After enjoying Alex North’s previous two books, I was excited to get started on this one. For some reason, there wasn’t as much hype surrounding this book’s release like the author’s other two books even with its interesting premise. My verdict on this book is that I wanted to like it more than I did because I think Alex North tried too hard to top his other books. A head-spinning cliffhanger that reads a bit like Harry Potter for grownups. . . . It would be a shame if no movie were made from this glorious piece of kaleidoscope-fiction.”— The Wall Street Journal

Over the top, fun filled adventure novel I’ve read in ages – and slightly on the verge of madness!!! With a recent promotion under her belt, DI Jamie Johansson should be flying high. However, the elevation within London’s Metropolitan Police came at a cost, when she shot a suspect to protect herself. Muddled with the guilt, Johansson takes a leave to clear her head and reset things once and for all. But because Joe has this heritage of the cool criminal, and his father's friends, and some remnants of his childhood training in London's (literal) underworld, he has the ability to turn his role as unfortunate pawn on its head. Which he does, and oh it feels good. There's a tommy gun involved. You know what I'm sayin. In this way, Angelmaker is like a reverse coming of age novel. Like Updike, but more fun.Joe’s status as a fugitive forces him to confront a crisis of identity foreshadowed since the beginning of the book. He has spent the past decades of his adult life actively trying not to turn out like his father and avoiding, as much as possible, associations with the criminal element. His status as “the Crown Prince of the Night Market” nips at his heels like an unwanted insurance salesman, but Joe is determined to survive on the straight and narrow. Except it increasingly seems that, if Joe wants to get out of this alive—not to mention save the day and get the girl—he will have to step up and become not Joe Spork, the grandson of Daniel Spork, but Joe Spork, son of Matthew “Tommy Gun” Spork. This inevitable transformation is almost an apotheosis of its own, albeit not in quite as grand a way as Shem Shem Tsien would like for himself. From there, the novel switches gears and becomes a wild ride from “crazy” to “insane” as Joe and his allies concoct a crazy plan to save the world. But an extremely bloated plot with obnoxiously verbose descriptions (of pretty much everything the main characters come across as they wander around) plus a recently discovered aversion for third person first tense narratives unfortunately kept me from finishing the book. It’s hard to put a finger on exactly why Angelmaker is one of the year’s best books. Know this, though: it is.”—Tor.com Normally, I am all for twists as I really enjoy them. It seemed like the author tried to be too smart with the twist, philosophy (think Laplace’s demon), and story. I didn't get surprised by anything unlike his last book because of that. I enjoy the author’s flirtation of supernatural elements in his previous mystery books, but the use of the supernatural was too blatant in this one for me. The overuse of it took away from the story. Then we have Hallberg, she's a smart cookie. I can't wait to see how she grows into her own detective role in future books.

And then the story wasn't really that creepy either. I was hoping for something a lot more depressing and dark (like Frankenstein), and definitely more horror. But nope. There were some tiny parts that grossed me out, but in the end it was all pretty underwhelming. Do we really have free will? Are we not merely at the mercy of our DNA and if so, might we eventually find and fix the genes that create sociopaths, along with all genetic diseases? Improve upon "god's work", work that is far from perfect and cannot be said to be from an all-knowing, all-good being. Might we humans do better than that which we think created us, and if so, are we not then gods ourselves? Are we not then better than the gods we created in our image? A big, gleefully absurd, huggable bear of a novel . . . . Harkaway’s prose is playful and beguiling, with a keen satiric edge.”— Slate Even though I didn't enjoy this as much as I initially anticipated, the ending and the audiobook are both excellent. It's worth a read if you like this author or want a dark and eerie story. My eyes are rolling so hard. Everything gets lost in that verbiage – the characters, the emotions, the plot. It’s all too self-indulgent to really pull me in. The descriptions are theatrically absurd and slow down the already meandering plot.Kate Smith had a charmed life growing up. At the end of her school year, she had it all - a boyfriend and a promising future awaited her. Then her younger brother, Chris was the victim of a violent crime, and everything changed. We have a serial killer, we have an estranged brother and sister, we have nefarious characters, we have police detectives, and we have a very important book but what does it all mean? You'll have to read this to find out. I enjoyed watching Joe coming into his own and understanding his family's complicated patrimony: he starts out so quiet, always hesitant of everything and unwilling to take any risks and finds the confidence he needs to be assertive and transcend his idea that he is stiffed by his father's inheritance. His realization that crimes are sometimes committed for good reasons, and that following the rules doesn't work when the game is rigged was an amazing and satisfying ride. Parents may leave us a complicated heritage, but there is always something to be learned from it.

The story is definitely engaging. Katie is a good egg, and is easy to root for. North provides her with the handicap of an unsupportive, disbelieving husband, which was cause for a bit of eye-rolling. It is such a trope these days. Maybe always has been. While it was slow for some reason, there are numerous gems scattered all throughout the book. Humour, wit, sarcasm, irony, you can find everything in this book. It made me cry, it made me happy, it made me think. The ending is not a fairy tale nothing bad happened type. Considering everything that happens in this book, it is close to a fairy tale ending as it can be. The first fifty percent I was totally confused, the next twenty-five percent, I was mildly confused, and the last twenty-five, I was still befuddled. First, there is Katie Show she is a mother, a little overprotective but she knows that bad things can happen when you are not careful. She might be having marital problems because of all her worrying. Can I just said that I loved, loved Edie?! That is exactly how bad ass I hope I'll be when I'm ninety - minus the people hiring assassins to kill me, of course. Harkaway's female characters are no push overs: Polly and Frankie aren't exactly maidens in distress either, and it was lovely to read about such unusual ladies. The supporting characters are also well fleshed out, and deeper than I expected from a book that starts off with such a pulpy premise. It is easy to get attached to all of them.As I have said about the other books in the prequel series, Morgan Greene can surely write and pull the reader into the middle of the story. There is always so I much going on that I cannot get enough of what Greene has to say. With a strong narrative and short chapters, the story flows with ease and keeps me wanting to devour just a little more to understand what’s going on. The reality of the Swedish experiences is heightened by use of the native language throughout, permitting the reader to get that feeling of being right there. Greene does well to balance it out and offers translation moments when needed to allow the reader to stay with the story. If this is what is to come, I am fully committed to this series and cannot wait to see what’s next. With a strong cliffhanger at the end of this book, I can surmise it will be a rough ride in the next publication.