The Thirteenth Child
Book One in the Section Thirteen Case Files series.
Immortal sidhe Tuulois MacColewyn is living rough. After nearly two centuries of life as one of Faerie Queen Titania's prized wolves and a handful of years as a Roaring Twenties mob boss's favorite enforcer, he's now exiled to New York, making rent doing dirty jobs for other fey outcasts. He used to consult on the occult for Detective James Corhagen at the NYPD, but since their highly combustible friendship burned itself out a year ago, Cole hasn't heard from him.
All that changes when Corhagen summons Cole right out of his shower and into the middle of a crime scene. The NYPD is facing a rash of messy black-magic murders, complete with exploding hearts and very little forensic evidence, not to mention the sinister disappearance of several half-fey children. However hard he tries to deny it—and his inconvenient attraction to the sidhe—Corhagen needs Cole’s help. A persistent police inspector rounds out the team, but when their investigation comes too close to the truth, suddenly it’s their lives on the line. With a powerful killer on the loose, Cole, James, and Inspector Vallimun must race against time to stop the monster out to claim the thirteenth child.
- The Baby Trap: Detective Corhagen is married to a shrill, controlling woman that Cole believes lied about being pregnant. It turns out the woman really was pregnant, just not with Corhagen's child.
- Badass Normal: Detective Corhagen shows shades of this initially. There are hints early on that he may have some small preternatural ability involving foretelling dreams but this has yet to be elaborated on. Inspector Vallimun has this in spades, however, particularly after he gets the bazooka.
- Bag of Holding: Robyn the mercenary has one. It was made by her grandmother.
- Everybody Has Lots of Sex: Averted initially. The sex scenes don't kick in until roughly midway through. When they DO, however....
- The Fair Folk: Cole is a pure-blood sidhe who has lived in New York City for the past ninety years or so. Nevertheless, he still thinks very much like a sidhe and not a human. In this particular brand of New York City, fey are all over the place. Most people ignore them out of the belief that they aren't real.
- Fairy Godmother: Naryssa could be called a subversion of this. She's a serial murderer/child kidnapper who thinks that half-breed fey children cannot co-exist with humans.
- Fantastic Racism: There are hints of this, particularly with the character Naryssa and her adopted children, though it hasn't been elaborated on yet.
- IKEA Erotica: So far, not so much.
- Invisible to Normals: No one in New York City notices that there are trolls, pixies, sidhe, and all other manner of creatures living alongside them right under their very noses. Even for New York, this seems a bit hard to take. Word Of God says that its due to people no longer believing in them. Their minds either ignore it or make up some excuse
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Inspector Vallimun. And again, Cole.
- Little Miss Badass: Robyn, hands down. She looks no older than twelve yet is armed to the teeth thanks to a Bag of Holding made by her grandmother. She also wears a red hood over camo fatigues and can perform Beyond the Impossible acrobatics without batting an eye.
- Meaningful Name: Sort of an inversion. Cole has albino skin and silvery-white hair, yet his shortened name is Cole (Coal).
- Money, Dear Boy: Things haven't been going well for our immortal protagonist. His motivation for taking the case Corhagen offers him is money so he can keep paying the rent. And to play video games.
- Scary Scarecrows: Scary Scarecrows in a locked-down hospital, no less!
- Shape Shifter: Cole can change into a wolf at will thanks to having served Queen Titania at one point.
- Three-Way Sex: This happens in a dreamscape between the three main male characters. Corhagen flip-flops back and forth afterwards between wanting to deny it happened and trying to blame it all squarely on Cole.