Magic and the Mob: “A Criminal Magic” by Lee Kelly

Greeting and hallucinations, my dears, and welcome back.

Before I begin this review, I would like to welcome two new people who have deigned to follow me since I last posted. Bill, Corey, thank you, and I hope you won’t regret it.

Now, on to the latest bit of insanity.

It’s 1926, and the 19th Amendment has been in effect for seven years, prohibiting the sale, distribution, and making of one of the most dangerous and addictive substances imaginable. The difference between this book and history is the target of Prohibition: not alcohol, but magic. The similarity is sadly the same: the rise of organized crime — and the innocent people forced by circumstance to work for them. Especially coveted by the criminal class are those with the magic touch, sorcerers who can do everything from conjure birds and flowers from thin air to transforming water into “sorcerer’s shine”, a strange combination of moonshine and LSD, with similar results and side effects.

Lee Kelly’s A Criminal Magic is told in stream-of-consciousness from two different points of view. Joan Kendrick is a girl from the Virginia backwoods, trying to run her family’s shine den and looking after her sister Ruby and cousin Ben, still haunted by the death of her mother. She’s recruited by a D.C. gang member to become one of seven sorcerers in a shine room run by the Irish Mob. Alex Danfrey, trying to make up for his father’s crimes on behalf of the Italian gang in D.C., has joined the Prohibition Unit, going undercover to bring the gangs to justice while exacting revenge for his family. Joan and Alex catch each other’s eyes while working on opposite sides of the law, and start to feel sparks that have nothing to do with their respective magics.

This story is a wonderful mix of historical fiction and urban fantasy. Kelly wrote Joan’s and Alex’s points of view with delicacy for their states of mind and vulnerabilities of heart. Joan must balance her feelings for Alex with earning money to take care of her family. Alex’s balancing act is in three different directions: his feelings for Joan, his undercover act within the gang, and making sure no one discovers his ties to the Feds.

The secondary characters are also layered and complex. The members of Joan’s magic troupe have their own specialties and suspicions. Gunn, the gangster who runs the shine den, is calculating and canny, but holds a regard for Joan. McEvoy, the capo of the Irish mob, is vicious and suspicious, and being an addict doesn’t help. Agent Frain, Alex’s boss with the Prohibition Unit, is dedicated to the ideals of the law, but is not above blackmail to get the job done. Even the street-level thugs that have family ties to their respective gangs are nicely ambitious and nuanced, not just cardboard cutouts.

A Criminal Magic can be found on Amazon, from Saga Press. If you want to lose yourself in how magic can go as wrong as it can go right, you really should check this out.

Thank you for reading my ramblings, my dears, and I hope to hear from you. If you’d like to recommend a book for me to read and review, or even need me as an editor for your own work, please leave a comment or contact me.

In the meantime, keep reading, keep writing, and never give up making your own magic. Be well.