Rachel Wilde comes from a dimension that exists adjacent to ours. The people there have structured their society around daemon collecting: they locate, catch, and repair malfunctioning daemons (creatures out of phase with our world that tempt people to do good or evil). Now Rachel has been given two unusual assignments: 1) find a person who has been trying to break down dimensional barriers, and 2) track down a missing line of gatekeepers, human placeholders for a daemon that was too badly damaged to repair. Authorities of Rachel’s world believe the missing gatekeepers are descended from a girl who went missing from West Africa hundreds of years ago, likely sold into slavery. With no leads to go on, Rachel seeks help from Bach, a raving homeless man who happens to be an oracle. Bach does put her in the path of both of her targets—but he also lands her in a life-threatening situation. Somehow, Rachel has to stop the criminal, reunite a gatekeeper with her stolen past, and, above all, survive.
Gatekeeper follows the story of Rachel Wilde, Daemon Collector, as she does her job collecting defecting daemons and submitting them for correction. When she misses assignment day she gets stuck with the worst undertaking she has ever had: hunting down a person who has been trying to break through to the other dimension and finding a missing gatekeeper. Not only are these assignments unwanted but they turn out to be more dangerous than Rachel expected. In Gatekeeper, Rachel Levy asks us to explore a world of different dimensions, one where other beings exist.
Levy does a good job accomplishing that with this book, for the most part. The characters in this story are really interesting, starting with Rachel. Just a daemon collector trying to do her job, she gets thrust into a an unexpected and difficult situation when her most recent targets turn out to be more work than she anticipated. But Rachel is a badass, and she resourceful, and it is her actions and decisions that drive the plot. I very much enjoyed Rachel as the main protagonist. The other character the reader gets a lot of exposure to is the human who is trying to break through the barrier to the other dimension, even getting a few chapter sections from his point of view. This was a good development, because it gives the reader a little bit of a break from the single point of view and adds dimension to the story.
As for the rest of the characters, the daemon Rachel finds has an interesting effect on the story, it ends up having an important impact. Same goes for the gatekeeper and the Oracle (another character Rachel meets along the way): they all have small but significant roles in the course of the plot. There were times where I wished I had a little more background on these characters, a little more depth, but I also think Levy does a nice job of highlighting every character’s importance. Even if they do not get much page time.
Along those same lines, I feel similarly about the story itself. It is short, and I think there is room for some world-building. But, the story that we do get does not waste a page. Every plot point is important, nothing gets phoned in. It is also a very unique narrative. I am not sure I have read anything like it before. In the year 2020, differentiated ideas are hard to come by, so it is not often I say a book is one-of-a-kind. Gatekeeper is such a book, and that is a pretty big compliment.
Overall, this was a really good debut for Levy. While it may be a short novel, Gatekeeper packs a punch, and there is definitely enough intrigue for me to want to keep reading the series. I recommend this book for fantasy fans who are looking for something different.
Alongside our world is another dimension, the Arcana, whose people live and work with ours in order to keep our dimension working properly. Rachel Wilde is one of those Arcanans who works as a demon collector. Rachel catches malfunctioning daemons and brings them back for repair. Rachel's latest caseload involves a bunch of unusual assignments: first, a riot daemon who no longer wants to affect humans negatively and is assigned to live with Rachel since it is unable to be repaired at this time; second, a human man who is trying to break down the inter-dimensional barrier to bring back the daemon Apep and lastly, the woman who is the last gatekeeper for Apep, keeping the daemon locked in the wasteland. Rachel's assignments turn sour as the two human marks cross paths, but she may finish her assignment with the help of some new friends.
Gatekeeper is a fun daemonic adventure through alternative dimensions and a diversity of daemons. The prologue sucked me in as a mysterious murderer brutally kills off what he believes is the last of the gatekeeper line. Rachel's character is strong, edgy and impulsive. I was very interested in the other dimensions and Rachel's dimension of Arcana. Arcana seems similar to ours, but with a better social structure. I would love to explore more of Arcana and how the people there came to be in charge of the daemons in the different dimensions. I also really enjoyed the human Oracle, Bach. I know that he probably has a great backstory, but it hasn't been explored yet. The riot daemon is a wonderful addition and I hope it doesn't get sent away just yet. I have a lot of questions about Apep and why a human would kill to have the daemon back on Earth. The ending was suspenseful and kept my interest up right until the end. There is definitely a lot more to explore in the series and I want to know what happens next!
This book was received for free in return for an honest review.
This took me a ridiculously long time to read. It truly doesn't reflect on the quality of the book, honestly, I just chose to read this alongside a seven book series. Oops.
I will admit I wasn't completely interested and had to force myself to pick this back up a few times, but only because all of the exciting stuff happens at around the 60% mark. The fast-paced, totally unexpected plot twist made me feel better about how long this took to take off. I could have read it in one sitting, but my book hangover really did a number on me.
This was by no means a bad story, it was actually really fun at times and is usually the genre I go for. Demons, daemons (yes, there's a significant difference!) and badass "collectors". I'm a bit confused on the whole Gatekeeper history and the roles of each person within this created society. All of that said, I'd absolutely like to read further books to see where this goes.
The story is unique, quite detailed at times, interesting and has a really heart racing twist.
✨I received an ARC of this book for free, and am leaving this honest review voluntarily.✨
Thanks to Books Forward PR for the free advance copy of this book.
Rachel is a human from a different dimension. She travels to ours for her job as a daemon collector - picking up malfunctioning daemons (invisible creatures that tempt humans to steal, kiss, riot, etc.) for repair. Today, though, she's been assigned the job of tracking down a dangerous person who is trying to break the barriers between dimensions, and everything goes haywire.
Wow, what a fun book! I loved the world built here, it's so clever and unique, and shown to us so clearly in just barely 200 pages. Rachel is a fantastic character - sharp and prickly, but with a good heart. GATEKEEPER also touches on a number of social issues, ranging from women not being taken seriously at work to the difficulty Black Americans have tracing their ancestry due to slavery.
I'm looking forward to seeing how this universe expands in the next book, since there’s obviously more coming with the way it ended. Also, I hope there's more of the daemon who likes to wear a coat, it was so cute!
The story follows Rachel, a daemon catcher in a world full of alternate dimensions. Her job is to chase defective daemons and fix them so they can keep doing their job. But when she's assigned to track down a gatekeeper, she'll soon finds out maybe nothing's as it seems.
The concept for The Gatekeeper sounded really good, but the devil's in the details and the execution of this book was kind of flat. Flat characters, cumbersome dialogue, poor worldbuilding and one pecent daemon presence. It's pretty obvious this is the first book in a trilogy but apart from being a lot introductive there was just barely plot. It gives the impression the author used this book simply for the use of setting up the pieces for the following books and feels like just a novella rather than a proper book.
As I said, concept's pretty interesting so we'll see how all this turn out.
Alison Levy's Gatekeeper is the first novel in the Daemon Collecting Series. It's also the author's debut novel.
Gatekeeper was a pleasant surprise for me, because it's well written and fast-paced urban fantasy fiction with a good and gripping story. This novel instantly pulled me in, because the author has come up with an intriguing plot that kept me fascinated all the way from the very first page to the final page.
This novel tells of Rachel Wilde who comes from another dimension, the Arcana, that is adjacent to ours. In her world, the society is structured around daemon collecting, which means that people locate, catch and repair malfunctioning daemons (Rachel works for the Central Office of Daemonic Monitoring). Rachel's job is to find a person responsible for trying to break down the dimensional barriers and track down a missing line of gatekeepers, which are human placeholders for a daemon that is too badly damaged to repair.
The story begins with Rachel waking up late and being late for her assignment. When she arrives at the office, she gets the jobs that nobody else accepted. Her first two jobs are pretty easy, but the next ones are a bit more complex. When Rachel begins to look for the person who has tried to open interdimensional gateways and tries to track down the gatekeeper, she finds out that the tasks are more difficult than she thought...
There's much to like in this novel, because the author has created a compelling story and writes fluently about the happenings. I was impressed by how effortlessly the author keeps the story going forward at a steady pace. I was also taken by the humorous elements in the story, because they worked well.
Rachel is a fascinating protagonist. She's a sharp and sassy yet charismatic and easily likeable character who clearly has a good heart. Bach, the oracle, is also an interesting character, because he's had a rough life. His gift has complicated his life and has caused him suffering. I enjoyed reading about both of these characters.
I like the author's way of writing about how it feels to cross the boundary to another dimension. Her depictions of crossing into another dimension are surprisingly vivid. I also enjoyed reading about Rachel's work, because catching daemons is not as easy as one might think, because some of them don't want to be caught and repaired.
The daemons serve a purpose in this novel. They keep a natural balance between good and and bad, because some of them tempt people do good things while others cause people to do bad things. I won't reveal any details about the daemons, but I can mention that it was very entertaining to read about the riot daemon and its connection to Rachel.
Because Gatekeeper is the author's debut novel, it has a few tiny flaws (the story would've benefited from a slightly deeper characterisation and worldbuilding). These flaws didn't bother me much, because I greatly enjoyed what I read and liked the main character. I look forward to reading the next novel, because this was a good start to the series and I really want to find out what happens next.
If you love fast-paced urban fantasy, Alison Levy's Gatekeeper should be on your reading list, because it's a well written novel that leaves you wanting more. Reading this novel offers you a relaxing break from reality, because it's pure escapism from start to finish.
Alison Levy has written an interest grabbing supernormal start to a series that looks to be a lot of fun. There are multiple dimensions - we learn that Rachel is an Arcanan, who works on locating and detaining broken 'daemons' in our world, which is known as the 'notan' dimension. The daemons are like little pokemon style spirits that exist to influence humans - there are riot daemons, petty theft daemons, joy daemons - the little whispers in your ear that prod you into an excess of emotion or desire to do something. I love this idea (it feels like it is influenced by Japanese culture for sure). We follow Rachel in her work week, which ends up being a lot more than she bargained for, with a defective daemon latching onto her, an oracle dogging her steps, and a simple assignment turning into a life or death situation. The world building is fairly good - I was never confused about who was where, but I would have liked more expansion - however as this is first in a series I absolutely expect that in the next books. I really, really loved the riot daemon! So cute! The only issue I have is that Rachel has some serious anger management issues! She seems one step away from losing it all the time - i felt like her anger was disproportionate to the things that made her angry. It made her unlikeable at times. (also who wouldn't rescue a puppy under the porch?!!!!!) I hope this is either explained or maybe tweaked a little in further books. However, I devoured this book. And would happily recommend it to anyone that likes a supernatural series similar to Kim Harrison and others. Will be watching out for book 2!
[I received a physical copy for an honest review] Gatekeeper is the debut novel of Alison Levy. It's a fiction fantasy novel set in a world with different dimensions, daemons, and oracles.
Rachel lives from one dimension but spends her time living in another for her job. A job which consists of hunting down defective daemons. Her job gets significantly more difficult when she's tasked with hunting down a human trying to destroy the barrier between worlds and a woman whose life is key to keeping a deadly daemon in exile.
The concept and storyline of Gatekeeper as a whole was interesting. I enjoyed the characters; Rachel our leading protagonist, the oracle, and her somehow cute daemon tag along (even though its physical description was not so cute). However, I'm not sure why, maybe it was the writing itself, but I found myself a bit bored. There is some sporadic point of view changes throughout and then at the end it was a whole lot of point of view jumping in a small amount of time. Gatekeeper was a decent start to a fantasy series, and I am intrigued enough of the characters that I could see myself picking up the future releases in the Daemon Collecting Series.
Gatekeeper follows Rachel, a daemon collector who lives in a dimension that, as the synopsis states, is just adjacent to ours and known as the Arcana. This alternate dimension basically helps to keep things running smoothly in our dimension, which is where Rachel comes in by collecting and helping find daemons who need to be rehabilitated become the daemon they were meant ot be. Now, these daemons probably aren't quite the type you're thinking of, but rather daemons that sort of live in the background of our everyday lives and plants seeds of ideas in the minds of humans, such as ideas of riot or discord that influences how people may react in different situations. A daemon is considered 'defective' if it either isn't doing that or is getting a bit out of control. I really love concepts like these and I thought that Levy did a great job developing this multi-dimensional setting.
Our protagonist, Rachel, was someone I enjoyed getting to know and I found unexpectedly charismatic. I found her snow globe-like living situation really interesting and I enjoyed seeing how she managed to balance straddling two dimensions, as it's not necessarily something that is overly common. She's not necessarily the warmest or friendliest of people, but she's good at what she does, she's loyal, and she doesn't give up easily. In Gatekeeper, she gets stuck with a rather unfortunate assignment (due to her own oversleeping) and despite her exceedingly strong desire not to follow through with her assignment, she does it anyway and puts a strong amount of effort into getting everything done right, which I really appreciated about her character.
The daemons themselves were particularly fun to learn about and I thought all of the different varieties of daemons that exist were a really unique idea. It was interesting to hear about how the daemons interact with out dimension and the process that occurs when they are declared 'defective,' which we get to see a few examples of in Gatekeeper when Rachel is tasked to find and bring them in.
I also found Levy's writing style engaging and easy to follow. There was something pleasingly straightforward about the narrative--it was simple without being boring, yet still somehow full of details and depth. I think it is because of the writing style that I was hooked almost immediately upon starting the book, and I genuinely enjoyed the entire book with the same level of intrigue. I don't htink I ever once found myself losing interest and I credit that completely to not only the interesting plot and world-building, but to Levy's skill at pacing and crafting a captivating narrative style.
Overall, I've given Gatekeeper 4.25 stars! If you're looking for a quick fantasy with a really interesting and fun premise and worldbuilding, then I'd encourage you to pick up Gatekeeper!
I can't follow a protagonist who has anger management issues, no impulse control, and not enough brains to actually think of a plan before charging head first into everything... and then she gets mad because she gets her butt handed to her. Oh, and she is so incredibly self-centered and incapable of empathy that she doesn't notice anything or anyone around her, unless she needs them for some reason.
The worldbuilding is also clunky and confusing. Even at 40% of the book I had no clue what her job was or what the rules of her organization were or why she did what she did.
Nope. Too little time, to many other books to read.
PS. I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley.
2.5 stars. It is hard to explain this book. The best way to describe it is that it’s pretty light on details and the ones we get are not given in a linear manner. There’s so many things that are not explained until half way through or even until the very end. There are also lots of random POV changes that had me scrambling to keep up in places. The name of the book, Gatekeeper, we don’t get a true explanation of what it means until the last chapter. It sort of explains in the plot blurb that a Gatekeeper is a human that holds the place of a defective daemon but the significance of that isn’t explained until the very end. Also, this book says the world contains 7 dimensions but humans only live in four of them. Seems kind of important but it isn’t fleshed out. I spent a lot of this book confused, wishing for more world building and details.
Now, some really good stuff. The main character is a foul mouthed, ass kicking woman named Rachel. (We learn halfway through the book that this is not pronounced Rachel like on Friends, but as Rah-Kel like Raquel. I wish I’d known that sooner but I digress). Rachel comes from a really awesome sounding matriarchal dimension called Arcana where people are peaceful, non-religious and fair minded. They seem to work together as an entire world for the greater good of their people. She clearly loves her family and has a great heart and mind.
Rachel works for The Central Office as a daemon collector. She doesn’t always do her job 100% by the books so it seems like she gets stuck with crappy jobs more often than not. I loved her spirit, I loved how sassy she was. I loved how much she wanted to do the right thing and didn’t care much that she might suffer repercussions. She’s the best part of the book and as she muddles through one emergency and moral dilemma after another, a murder mystery and a bigger terrorist plot that threatens multiple dimensions unfolds.
So, as a debut novel this is decent. It is Imaginative and has a great main character. Many of the side characters are a bit flat and stereotypical which irked me. This is stated as Book One of a series so I am hoping for more world building and more character depth to come.
Thank you to Books Forward PR and Spark Press for my gifted copy.
I started reading Gatekeeper when I went for checkup in hospital. I had to wait for a very long time. So , this was a perfect read. I loved it from the beginning. The prologue glued me to the book. And before I knew, I was on page 100. It was really addicting at first. Then it got boring after that. And then interesting again towards the end. Anyways, I liked the writing and the story.
I like the Protagonist of this book (Rachel has anger management issues and is impulsive and I don't know why I like her. She is just cool). Rachel Wilde is an Arcanan, citizen of another dimension adjacent to ours. She is a Daemon Collector (Cool right??). She catches daemons which are malfunctioning and brings them back to get them repaired. She receives some unusual assignments this time. A Daemon is malfunctioning and then some dude is trying to bring back Apep (a bigger Daemon) and she has to search for the last Gatekeeper whose life is in danger. All in all, we get to go on an adventure with Rachel while she works on her assignments.
I think this book was a fun adventure for me. It was really different and got me out of my reading slump. The world building was great and I was really intrigued about Arcana and other dimensions (Arcana kind of sounds like a Star Trek thing (idk why I think that)). It does get a bit boring in the middle where you kind of want to skip unnecessary details.
I want to read Book 2 too to find out why they want to bring back Apep and also because the epilogue was nearly as good as the prologue.
Anyways, If you want to read something that you can finish off in one sitting, this is the book.
Thank you Books Forward PR for sending me this ebook in exchange for an honest review.
Gatekeeper is the first book in a series called Daemon Collecting Series. The story is about Rachel, a young woman from the fictional Arcanan race. She is working in the world of another fictional race, Notan. Her job is to collect defective daemons, minor demons that plant seeds of temptation and riotous behavior in people. Also, she gets the task of finding a gatekeeper and a dangerous person who is trying to break dimensional barriers to let in more dangerous daemons. Along the way she meets a homeless oracle named Bach, who had a completely normal life before his oracle senses overwhelmed him and caused him to have a breakdown. She inadvertently helps Bach get on his feet and catches a daemon who she has to keep as a charge until the office she works for can take it in for repair. Bach’s predictions and Rachel’s own intuition set the tone for the outcome of the storyline as she races against time to catch the bad guy and find the gatekeeper before it’s too late.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book. I loved the main characters and supporting characters. The interaction between Rachel and the daemon she became responsible for watching made me laugh. I thought it was sweet how Rachel also helped the Oracle find himself again. What I did not expect was the outcome of the criminal Rachel had to catch. The way the plot unfolded with the criminal and gatekeeper was completely unexpected. I hope to see more background on the history of Arcana/Notan worlds and the origin of the daemons/gatekeepers in sequels to come. Thank you again to Hannah with Booksforward for sending me a copy and thank you to Alison Levy for the opportunity to review your novel!
The prologue kick-starts this book. You are thrown straight into the action. It sets up the mystery of the Gatekeepers - who are they? Why are they being hunted? After that though things slow down. The action doesn't really pick up again until the last couple of chapters.
This is a modern fantasy where the world is full of alternate dimensions.
Rachel Wilde is the main character. She is a daemon hunter also known as a collector. I found her to be a little one note. She seems to just be angry at everything. Even the smallest things set her off. We follow her during what is supposed to be a typical week for her however not everything is as it seems. Her main role is to track down defective daemons however she has been given 2 assignments that are seemingly unconnected. With the help of an Oracle, and a defective daemon, Rachel needs to figure out what is going on and stay alive throughout it.
The world building was fairly simple as was the dialogue. However the story was pretty well paced, easy to read and kept me interested. The twists and turns of the plot was pretty simple and predictable though, I had already picked out a few of them before they were revealed.
All in all, I did enjoy the book. It was an easy read and it did set up for a sequel nicely. It has an interesting premise, and I hope the author comes out guns blazing with the sequel. I look forward to reading it.
This book caught my attention because of the mention of different dimensions. I am very intrigued by the synopsis so I immediately got this on netgalley.
The world has a lot of potential. On this world there are collectors, oracles, gatekeepers and daemons. Our main character is Rachel, a collector. Her job is to collect daemons that are malfunctioning.
It took me a while to get into the story because a lot of things are being thrown in my face without introductions. It's like the author expects you to understand just by merely mentioning them on the book.
Rachel is quick to anger and impulsive. She's grumpy most of the time. Being in the profession for a while now (as what she claims in the book), she still strike me as some naive newbie who doesn't even think of a plan before doing something. She's quick to do the 1st step but doesn't plan beyond that.
The characters that I love on the book is Bach and that tiny daemon attached to Rachel. They made my reading experience better. The plot is also okay. I love the mystery part and the possibility of what will happen on the next book.
All in all, it was an okay read. I can see lots of possibilities for the succeeding books.👍
***Thanks for netgalley, the publisher and author for making this available for review.***
Rachel Wilde is from a dimension that is responsible for maintaining daemons. She over sleeps one day and gets assigned a couple crummy jobs, find a broken daemon, find a human trying to open a portal to the demon dimension, and find the last Gatekeeper. The first is easy to take on but the human puts up one heck of a fight but Rachel is up to the challenge.
The Gatekeeper is another issue. A Gatekeeper is a human that has the ability to open a portal and release a daemon. The problem is the bloodline that should be able to do this was recently killed. Rachel is not happy about this but with a call to archives and an undocumented oracle she might just find the woman.
I was instantly drawn into the story with the prologue that was unexpected. From there, Rachel is a tough woman, knows her business, and is determined to finish her tasks. I had a hard time stepping away from the book and would rush back to see what would happen next. Personally I think my favorite character was the woman’s coat, I’m not going to give that one away.
If you like fantasy stories I recommend checking out Gatekeeper. I really enjoyed the read and I’m very excited to find out where this story is going to go in the next book.
I received a complimentary copy of this book for free. I voluntarily chose to read and post an honest review.
Gatekeeper follows Rachel Wilde who is a daemon hunter from the Arcanan dimension. Her job is find a collect malfunction daemons and bring them to central offices so they can be sent out and fixed. Her job is pretty much the same until she receives an assignment to capture a person who had been trying to break down the dimension barriers. She is also tasked to find a line of missing gatekeeper. Needless to say nothing is normal about this job.
So I really liked the whole concept of this book. Theres different dimensions that are adjacent to earth and the gatekeepers were really cool. My only complaint is that I feel like there could have been a little more explanation of the dimensions. Really the whole book could have been longer and not as rushed. Yes I know this book 1 in a series but I really felt like I was missing something while reading this. I enjoyed the book enough that I would 100% read the next book, especially with that ending. Like I said really liked the whole concept of the book and enjoyed reading it…I just felt like it was missing something.
Thank you to Books Forward for sending me a copy of the book!
*I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review*
I absolutely loved this. I would have gotten this review done sooner but I am so busy with college lately. Rachel is from another dimension. Her job has her working with daemons, but her new assignment has her tracking down a killer trying to open another dimension so a very old, very dangerous daemon can get out and wreak havoc. The job is something she's never done before-and she has no available help since the offices are closed and no one is answering her calls. Rachel's first attempt at capturing the man is unsuccessful, but she finds a flash drive that he drops while running away. Since she is unable to read the language on the drive, she enlists the help of Miss Morely, an expert in languages, which gets them both captured. Can she finish the job? Why is the killer so obsessed with opening this door and finding a long lost gatekeeper?
I loved getting to know Rachel and her home dimension. I would, however, have loved to know more about her home and job. The end sounded like there was going to be a sequel, which would be amazing. I can't wait to see what else the author has in store.
Gatekeeper by the author Alison Levy is the first book in the Daemon Collecting Series. The protagonist of the story is Rachel Wilde. She is a daemon collector. One day she slept more and reaches late so she was given the difficult assignments to find the person who is trying to break the dimensional barriers and to find the missing line of gatekeepers, human placeholders for a daemon that was too badly damaged to repair.
Grab a copy of this book and read the story yourself to unveil the suspense. World building is really nice. In this book, Rachel will take you on adventurous assignments. Alison has written the story very nicely. Title is unique and according to the contents of the story. The storyline is unique and I couldn't put this book down until I finished it. Cover photo is really attractive. Narration is remarkable and the story is promising. It won't disappoint you. Go ahead with this one.
I like to strongly recommend this book to the fantasy readers.
A parallel world that exists between dimensions to keep this world free from rogue or damaged daemons and lets humans live without worry. Gatekeepers are required to insure any who enter or exit their dimensions do not interfere with other worlds. As a daemon collector, Rachel's job is to capture and repair the damaged daemons who would cause so much havoc. Her personality matches her job, she's fearless but also easily frustrated when things don't work as she wants. Events conspire to cause her quite alot of frustration!
This is the first book in a new series. It's a little rough in places but has some really good character development and the back story seems solid. As the series matures, we will see some outstanding writing from Alison Levy....aka gatekeeper extraordinaire.....
This book fell pretty flat for me. The concept was interesting but the execution, not so much. The story follows Rachel Wilde who is a daemon catcher in this world of alternate dimensions. She gets an assignment to track down a gatekeeper- a woman who has the ability to trap a dangerous daemon in an alternate dimension. Rachel soon finds out that all is not it seems to be. The characters were pretty bland, the dialogue was clunky. The world building could have been better, could have been less exposition heavy. The writing was easily digestible, it was quick to read and easy to get through. The ending was quite abrupt. It felt like the author used this book just to set up pieces for the next one. The actual action is going to go down in the next book.
The book Gatekeeper takes the reader into a modern-fantasy realm where there is another world beside ours where deamons need to be monitored and taken in for reprogramming when they malfunction.
The story begins with the murder of a family line whose extinction should open a portal to allow greater deamons the ability to travel between realms. But since the portal doesn't open, that means there is a member of that specific line still alive. The hunt is on to find this woman before more sinister forces do. And perhaps with the help of a malfunctioning yet harmless daemon and a bonkers oracle, our hero might just be able to solve this case.
I enjoyed the simplistic world building, and how the plot remains open for more stories. I will definitely read more of this series.
The Gatekeeper by Alison Levy started good with some exciting beginning scenes, but then the rest of the book kind of slogged along, and I had a difficult time getting through each chapter.
The story follows Rachel, who is a daemon catcher in a world of alternate dimensions. Her assignment is to track down a gatekeeper. The synopsis sounded so good and a book I could get into, but unfortunately, that did not happen. Rachel was an okay character, but I could not really get into the storyline or feel invested in what was going to happen next. The world building is good, and there are some interesting parts to the book about the daemons and the dog. Hopefully, the next books in the series will be more engaging for me.
Gatekeeper by Alison Levy (Book One in the Daemon Collection Series) Daemons are not exactly traditional demons although there are similar characteristics. Daemons can become defective and not be able to do their assigned roles such as promoting chaos or avarice. Rachel Wilde is from another dimension and her job is to collect defective daemons for correction or expulsion. This book details one week of her assignments. Levy does a nice job developing Rachel Wilde’s character. Rachel is a protagonist that is not omnipotent. Her flaws and insecurities provide depth and believability to her character. Rachel’s dimension is also portrayed as not being infallible and totally altruistic. The plot is complex without being confusing. I enjoyed the book and recommend it.
The concept for this one sounded intriguing. A female who works for an agency in another dimension that rounds up defective Daemons and returns them for repairs. The heroine was strong and kickass though she often had to rush into situations that resulted in her getting said ass kicked, granted because her backup just wasn’t available right away. The villain of this piece was nasty, vulgar and rather one-note which is disappointing. The story is open for something better in the future, but I found the plot of the first installment simplistic, predictable and lacking, for want of a better term. I’m not sure if I would try Book 2.
Alison Levy has penned a wonderfully crafted fantasy world.
It came across as unique and imaginative. The author really gave us something different.
When you dive into this world, you will be inundated with new things and have to learn the world, but Alison Levy does a great job of keeping us up to date and helping us understand while continuing to move the plot. She really managed to navigate it effortlessly and keeps us wanting more through the entire book, while ultimately leaving us satisfied, yet needing the next book!
Thank you Books Forward for the ARC of Gatekeeper.
I liked this story. I think it is a good start to this series. I like the plotline, collecting defective Daemons for fixing, as well as the Gatekeeper aspect that keeps really bad daemons locked away.
The female leads are strong and don't take crap from people. I appreciate that they don't become wilted flowers when things get tough.
Thank you to the publishers, author and NetGalley for the free copy of this book!
I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked this! I enjoyed the world building, and although the main character rather annoyed me from time to time I thought it was rather well put together. Would definitely recommend to give this book a try!
The book hits the ground running, letting you piece together the world and it’s rules as you go, which I enjoyed.
It’s an excellent foundation for a series, and I really like the main character and the collection of companions that are taking form. I’m curious to see where the next book takes us.
I found gatekeeper really interesting but lacks any real background of this new world. It definitely would have been better if there was more details about this world and all of the differences between the dimensions. Other than it lacked details I still found the story pretty interesting!