C.E. Murphy Reviews

Added September 26, 2005

Urban Shaman

The Walker Papers

Author: C.E. Murphy
Publisher: Luna Books
Available At: bookstores
Publishing Date: June 2005
Genre: Fantasy: Urban
Format: Trade Paperback
Price: $13.95
ISBN: 0-373-80223-4
Author Email/Website: http://www.cemurphy.net/
Reviewer: Safiya Tremayne
Rating: 9 Gargoyles

It was going to be a hell of a week. Coming back from her mother's funeral to be fired for overextending her personal leave, Joanne Walker hadn't even been off the plane for an hour before she was off on a crusade. While flying over Seattle she saw a woman running from a pack of hounds, straight to a church where a man was playing with a knife. The woman was in trouble and Joanne knew she had to help. She didn't expect her life to take a complete turn.

Hopping into a taxi, she tells the driver to head northwest and tells him why. Gary is a sweet, seventy year old who immediately insinuates himself in Joanne's business and her life. Miraculously, they find the woman alive but when they hear her story they wish they hadn't. Marie is banshee, meaning she has the ability to see who is going to die; and Cernnunos and the Wild Hunt are chasing her. Joanne knows she's in trouble and her life goes downhill from there. Cernnunos finds Marie, destroys the diner where Marie, Joanne and Gary are talking and pierces Joanne's heart with his sword. This is when her life gets weird.

She finds herself in the desert, listening to a lone drum. A coyote tells her to follow the drumbeat if she wants to live. The drumbeat is her heart and only she can save herself. However, saving herself isn't as easy as it sounds. All her life Joanne has denied belief in anything mystical or spiritual. Now she has to believe, use abilities she didn't know she possessed and heal herself. As if that wasn't enough, there's some lunatic out killing other shamans, just to increase his powers. Joanne has to find him, rebind Cernnunos to the Otherworld and try not to piss off her boss. She's going to need all the help she can get, cause she's been promoted to street cop and she's never seen a body in the entire time she's been a cop. And she's already on her second in three days.

Could her life get any crazier?

Wow. C.E. Murphy completely rocks! Joanne Walker is as tough as Anita Blake and twice as much fun. Urban Shaman is packed with action, suspense, supernatural villains, and humor. The action is non-stop, the humor unexpected at times but genuinely funny and the secondary characters are perfect. From taxi-driver Gary who just refuses to let Joanne do anything without him to Billy the cross-dressing detective to Morrison her commanding officer, these characters are an integral part of the story and aid Joanne in so many ways. The byplay between Joanne and everyone is amazing, you can actually see the events unfolding and find yourself surprised when you realize they're not as you expected.

One of the best things about Urban Shaman was the way Murphy blends Celtic and Native American shamanism. She doesn't put it down or treat it as something odd. It's a part of the novel and while Joanne may not understand anything about it, she does her best to learn and apply it to her life. And Murphy's depiction of Cernnunos...(fans self)...I've never thought of Cernnunos as being so compelling or desirable.

Murphy has earned her place on my auto-buy list and Urban Shaman is going straight to my keeper shelf.

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