Where Angels Fear to Tread by Thomas E. Sniegoski
The Remy Chandler Chronicles, #3

Six year-old Zoe York has been taken and her mother has come to Remy for help. She shows him crude, childlike drawings that she claims are Zoe's visions of the future, everything leading up to her abduction, and some beyond. Like the picture of a man with wings who would come and save her-a man who is an angel.

Zoe's preternatural gifts have made her a target for those who wish to exploit her power to their own destructive ends. The search will take Remy to dark places he would rather avoid. But to save an innocent, Remy will ally himself with a variety of lesser evils-and his soul may pay the price...

-- Where Angels Fear to Tread
by Thomas E. Sniegoski
Copyright © 2010 by Thomas E. Sniegoski

My Review

I saw this novel as a kind of place-holder between Dancing on the Head of a Pin and A Hundred Words for Hate. While interesting, it wasn’t as compelling as the previous two novels. For me, this was due to the fact that Francis, Remy’s fallen-angel friend, was not in this story. Granted, his return from Tartarus is a story in itself, which should be covered in A Hundred Words for Hate, but with him missing, and Remy’s cop friend Steve barely getting a mention in this tale, I felt like my anchor was not in firm ground. I did like, however, Remy’s dream-like interactions with his late wife Madeline. She’s his anchor, and for him to be able to visit with her and get advice from her made me want to cheer for Remy.

I give this story THREE STARS.

Dancing on the Head of a Pin

Dancing on the Head of a Pin by Thomas E. Sniegoski

The Remy Chandler Chronicles, #2

Once he was known as the Angel Remiel, but generations ago, Boston PI Remy Chandler chose to renounce heaven and live on earth, where he found a secure place among us ordinary humans…

But now, having lost the love of his life, Remy finds himself turning more and more away from his human friends and his everyday existence. He’s begun to seek out dangerous jobs—those that involve the supernatural, those that bring him into contact with his past.

Like his latest case: the theft of a cache of ancient weaponry stolen from a collector who deals in antiquities of a dark and dubious nature. The weapons, Remy knows, were forged aeons ago and imbued with unimaginable power. If they fall into the wrong hands, they could be used to destroy not only Heaven but also Earth. And to prevent that, Remy Chandler must decide whether he is willing to lose the last of his own humanity…

 --Dancing on the Head of a Pin

by Thomas E. Sniegoski

Copyright © 2009 by Thomas E. Sniegoski

My Review

A few months after the death of his beloved Madeline, Boston P.I. Remy Chandler is slowly starting to get back to his life.  It’s difficult for him, having never before suffered such a heart-wrenching loss, but time goes on and he needs to keep going. 

He’s also struggling to hold on to the humanity he so carefully crafted the many millennia he’s lived on earth.  He’d only let his angelic nature out twice in the last fifty years, once to Madeline and once to a cop who is now one of his closest friends.  In order to avert the Apocalypse, however, he had to become Remiel and do battle as an angel of the Host Seraphim.  Now, he’s having a hard time keeping that part of him inside.

Life in Boston—and around the world—has changed subtly since the Apocalypse was averted.  Things are darker now, more surreal, and supernatural things are happening all around.  Like the black-market selling of an angel’s internal organs.  He’s investigating that particular case with his friend Francis, a fallen angel and guardian of Tartarus, when he receives a call.  An antique weapons collector has had several of his prized pieces stolen.  He agrees to check it out and quickly discovers that the missing weapons are known as the Pitiless, a sword, battleax, twin daggers and a pistol made of material not of this earth. 

The Fallen angels of Heaven want the weapons in order to free their master, the Morning Star, from his tomb in Tartarus so that the great war of the heavens can resume.  Remy must do everything in his considerable power to stop this from happening, even if that means shedding his prized human form forever.

I give this story FOUR STARS.