Bound (Alex Caine, #1) in Aussie Readers

Jun 08, 2014 Tarran rated it really liked it

I had gone off Urban Fantasy lately. It all seems the same and all the plot lines tend to blend, but not this book.

Bound is the first book of the Alex Caine series by Alan Baxter. We start off in Sydney, then London and then all over the world. We are introduced to characters from Mythology and a new species of Fae. Alex Caine is a martial artist who makes a living off cage fighting. Then after a set of circumstances forces Alex to leave Australia, he then becomes bound to a dark grimoire which ...more

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Jun 18, 2014 Stephanie rated it really liked it

Shelves: read-2014, kindle, netgalley

eARC provided in return for a fair review via Netgalley (but I also nabbed my own copy subsequently)

Alan Baxter begins a new urban fantasy series with Bound, the first of the Alex Caine books.

Alex Caine is a professional fighter who has some odd talents - a kind of magical intuition is one of them, which he uses at the opening of this book to win a fight. This win, and the use of his talents, bring him to the attention of Webley, and Englishman who shows Alex that his talents are part of a bigge eARC provided in return for a fair review via Netgalley (but I also nabbed my own copy subsequently)

Alan Baxter begins a new urban fantasy series with Bound, the first of the Alex Caine books.

Alex Caine is a professional fighter who has some odd talents - a kind of magical intuition is one of them, which he uses at the opening of this book to win a fight. This win, and the use of his talents, bring him to the attention of Webley, and Englishman who shows Alex that his talents are part of a bigger magical world.

Cue a fast-paced trip around the world, with Alex discovering more and more about the world that is hidden beneath the mundane world. This is no pleasure cruise for Alex - tough as he is, even he finds it difficult to deal with some of the darkness that he finds.

It's really quite refreshing to see urban fantasy/dark horror written very much in the style of a thriller - this works especially well with Baxter's writing, which often evokes a very cinematic feel (and I am so with reviewer Sean the Bookonaut in that I could so see Jason Statham playing Alex). It's also very clear that Baxter has spent a lot of time building up this world - of which we only skim the surface (and of which I hope we delve deeper in the two subsequent books in the trilogy).

Some readers should be warned that there is a decent amount of sex (consensual) in this book, as well as lashings of violence. Especial note needs to be made of how damn good Baxter's fight scenes are - quite frequently fight scenes are something that I'll skip over as a reader, but I found myself sunk into each one in Bound (see the cinematic comment above).

Alex is always a very human character - he really struggles with the powers that he acquires, even as he takes a fighter's joy in them (which is a really refreshing change to a lot of urban fantasy). Even the minor characters live and breathe on the page, and always seem to act in a fashion that makes sense (even if it is sometimes a warped kind of sense!).

Hat tip to the naming of the characters Hood and Sparks (references to friends of the author and prominent people in the Aussie SF field), which I think just reflects the absolute joy that Baxter takes in his writing and his community.

An extremely promising start to a new urban fantasy series, which is highly recommended. I'm looking forward to the next two books. And dammit, someone make a movie out of this, please, because it is begging for it. ...more

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Apr 26, 2014 Greg Chapman rated it really liked it

This is a terrific dark fantasy action debut novel. Rich with detailed supernatural lore and a character who truly experiences the internal struggle between good and evil and his own personal torments, this is a thrilling start to the Alex Caine trilogy.

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