Trance by Kelly Meding

Trance by Kelly Meding

Book Stats:
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Mass Market Paperback: 432 pages
Publisher: Pocket Books
Release date: October 25, 2011

Series: MetaWars #1

Source: Personal Shelf

Reviewed by: Tynga

Purchase: Amazon | Book Depository

Kelly Meding’s war-ravaged Los Angeles is ground zero for the ultimate Meta human showdown in this sexy, action-packed new series.

Fifteen years ago, Teresa “Trance” West was a skilled telepath and a proud member of the Ranger Corps. But ever since the Rangers were inexplicably rendered powerless at the climax of the devastating Meta War, she’s bounced from one dead-end job to another. Now her powers have reappeared just as mysteriously as they vanished— only they’re completely transformed and more potent than ever. And they’re threatening to destroy her.

Trance heads to Los Angeles to track down the surviving Rangers and discover who restored her powers—and why—but a phantom enemy is determined to kill them before they can reassemble. As they dodge his deadly attacks and come to terms with their new role as heroes, Trance and the rest of the team set out to annihilate the sinister madman . . . only to discover their own powers are his greatest weapons.

Fifteen years ago, a war between the Rangers and the Banes, two supernaturally talented factions, was rapidly destroying the States and the world in its crossfire. When the Banes (the bad guys) were about to win, killing the last Ranger children alive, they all suddenly -and painfully- lost their abilities. The Banes were locked up in a mega prison located on Manhattan island and the Ranger kids were spread across the States into foster families. The last fifteen years have been really hard on Trance, juggling three job to be able to pay rent and eat, her love life’s a real joke and the future seems no better. Everything changes though when her powers, well the wrong ones actually!, comes back to her. Not knowing what to do, she heads back to the old control base, to meet with her new destiny.

The MetaWars series really remind me of a mix  between Xmen & Heroes (the TV show) and as I enjoyed both, I was right in my element with this novel. Kelly Meding created a post-war world where people grew to fear the supernaturally talented beings, even though the Rangers helped with rescue mission and such in the past. When they all regain their powers and one of the Banes sets on a quest to kill all the remaining Rangers, consequences affecting humans won’t go unnoticed and the big bad needs to be stopped before he kills all the good guys one by one.

It was interesting to see the Rangers struggle with their long lost powers and try their best to do the right thing in a battle they barely have any experience of. Trance found herself in leadership position and it’s no an easy task. Worries and insecurities are eating her up, failure after failure doesn’t help her case but this dreadful situation puts her in a position to grow.  Gage, Trance’s sidekick and love interest, was extremely interesting. He supports Trance everyway he can, yet he won’t let her get close. The shuts her out, hiding his past and his feelings, and their tug-of-war relationship added to the tension in the novel.

True to every superhero story, the plot moved forward in a goal to eliminate the big bad but the long chain of defeat, surprising twist and turns and unlikely allies, made-up for an interesting chase. The end was like a domino chain effect, everything going down in rapid succession with our heroes lagging to catch up, culminating with an extremely surprising reveal of the mysterious bad guy (who’s identity/location was unknown the whole novel).

This Superhero story is a nice stray from the traditional Urban Fantasy path and even though it won’t make my top 10 favorite series ever, it is a great debut to a new series and I’m looking forward to the second installment, Changeling. Action-packed with just the right amount of romance, Trance will please the superheroes lovers out there!

Posted by Tynga at 10:06

 Kelly Meding, Review, Simon Schuster  4 People left their mark

Tynga is a 32 years old mom of two, from Montreal, working as a lab technician in an hospital specialized in heart disease. In her free time, she enjoys reading all things Paranormal and photography.

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