Early Review: Old Dog, New Tricks by Hailey Edwards (Black Dog #4)

Old Dog, New Tricks (Black Dog #4)
Hailey Edwards
Published: July 30, 2015 (Crushstar Multimedia)
Purchase: Amazon
Review source: copy provided by publisher in exchange for an honest review

Reviewed by: Margaret

Rating (out of 5): 4 stars

I’ve really enjoyed the Black Dog series. It’s full of fun, quick reads with lots of action, great magic and interesting creatures. It’s part paranormal police procedural, which I love, and part fantasy adventure in the Faerie realm. The series follows Thierry Thackery, a half-fae whose father is the Black Dog, a bounty hunter and peace keeper to the Fae courts. Thierry doesn’t meet him for the first time until book 3 in the series, but she has inherited his powers. Her left hand has the power to kill with a touch when she sets her magic free.

At the beginning of the series, Thierry has just graduated from the academy and become a conclave marshal, Fae law enforcement officers who police their own and keep them secret from humans. Her partner, who was also her trainer in the academy by virtue of being the only marshal in their region immune to her power, is Jackson Shaw—an incubus and her longtime crush. I loved the chemistry between Thierry and Shaw! Their relationship is on-again-off-again throughout the series and quite complicated because of their powers and their partnership. And then there’s the fact that they keep getting separated by various kidnappers.

This final installment has Thierry working with her father to master her powers so she can feed without killing. That includes being able to feed Shaw without hurting either of them, which since he’s an incubus is basically getting sex advice from her father. (Awkward!) With all the action that she sees in her job as a marshal, I had forgotten that Thierry is only 19. But Old Dog, New Tricks focuses a lot on her family and her mixed feelings about her father being back in both her life and her mother’s. I enjoyed the family drama, especially when Thierry’s father was teaching her magic, but it was a little odd for her to feel so young after everything that’s happened to her in the earlier books.

Later Thierry and her father must work together to sever the tethers between Faerie and the mortal realm and stop the Morrigan, who’s taken advantage of a power vacuum in Faerie, from taking over both realms. I love Edwards’ version of Faerie! It combines some of the expected elements, like a region for every season (say that five times fast!) with Wonderland-style images, like insects in hats and vests having a tea party and Thierry chasing a pucca in rabbit form. Old Dog, New Tricks also features lots of the usual creatures like redcaps, trolls and ogres, as well as some new and unexpected ones.

Set against that fanciful backdrop are lots of power grabbing and backstabbing. And I love the political machinations almost as much as the fairytale creatures. Some of those issues are still unresolved at the end of the book so even though this might be the end of Thierry’s story, I’m excited about what’s next in this world. It looks like the next book stars Thierry’s best friend Mai. She’s a kitsune, which is one of my all-time favorite underused creatures, so I can’t wait to learn more about her. I hope to see a little more of Thierry and Shaw as well.

Sexual content: sex