Book Review
Title: Strange Practice (Dr. Greta Helsing Book 1) by Vivian Shaw
Genre: Gothic, Paranormal, Fantasy
Rating: 5 Stars
I didn’t know anything about Strange Practice before buying it as I will admit it was a cover buy but after reading the synopsis I was excited to get into it. The opening to Strange Practice was interesting as we are introduced Greta Helsing, a doctor for all things and persons supernatural. On this night she is making a house call to a vampire friend, Ruthven but not for himself. He had called because his lunar bound vampire friend, Sir Francis Varney was attacked and he isn’t recovering the way vampires normally would. Greta managed to get Varney to explain that several people dressed as monks broke into his home covering everything with garlic which vampires are allergic to and they attacked him with a strange instrument leading to his current predicament. Greta isn’t happy with the way Varney is responding and decides to take a closer look at the wound and finds something embedded in it. She removed it but the smell the piece of metal gives off is familiar but Greta can’t place it and takes it for analysis. We learn there have been a string of local murders and the killer had been named the Rosary Ripper and this seems too close to be a coincidence for Greta. While heading home waiting on lab results Greta runs into another one of her patients who had been without his medication for week and gets him some more before treating him to lunch. Greta unlike most modern doctors goes above and beyond not just treating her patients but helping them with other things when she can. We also get a brief glimpse at the potential killers and they seem strange, driven by religion but also performing some form of self-mutilation on themselves.
As we approach the ¼ mark in the novel, Ruthven contacts a friend, August Cranswell to see if he can find anything in history about this cult of murderous monks and agrees to come by later. Greta has also dragged Fass over to Ruthven’s to try and recover from his cough and to keep an eye on Varney before venturing home herself for supplies before heading back. However, as she is heading to drive back she herself is attacked by one of these monks and despite her years of supernatural experience she had no idea what it is. What the monk says confirms the suspicions that this is a branch of the Order of the Holy Sword. This is a cult determined on wiping out the supernatural and anyone associated with them which explains why Greta was attacked despite being human. After spraying her attacker with pepper spray she manages to flee and take his unusual knife with her before heading back to Ruthven’s. She know that the substance on the blade doesn’t affect her the same way it did Varney but it did cause her to faint and she is impatient to have the analysis back on it. With the five of them are stuck together in Ruthven’s home they are trying to figure out what the cult’s aim is and why they are targeting seemingly random people. However, we do get to see the cult from the inside who ordered the attach on Greta and they are angry that she survived to the point where the monk sent after her is going to be killed for failing in his task.
As we cross the ¼ mark in the novel, Greta and her supernatural friends are trying to locate the murderous monks and figure out what they want. It is Ruthven who figures or that they are using the sewer tunnels to get around which also makes sense since they drove a bunch of ghouls out of the tunnels. What they need to know now is exactly where they are coming from within the vast network of the London’s sewers and this might take them a while to track down. During this time Greta has the results back on the substance found on the blades and it is extremely interesting. It seems the blades are coated with various things almost every kind of poison that harms the undead or supernatural is found on there which also explains why it did so little to Greta as most of these substances aren’t harmful to her. This solidifies the idea that they are wiping out supernatural creatures and the killing rate has increased sometimes with more than one murder in a single night and I am excited to see where the story goes from her. It is also interesting to note that Varney seems to be developing an attraction towards Greta which I found greatly amusing especially when you couple it with her melancholy personality.
As we approach the halfway mark in the novel, we are getting to know more about our characters and their unique abilities. In addition to Ruthven and Varney being vampires they have some talents but the most interesting is Fass as he turns out to be a demon. Fass had some amazing abilities that come in very handy like making himself and others invisible, being able to teleport himself and others as well as being able to track the signatures from other beings both human and not. I was not surprised when Fass locks into the signature of the monk that attacked Greta and eventually finds him where he’s been dumped after being thrown out of the order. Despite everything he’s done Greta can’t turn him away and treats him like she would any other patient as they piece together the things he has said. Together they learn that some entity must have taken up residence in an old mercury bulb and is indoctrinating these monks into doing its bidding. This is confirmed when we finally get some knowledge in the entity that seems to be far older and more powerful than anything we have seen so far. When it learns the outcast monk is with Greta he reaches out to the fellow monks and orders them to burn the house down with everyone inside regardless of how far the damage will spread as it feeds on fear and despair which is why it targeted Greta since her death would mean a great loss for the supernatural community.
As we cross into the second half of the novel, Greta is trying to get the monk to explain to her what is happening but he seems to be battling with the entity residing inside of him. Eventually she turns to Varney for help and being a little smitten with her he agrees to thrall the monk for information and Fass begins dropping hints about his attraction to Greta and I hope it goes somewhere. Watching Varney thrall the monk we see how much more powerful he is than Ruthven but in a different way. Together he and Greta manage to drive the entity out of the monk leaving him free to explain what he has been through and they finally get some leads that are beginning to take them somewhere. Greta’s drive and perseverance are really shining through and I love her as a character and I can’t wait to see them turn detectives and how they are going to stop the monks and the entity controlling them.
As we approach the ¾ mark in the novel, the decision is made for everyone but Greta to head down into the tunnels to try and stop the entity since she is the most valuable person to the supernatural community and the only one that can help the injured monk who is slowly doing without the entity because of his injuries. However, Greta is soon attacked by the remaining monks and Greta has to flee into the cellar with the ghouls leaving the monk behind. The leader of the ghouls, a frequent patient of Greta’s tells her to leave with his son and some others while the remainder protect the house. She does this but Mawleep informs her of a power switch for the very light they are trying to destroy and he takes her to it. While Greta is shutting off the power a lot happens, first Fass distracts the two remaining monks with his true form which is angel like until he is stabbed by some who return at the entity’s command. Cranswell becomes vital as neither Varney or Ruthven can get close to the light and he ultimately destroys it but it seems that Fass had died or returned to where he came from. However, Samael appears, who is the devil himself and a close friend of Fass’ who informs then that he will help them but there is something he needs to take care of first which is binding the entity as a small orb of light under his control. Greta notices the absence of Fass in her mind and rushes to the location of the others going that her friends aren’t dead.
As we cross into the final section of the novel, Fass is healed by Samael and taken back to heal in order to recover and return later on. The remaining group head to the Savoy since Ruthven’s home is unavailable for them to use for the time being and they begin to journey of recovering from everything that has happened. The novel ends up the group taking a vacation to Greece where we see Ruthven confront Varney over his attraction to Greta and her returning that attraction even if he is too blind to see it and I hope we see more of this relationship in the future books. We also get to see the return of Fass which greatly pleases Greta since he is like family to here. Overall, I found Strange Practice to be a fast paced, action packed novel with plenty of humour and a sprinkle of romance and it just hit all the right notes for me and I would highly recommend it and I can’t wait to continue the series very soon.
Buy it here:
Paperback/Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
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