Summer Storm

Neighborhood Watch #2

by Morgon Newquist

Now that she’s seen it, Emilia can’t leave the supernatural world behind.

After her victory over a murderous shape-shifting beast, it's been business as usual for Emilia King in the neighborhood. Until the elusive and powerful Board of Directors is breathing down her neck over the explosion she caused. She’s got to convince them she’s a suitable temporary replacement watchman while her grandfather recovers, and Emilia has never had to be this responsible in her life.

As a crushing drought grips the neighborhood, terrible nightmares about burning alive haunt her, and Emilia must hunt down and stop whoever is behind it.

But she only barely defeated the monster last time. Emilia has no magic, no powers, and no special knowledge to aid her. If she fails, not only will the neighborhood suffer, but her grandfather will lose his beloved Neighborhood Watch. And this time, instead of fairy magic in the air, there’s Hellfire.

To keep the Neighborhood and the Hellgate safe, Emilia will have to dig deep and discover who she really is.

Can Emilia save the neighborhood again? And what will she do when this new crisis strikes at the heart of her family?

Genres: Fantasy

268 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 5, 2021

About the author

Morgon Newquist started life by causing an international incident in Central America, and has been marching to the beat of her own drummer ever since. She grew up in the Rocket City - Huntsville, Alabama. After a stint at the University of Georgia to study Latin, she has returned to the place of her upbringing where she wrangles two dogs, a cat, and four children daily.

She is an avid fan of fantasy, science fiction, gaming of all types and other nerdy pursuits.

Her current focus is an ongoing saga of sword and sorcery short stories called The School of Spells and War. The first novella, Down The Dragon Hole, is highly rated and continues to introduce many new fans to the series.

Morgon has worked as a freelance writer off and on since 2007, and written for video game mythologies, table top RpGs, online game guides, and blogs as well as her own short works. She has several published short stories and is currently working on several novels.

Reviews

[Gordon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This series began a solid premise but I was underwhelmed by the first book and found the MC irritating. I'm glad I carried on because I liked this book a lot better, albeit it's veered away from urban fantasy towards light horror. To recap : MC Emilia's lovable grandfather is a watchman against the supernatural living over a suburban Hellmouth but developing dementia, she's a scatterbrained but good hearted Gen Z with an aversion to responsibility, an overbearing mother not in the know, and a plot trajectory to take over from grandpa whether she wants to or not. Beasties in the night and explosions ensue. I didn't review that book because it just didn't work for me and found I Emilia annoying and unsympathetic. This one Iiked a lot better, her character development began to draw me in and the faith crisis brought about by battling a demon began to be interesting.

There are some nice touches (I especially like Father Giles the ghost priest) and some potentially intriguing supporting characters but I don't know if the author is going to continue with this series at the moment.