I’ve mentioned this before but I have four favorite authors. Surprisingly, even though I’m on a major YA kick this year my favorites are all still Urban Fantasy authors. The most recent addition is one Carrie Vaughn.

For some reason I avoided her books foreevveerr and looking back, I have no idea why. Kitty and the Midnight Hour was unbelievable. Since then I’ve plowed through the rest of the books. There have been one or two in the series that were a little out there but for the most part I can only gush about these books. The plots are never repetitive and always have you anxious to see what happens next.

Kitty is one of the most true to life MC’s that I’ve read. She started out very timid and unsure of herself and only through the course of the books has she turned into the fearless leader type. Kick-ass female leads are everywhere now, and really that’s fantastic but it was definitely nice to see how sometimes they have to work for character growth just like real people. We don’t all just come out this awesome you know? Sometimes it takes a little trial and error.

The supporting cast is great too. Her wolf pack makes up the bulk of the characters that you see in every book (plus one surly ex-con that I don’t always get the appeal of) and they all have distinct and well rounded personalities as well as histories to help explain why they are who they are. My favorites though are some of the randoms she meets along the way. I especially like her vampires. A little ominous and mysterious, always playing the long game.

I still have a couple non-Kitty books I need to read in order to get the full Carrie Vaughn experience. I read Voices with Dragons last year and honestly, I didn’t love it. But it didn’t sound like my kind of book to begin with but I’m really looking forward to reading Steel, a YA novel about a girl who fences competitively and then somehow gets sucked into piratey adventures where her skills have some real use.

The other reason I love Carrie Vaughn… her blog! Filling The Well. She doesn’t only post when she has something to say about one of her books so I’m always checking back to see her take on movies etc. just because she’s a really entertaining person and totally someone I could see me getting along with.

Anyways… I love her! You should too!