Name of the Devil by Andrew Mayne

Hi, everyone! Today I'm a stop on the TLC book tour for Andrew Mayne's second Jessica Blackwood mystery, Name of the Devil.

An explosion at a church in the town of Hawkton, West Virginia kicks off a truly odd investigation in this latest from Andrew Mayne.

After her success on the Warlock case, Jessica Blackwood is seeing much more field action these days. She and Agent Knoll have been called in to assist on an investigation in the small town of Hawkton where a church explosion has left little in the way of evidence. At first it's assumed the blast could be an accident, but with no "natural" explanation, gas lines, or such to blame it seems something darker must be at play. Then the first body is discovered - well beyond the blast radius - hung upside down in a tree and etched with what appears to be a Hebrew name for a demon. From there things only get weirder. Bite marks on the bodies contain remnants of a psychotropic that can only be traced to Mexican cartel territory, and the person matched to the bite pattern - Hawkton's own local sheriff - is missing. 

I am truly loving this series! As I said in my post last year on Angel Killer, Jessica Blackwood is, to my knowledge, one of a kind. And even if there is, somewhere in the boundless literary universe, another magician FBI agent, they're still not Andrew Mayne's magician FBI agent.

It's not just Jessica that makes the series stand out either. The plots so far are seriously fantastic. I can't even imagine where Mayne gets his ideas - bizarre headlines would be my first guess. Even still, he's got some seriously creative skills working.

I should add one more note: while I don't doubt there's quite a bit of creative license going on, Mayne's father, a federal agent, and brother, an FBI agent, are both listed in the acknowledgements. So in addition to having the Blackwood magic down, Mayne's got some serious law enforcement resources to pull from, too. All of this is to say that Andrew Mayne's series is super engaging, super odd, and unbelievably believable!

Rating: 4/5

To see more stops on the tour be sure to check out the official TLC tour page here.

For more on Andrew Mayne and his work you can visit his website here. You can also like him on Facebook and follow him on Twitter.