the idea of how the magical races interact with nonmagical humans. But this one took an interesting and unexpected turn: what happens after magic is stripped from the land and its people? Humans don't rely on magic; they can't use it (and honestly it was used to, at best, disregard them and, at worse, actively oppress them). But the other races? It's everything. Vampires lose their fangs, werewolves get trapped in a grotesque state half between human and wolf, wizards can't cast spells, Elves grow old, and suddenly all of these powerful people are weak and altogether human.

It was fascinating to watch the ways the magical races fought to retain their history and culture in a non-magical world: creating schools specifically for non-human beings where they could learn their history and magical theories and life skills depending on their species. And there was enough left unsaid that I think Sunder City (and Fetch Phillips) has way more to offer in future book(s)