Discount Armageddon by Seanan McGuire Narrator: Emily Bauer
Series: Incryptid #1
Published by Audible on November 20, 2012
Genres: Urban Fantasy
Length: 11 hours, 20 minutes
Format: Audiobook
Source: Purchased
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Ghoulies. Ghosties. Long-legged beasties. Things that go bump in the night....
The Price family has spent generations studying the monsters of the world, working to protect them from humanity - and humanity from them. Enter Verity Price. Despite being trained from birth as a cryptozoologist, she'd rather dance a tango than tangle with a demon, and is spending a year in Manhattan while she pursues her career in professional ballroom dance. Sounds pretty simple, right? It would be, if it weren't for the talking mice, the telepathic mathematicians, the asbestos supermodels, and the trained monster-hunter sent by the Price family's old enemies, the Covenant of St. George.
When a Price girl meets a Covenant boy, high stakes, high heels, and a lot of collateral damage are almost guaranteed. To complicate matters further, local cryptids are disappearing, strange lizard-men are appearing in the sewers, and someone's spreading rumors about a dragon sleeping underneath the city....
©2012 Seanan McGuire (P)2012 Audible, Inc.
I haven’t read much from Seanan McGuire under this pen name, but I’ve read everything she’s written under the Mira Grant pen name. Grant is a horror writer. I knew McGuire was not as dark of a writer as Grant, but I wasn’t expecting the humor I got in this story. This is a bit of a silly urban fantasy.
Discount Armageddon follows Verity Price, a human cryptozoologist who comes from a family that has studied cryptids for generations. While most of the family is in Oregon, Verity is checking out the cryptids in Manhattan. She’s also trying to spend some time on her real passion, ballroom dancing. She’s also working as a server at a strip club called Dave’s Fish and Strips, owned by a bogeyman named Dave.
Verity sublets an apartment and has a group of Aeslin mice with her. These mice have been with her family for generations. If you read The Price Family Field Guide found on Seanan McGuire’s website, it says; “The Aeslin mouse has a highly sophisticated society, centered around a devout religious class. Each colony of Aeslin mice to have been recorded has worshiped a different god or set of gods.” They were a very interesting addition to the story. And while they don’t affect the main arc of this story directly. They are a big part of Verity’s life and add a lot of depth to the story.
Cryptids in Manhattan are going missing. At first, Verity finds a member of the monster-hunting Covenant of St. George. However, he hasn’t attacked any of the sentient cryptids. Verity uses all of her cryptid resources to try to find and help these cryptids. She might be human, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t feel responsible for the cryptids of her city. Along the search for people, she learns there might be an actual dragon asleep under the city. Dragons have been thought to have been extinct for centuries.
I have to say I really enjoyed this introduction to this new-to-me series. I like that there are a large array of cryptid species, some of which I’ve not heard of before. There are a lot of cryptid species that I have heard of. I have plans to try book two soon.
Narration:
This is my first time listening to Emily Bauer. I wasn’t a huge fan when I first started the story. But by maybe two hours in, I was very used to her narration and all the voices. I never did get to where I liked the voice of Dave, it always sounded not scary enough to be the voice of a bogeyman. I didn’t have any issue with the voices of the rest of the cast. I do plan on continuing the series on audio.
Listen to a clip: HERE
About Seanan McGuire
Hi! I’m Seanan McGuire, author of the Toby Daye series (Rosemary and Rue, A Local Habitation, An Artificial Night, Late Eclipses), as well as a lot of other things. I’m also Mira Grant (www.miragrant.com), author of Feed and Deadline.
Born and raised in Northern California, I fear weather and am remarkably laid-back about rattlesnakes. I watch too many horror movies, read too many comic books, and share my house with two monsters in feline form, Lilly and Alice (Siamese and Maine Coon).
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I started listening to audiobooks when a new book in a series was coming out and I wanted to get a refresher, but didn’t have time to read all the books (I think it was Anita Blake). I fell in love. I stayed with strictly re-reading books that I’d already read for a long time. I eventually tried an audiobook for something that I hadn’t read first and was hooked there too. Now, I listen to audio for both re-reads and first time. I have some series that I’ve given up reading and only listen. I try to get any many books/audiobooks from the library to help save on my budget. Books on CD and the newer digital downloads from the library really allow me to listen more. I then purchase my favorites (because who can wait in line for your favorite book??) and less mainstream books from Audible or some other online retailer.
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I’ve read two of her books and I have to say the talking mice were the best part of the books for me.
This does sound kickass!!!!
I’ve really got to read this author under one of her names! This one sounds good. Thanks for sharing!