John Ridley, What Fire Cannot Burn

What Fire Cannot Burn

John Ridley

Aspect, Jan 2006, $6.99, 432 pp.

ISBN 0446612030

During the Age of Heroes, mankind was willing to let the metanormals be the policeman for mankind but when two of them fought and destroyed half of San Francisco and killed six hundred thousand people, humanity turned on them with a vengeance. Overnight, they were declared non-human, their rights stripped away and those that turned themselves in were sent to a special facility or transported out of the country.

Soledad O'Roark of the Pacific MTac, a division of the LAPD, is dedicated to fighting and killing mutants, but is injured during a nasty battle. While she recovers, she is transferred to the DIA, the unit that gathers Intel on mutants and hands it over to MTac for them to catch or kill. A man from I. A. approaches Soledad asking that she infiltrate a rogue cell within DIA that is killing mutants illegally. She infiltrates the group because she believes she can gather real Intel; the mission goes south so Soledad's comrade in MTac, Eddi Aoki, takes her place and finds she is dealing with a serial killer and an illegal cabal with a vision much different than the powers that be.

John Ridley is an expert when it comes to writing excellent, exciting, and entertaining urban fantasy. Humanity is already questioning the laws that says metanormals are not human (just like today many are questioning the Patriot Act) believing it is biased and overkill since there are many good metanormals who want to live ordinary lives and help humanity just like there are bad mutants who use their powers for their own gain. This is an action created work but the characters are fully developed so that the audience feels as if we are part of a very special reading experience.

Harriet Klausner