Simantov

Pros:
-Good police procedural
-Great modern/urban fantasy feel.
-Takes a country I’m very familiar with and a culture I belong to and adds a layer of mystique I wasn’t expecting.
-Family dynamics and relationship tension, definitely unexpected, but enjoyable.

Cons:
-pacing is on the slow side. Takes a while to get invested in the characters.
-At one point, a character refers to “calling 911.” 911 isn’t the emergency services number in Israel. Saying “call emergency services” instead would have gotten the point across without being jarring for readers who know the difference.

3.5/5 stars (rounded up for the star counter),
worth a read.

Thanks to #NetGalley and #AngryRobot for the eARC

Angry Robot releases a wide variety of Science Fiction/Fantasy/Weird stuff novels, so it is no surprise that they have opted to publish Simantov by Asaf Ashery. Originally published in Hebrew, the story is part police procedure/part apocalypse. Mazzy Simantov leads a group of mystical detectives filled with coffee ground and tarot card readers, soothsayers, and clairvoyants, to help with cases the routine police cannot solve. When women start to get kidnapped by angels, they are called in to help solve the case.

There are some things that I did not like about the novel, but I wonder if some of it is due more to the translation than the actual original text. Since I am reading a translation, there are some things that could have been treated differently in the original text. I did not like how dismissive the main character is to her husband, Gabby. We are not really told how their relationship had been before the novel, but he is to the place where he is doing things to try to win her affection, and when he gets what little he receives from her, he is grateful and she is dismissive. I don’t know if this is one of the character traits that Ashery wants, but by making her this sort of person in her personal life, it makes me feel like the rest of her roles as a daughter, officer of the law, and hero, seem tainted. There are some ways that this tenseness between husband and wife carries too much weight at the end of the novel. I also do not like that there seems to be a workaround for every situation. Like if someone gets hurt, there’s a spell for that. If some problem is unsolved, there’s a tarot reading for that. For a book that is part police procedural, all of the clues they find are not used much. Instead Ashery uses a “Well it’s because they have mysticism on their side” way of solving the crimes. The actual detective work is very slim because it is easier to solve the puzzles with mysticism.

I did not hate this novel though. It was pretty entertaining despite its flaws. Some of the writing (or translating) is a little clunky at times, but I didn’t hate it. I wish I could do half stars because it deserves more than three but less than four. I think I have to round down in this instance, but if I could, I’d give it three and a half stars. Its slightly better than average, but not by too much.

I love that Angry Robot published this, and there needs to be more sci-fi/fantasy in translation. They are a press that always takes risks, and even though this one did not turn out perfect, the door needs to stay open for other books in translation.

I received this ARC through Angry Robot and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

An interesting and engaging urban fantasy, set in Israel. The novel follows Detectives Simantov and Bitton, along with their team of mystic agents, who are investigating the disappearance of a number of women under strange and mysterious circumstances.

The novel is an intriguing combination of mystery and biblical-fantasy. Well-written, it grabbed my attention early on, and I welcomed the atypical (for a Western market) setting. Definitely worth a look if you're a fan of the genre, but looking for something a little different. Recommended.