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Gods & Monsters (Shadows Inquiries #3)

3.87 of 5 stars 3.87 · rating details · 101 ratings · 20 reviews

View our feature on Lyn Benedict's Gods & Monsters.

Sylvie Lightner is no ordinary P.I. She specializes in cases involving the unusual and unbelievable. When she finds the bodies of five women in the Florida Everglades, Sylvie believes them to be the work of a serial killer and passes the buck. But when the bodies wake and shift shape, killing the police, Sylvie finds h...more

Paperback, 1st Edition, 320 pages

Published April 26th 2011 by Ace

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May 21, 2012 BamaGal rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: pnr-uf

This series is good, strong Urban Fantasy. You've got the gods and monsters of the title, a kick-ass PI in Sylvie, and loads of magic. Benedict is very good at weaving in the threads of past books into the plotline seamlessly while still moving the plot forward.

This time around, Sylvie is investigating a serial murder where the women turn out to be not-so-dead after all. This leads her, necromancer Wales, and a 'reporter' to a magical and physical confrontation with a god and a very powerful sor...more

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Aug 17, 2012 Dangerous Romance Book Reviews rated it 4 of 5 stars

For those of you who miss the early days of the Anita Blake series, when she was a loner and a tough cookie who lived by her own set of rules, only let one or two people in close and fought on the side of right …you’ll like God’s and Monsters, there is a lot in common. Sylvie isn't a necromancer, but she is forced to work with one and she does have something seriously screwed up going on inside of her powerwise.

Sylvie Lightner runs an investigative office called Shadow’s inquiries. She also just...more For those of you who miss the early days of the Anita Blake series, when she was a loner and a tough cookie who lived by her own set of rules, only let one or two people in close and fought on the side of right …you’ll like God’s and Monsters, there is a lot in common. Sylvie isn't a necromancer, but she is forced to work with one and she does have something seriously screwed up going on inside of her powerwise.

Sylvie Lightner runs an investigative office called Shadow’s inquiries. She also just happens to be the new Lilith, something she is not really happy about. Her lover Demalion died in the last book and was brought back to life in the body of another man. A married man. In order to keep him hidden from those who killed him in the first place, he has had to assume the life of the man whose body he is inhabiting and both he and Sylvie have to stay away from each other. Their phone calls to each other are poignant and quite sad.

Sylvie (or Shadow’s as all the bad guys seem to call her) is trying to find out what is going on in the Everglades, as women are disappearing and somehow being used to fuel a Sorcerers attempt to become a minor diety, which is very bad news for Miami. Sylvie has alienated the very community she needs help from the most, so she is forced to turn to someone whose very profession makes her skin crawl. He happens to also look like a scrawny sweet college kid . Alex, her personal assistant and all around overly trusting computer savvy best friend may be falling for him, which is a complication Sylvie doesn’t need.

People are dying or disappearing all over Miami and there are stories of shape shifters tearing up restaurants. Someone Slyvie put in jail has a hit on her in the magical community and the ISI, a secret government organization has decided Sylvie is dangerous and are following her all around town, making her job trying to stop an ancient evil all the more difficult.

I hadn’t read the previous books in the series but I was able to keep up and follow along nicely. Gods and Monsters had just the right balance of grit, horror and snark. There were funny lines and interesting characters and it read like a good old fashioned mystery that just happened to have supernatural elements, my favorite blend.
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Mar 25, 2012 OpenBookSociety.com rated it 1 of 5 stars

Review brought to you by OBS staff member Heidi

Beware of spoilers

Sylvie Lightner is back on the case in the third installment of the Shadows Inquiries series by Lyn Benedict. This time Sylvie is looking for a missing woman and the case turns out to be more than she bargained for (as usual) when she discovers five dead women floating in a lake. She calls the police in on the case and everyone is stunned when the police are attacked by the dead women.

Sylvie ends up bringing her favorite necromance...more Review brought to you by OBS staff member Heidi

Beware of spoilers

Sylvie Lightner is back on the case in the third installment of the Shadows Inquiries series by Lyn Benedict. This time Sylvie is looking for a missing woman and the case turns out to be more than she bargained for (as usual) when she discovers five dead women floating in a lake. She calls the police in on the case and everyone is stunned when the police are attacked by the dead women.

Sylvie ends up bringing her favorite necromancer, Tierney Wales, in on the case to help get to the bottom of what’s going on. Together they discover that a powerful and cursed sorcerer has the women under his spell as a way to fight the effects of his curse. But he quickly burns through his victims and then must replace them. Sylvie and Wells are on a race against the clock to find the God that cursed him and convince him to lift the curse so the sorcerer will release the women before it’s too late for Sylvie’s missing woman.

I was really hoping that this series was going to continue to build and get better, but unfortunately this installment fell flat for me and was an excruciatingly slow read even though it was barely over 300 pages.

I did like Wells in this book, but found his character in this installment to seem more and more like Wright from Ghosts & Echoes the longer I kept reading. But it was nice to see a budding relationship forming for him and Alex!!

I also liked that at the end of this book Sylvie starts questioning herself and what it means to be the “New Lilith”. It gives us a glimpse of what’s to come in future installments although I’m not convinced that I’ll be reading that far into the series as it struggles to hold my interest.

I really didn’t like this book. I thought the idea of a sorcerer using innocent people to counter-act a curse to be interesting and creative, but everything seemed so drawn out that it was just boring to me. I struggled with what to rate it and settled on a disappointing two stars out of five.(less)

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May 16, 2011 Julia rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fantasy, fiction, urban, arcs, romance

Where as the first book ends in tears, and the second in ashes, this book ends with a sense of hope. Everything Sylvie has weathered and withstood comes to bear, and like a diamond she's all the more thrilling for the pressure. Benedict vividly interweaves the fantastic and the mundane, and has a gift for finding a sentence that stops me in my tracks (There was a fight scene that took me several pages to shake off, talk about visceral). In this world, a dead bad guy is still a person's body, you...more

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Jun 03, 2011 Kara-karina rated it 5 of 5 stars

4.5/5
Lyn Benedict is such an understated author, and her books are awesome! They are everything I love about urban fantasy: a hard, kick ass, smart heroine, wonderful sidekicks, plenty of villains of magical variety and non-stop action.

If you haven't read previous two books, please do it first, because this review will contain spoilers for book 1 and 2.

The book literally starts where the previous left. Odalis is in prison and Sylvie takes on a seemingly easy case of disappeared wife. Aha! She th...more

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May 26, 2011 Stacy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Reviewed by http://urbanfantasyinvestigations.blo...

Sylvie has been through a lot and learned a lot about her self since book one in the Shadows Inquiries series. I'm going to start out by saying I really missed having Demalion by her side and I really hope he returns in book 4. Wales from book 2 comes back and helps a ton with the case that Sylvie is working. He was a great addition to her team and I hope that he stays on. There is also the return of another character from a previous book but I...more

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Jun 27, 2011 Shelley aka Gizmo's Reviews rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011-releases, urban-fantasy

*Rating* 4.0 Banana Splits
Genre: Urban Fantasy

**Review**

Gods & Monsters, by Lyn Benedict, is the third installment in the Shadows & Inquiries series featuring Sylvie Lightner. Lightner runs a private investigative business called Shadows Inquiries. Some in local law enforcement as well as the ISI (Internal Surveillance & Investigations which is run by the government), believe Lightner is a loose cannon and a vigilante whose hatred of the Magicus Mundi makes her a danger to everyone a...more *Rating* 4.0 Banana Splits
Genre: Urban Fantasy

**Review**

Gods & Monsters, by Lyn Benedict, is the third installment in the Shadows & Inquiries series featuring Sylvie Lightner. Lightner runs a private investigative business called Shadows Inquiries. Some in local law enforcement as well as the ISI (Internal Surveillance & Investigations which is run by the government), believe Lightner is a loose cannon and a vigilante whose hatred of the Magicus Mundi makes her a danger to everyone around her.

They even consider her more of a threat than Gods, mad sorcerers, necromancers, and witches who have crossed Lightner’s path and ended up paying the price including someone who worked for her.

Lightner has been in the middle of some really bizarre and earth shattering events over the course of the last two books. She has gone up against Gods, killed Lilith who was is in her direct descendant line, and watched as her friends Demalion and Alex Figueroa-Smith were put in harm’s way. She lost the friendship of a powerful witch who ended up losing her powers after coming in contact with the God of Justice in Chicago. Only Alex has escaped mostly unscathed but for the grace of the God Eros, and now is Sylvie’s business partner since Sylvie can’t seem to get rid of her.

This book ups that ante even more and brings back one of my favorite characters, Erinya the Fury, back to the series. Erinya was last seen chasing Demalion’s ghost in order to devour it after the events of Sins & Shadows. You definitely must consider reading each book in order so that you get the feel of what Sylvie is going through and how she has grown over the course of this series.

Each book has really increased the pressure on Lightner to continue to fight for her life, while remaining out of the hands of the ISI and others who want to bring her down. She is a hard-ass, and definitely shoots first, and asks questions later sort of gal. The fact that she is considered a vigilante shouldn’t shy anyone away from this series. She has to be that way or people around her die.

The story really begins at the end of Ghosts & Echoes when Sylvie asked a werewolf friend of hers Tatya, to be on the lookout for a missing woman that was last seen in the Everglades. Not only does Tatya find the missing woman, but 4 others as well. Then Sylvie finds out that she is against a very powerful sorcerer who wants to become a God, and calls in Tierney (Ghoul) Wales for help.

If that weren’t enough, Lightner is still trying to find a way to keep Odalys Hargrove, who is a powerful witch and necromancer, behind bars for her part in bringing rich dead people back to life so that they can take over the bodies of teenagers and be beautiful and powerful once again.

As I said, I love the fact that Erinya is back in this story. She is extremely fierce and has no problem with her mission of eliminating those who are deemed unworthy (IE pedophiles, and anyone who hurts children.) Erinya and Sylvie may not be bosom buddies, but they are woven from the same fabric and the belief in justice for those who are most in need. Erinya realizes that Sylvie is keeping a secret, but is unable to find out what it is before she is transformed. (Nuff said without spoiling the ending.)

We are definitely heading into an area where some major secrets about Sylvie are ready to be revealed. What that will mean to her relationship with Alex and Demalion is yet to be determined.

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Apr 28, 2012 All Things Urban Fantasy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed-by-julia

While the Urban Fantasy genre is no stranger to dark and twisty heroines (think Dante Valentine and Anita Blake), Sylvie Lightner’s inner engine of anger isn’t powered by horrific abuse or childhood trauma, but rather the preternatural legacy of her bloodline. Of all the magical “super powers” to grow into, Sylvie’s is an unyielding will that just will not give in to some magics. I love how Benedict juxtaposes glimpses Sylvie’s happy childhood and family with the Magicus Mundi. The Magicus Mundi...more While the Urban Fantasy genre is no stranger to dark and twisty heroines (think Dante Valentine and Anita Blake), Sylvie Lightner’s inner engine of anger isn’t powered by horrific abuse or childhood trauma, but rather the preternatural legacy of her bloodline. Of all the magical “super powers” to grow into, Sylvie’s is an unyielding will that just will not give in to some magics. I love how Benedict juxtaposes glimpses Sylvie’s happy childhood and family with the Magicus Mundi. The Magicus Mundi is our world’s magical underbelly, where defeating bad guys sometimes means hiding a body from the cops, you're usually better off if the gods don't hear your prayers, and no fight is won without a cost.

GODS & MONSTERS reminded me afresh that Lyn Benedict has a gift for intertwining the fantastic with the mundane and creating a story that stops me in my tracks. Sylvie’s world is dark, dangerous, and as magically treacherous as it is realistic. Though I enjoyed the first two books in the series, GODS & MONSTERS is definitely my hands down favorite thus far.

Given the growing pains and events Sylvie has muscled her way through in books one and two, I would not recommend trying to jump right into the series with GODS & MONSTERS. New readers should not be put off of the series by the losses Sylvie suffers in prior books, however. Benedict certainly puts her readers through the emotional wringer, but that makes the victories all the sweeter when they arrive.

Case in point would be Sylvie’s love life, one of the most complex I’ve ever encountered. While she and Demalion are separated by distance (and a lot of heartbreaking emotional baggage) for this entire book, I finished the last page eager to pick up where they left off. I finished GODS & MONSTERS with a victorious smile on my face and hope in my breast. Sylvie's world doesn’t get any gentler, but her indomitable will makes it easier and easier to believe in some hard brand of happy endings.

Sexual Content: Threat of sexual violence.(less)

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Apr 26, 2011 Kelly rated it 4 of 5 stars

A subplot in Ghosts & Echoes involved Sylvie and a werewolf, Tatya, looking into the disappearance of a young woman in the Everglades. Lyn Benedict picks that thread back up at the beginning of Gods & Monsters. The woman has been found dead in the swamps, along with four others. Sylvie doesn’t want to get personally involved in this case, so she calls the police — but when the police move the bodies, one explodes into flame and the other four shift into animals. Three policemen are kille...more A subplot in Ghosts & Echoes involved Sylvie and a werewolf, Tatya, looking into the disappearance of a young woman in the Everglades. Lyn Benedict picks that thread back up at the beginning of Gods & Monsters. The woman has been found dead in the swamps, along with four others. Sylvie doesn’t want to get personally involved in this case, so she calls the police — but when the police move the bodies, one explodes into flame and the other four shift into animals. Three policemen are killed and some injured, including Adelio Suarez, a cop with whom Sylvie has an uneasy alliance. Now she’s involved whether she wants to be or not.

A many-layered plot unfolds, featuring a sorcerer with a diabolical scheme and a god trying to re-awaken. Sylvie has to piece together what’s going on and how the women are involved, all the while dodging threats from enemies she made in the previous book. Benedict stays in control of the complex plot throughout, never letting it devolve into a confusing mess even when the reader doesn’t have all the pieces yet.

Also fantastic is the way Benedict weaves in bits of the previous books. This starts with the opening scene in the Everglades, and later we encounter other “ripples” from earlier events and a character I didn’t expect to see again (and was really tickled to see again!). While each SHADOWS INQUIRIES book so far has been a self-contained story, every event has consequences that carry over into the subsequent books. One non-spoilery example is that Sylvie alienated Miami’s witch community in book two, and so when she needs magical help this time, her options are limited and she ends up working with someone whose magical path makes her skin crawl.

The writing continues to be excellent. Benedict evokes a dark mood but breaks it up with occasional snarky humor, such as when Sylvie draws a magic symbol on an enemy’s door. She thinks it’s just a bluff, something she made up on the spot:

"It’s not like I go around memorizing random magical sigils. It’s probably some company’s logo. I’ve probably just invoked the wrath of Starbucks on her ass.”

(But of course the sigil ends up being another little detail whose importance becomes clear much later!)

Overall, Gods & Monsters is another strong entry in a strong series. It can be read alone but some events will be more meaningful to readers who’ve been following along. Benedict continues to deliver good writing, original choices of antagonists, and overall, urban fantasy that doesn’t fall into cliché. I wish we’d seen more of Demalion this time, but I have to admit that the way Benedict handles Demalion is another example of the series’ originality. Read these books! You’re missing out. (less)

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Oct 02, 2011 Nocturne Romance Reads rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: paranormal

"Benedict weaves a fantastic story full of mystery, wonderfully developed characters and great humor (more sarcasm). The unexpected twist takes the reader to the brink, and leaves him wanting to know what happens next."

Dori has more to say about this book read her full review on NRR's website http://www.nocturnereads.com/Gods---M...

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May 25, 2011 Schnaucl rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, library, may, read_2011, series, urban_fantasy

Although I'm really tired of Lilith's ancestor as the protagonist, I still enjoyed this book.

I liked the mystery and didn't see any of the twists coming, which I appreciate.

I do feel like atheists are getting screwed in Benedict's world though.

I'm glad Sylvie is expanding her circle a little. It's probably good for her.

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Jul 11, 2012 Kim rated it 4 of 5 stars

I enjoyed the first book in the series, but had difficulty getting through the second one. This third entry in Shadows Inquiries was excellent though. Sylvie is a real kickass heroine, not just some chick in tight leather pants with an attitude.

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Jun 25, 2012 Daeja rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: preternatural

The best entry in the series so far, much more even than previous books.

Wales didn't seem entirely consistent with his appearance in second book in the series, but then, we barely knew him at all there.

Looking forward to the fourth...

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May 31, 2011 May rated it 3 of 5 stars

Like the author's style but can't stand the heroine of this book so I won't be seeking more. She doesn't come across as smart or interesting- so I don't want to follow her around on any more adventures!

Note: copy received for review (@ smexybooks)- not purchased.

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Oct 13, 2011 Sillylittlefishey rated it 2 of 5 stars

I was really hoping that this series would continue to get better but this one fell flat for me. I liked the premise of it but the pace of the book was too slow for my liking.

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Apr 21, 2012 Wafiyah rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: detectives, action-suspense, fantasy, family, not-so-good, terrible-protagonist, sloooww-progress

Slowest read ever. I could barely understand anything and I spent maybe a week on only the first hundred pages. Definitely not my type of book.

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Jan 22, 2013 Adam rated it 4 of 5 stars

Slow to start but this may be because I skipped the second book. Loved the ending and left questions for the future.

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Sep 28, 2011 Laurie Bongiorno rated it 4 of 5 stars

Another great and exciting read. As a side note, I find it disturbing that Demalion is living that cops life with his wife, that is so not right. How can she not tell and how can he not have explained what happened?? She deserves to know and mourn her husband, and he can still help her financially and keep the job...

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Jun 21, 2012 Tia rated it 4 of 5 stars

This novel was still a little sad but overall better than the second novel in this series. 'Adam' is Adam no longer, her lover has completely taken over his body and now is going home to 'Adams' wife and child. It was horribly sad that she was losing him to this, it tore my heart out.

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Feb 14, 2012 Scooper Speaks rated it 3 of 5 stars

It seemed like a lot of the the plot lines from the last book were left unexplored.

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Apr 13, 2013 Sarahlouro rated it 3 of 5 stars

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About Lyn Benedict

Pseudonym of Lane Robins.

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Quotes from Gods & Monsters

“You think I'm a part of the Magicus Mundi?"
"You are telling me you're not? That being the new Lilith means nothing? That it's a human thing?"
"It's the quintessential human thing," Sylvie said. "The ability to say fuck you.” — 3 people liked it

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Gods & Monsters (Shadows Inquiries #3)

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