Unfallen Dead is a good strong installment in the Connor Grey novels by Mark Del Franco, advancing the storyline not only for the world at large, but also for the story arc about what happened to Connor to disable his druid abilities. More specifically, we’ve got ourselves a story where the Convergence, the great merging of the human and Faerie worlds a hundred years or so back, seems to be finally reversing itself. But Connor’s got his own issues; an underQueen of the Seelie Court is bent on interrogating him and Meryl Dian about the events at the tail end of the last story. And furthermore, Connor’s old Guild partner from New York, Dylan macBain, has shown up in town to fill in for Keeva macNeve, suspended from duty because of those same questionable events.

And just to add insult to injury, Dylan’s even got Connor’s old office.

It’s nice to be far enough along in the series arc at this point that we’re past Connor’s initial wave of resentment about his disability, and are moving on to him figuring out what it is and how to conquer it. There are events in the last act of this story that raise all sorts of interesting questions about what exactly happened to Connor, especially given how his nemesis Bergin Vize finally shows up on camera–in a state that Connor does not expect at all. But that’s only part of what he has to deal with from Vize, given that that elf’s bent on taking out the Seelie Court. Meanwhile, another fey is killing people and framing Meryl for the crime, giving Connor yet another challenge to juggle.

Good strong story over all and I’m looking forward to diving right into Book Four, now that it’s out. Four stars.