“The Speculative Fiction Indie Novella Championship (SFINCS, pronounced “sphinx”)a is a yearly competition to recognize, honor, and celebrate the talent and creativity present in the indie community. We are a sister competition to both SPFBO and SPSFC, and we highlight greatness in the novella format in all areas of speculative fiction (fantasy, science fiction, horror, etc.).” – From the official SFINCS website.
Note: The following review contains only my personal thoughts as a judge and does not reflect the views of the team as a whole.
REVIEW
Jessica A. McMinn’s Parasitic Omens is one of our five semi-finalists, and one I wasn’t initially assigned. Having read McMinn’s Call of the Huntress last year, I knew I was in for polished prose and a smooth, easy read, and I wasn’t disappointed. McMinn’s an author who recognizes the importance of clarity to the reading experience, and she wisely prioritizes that in her work. Parasitic Omens itself deals with darker subject matter than Call, and has a more layered narrative. While its spooky setting and set pieces should appeal to dark fantasy fans who love a secondary world, monster-of-the-week feel, engagement with its darker plot elements is fairly light, broadening his potential appeal. Much like Dave Lawson’s Pawns of Havoc (though I want to emphasize that the books are very very different), this one has real crowd-pleasing potential. Although Parasitic Omens includes fantastical and horror elements as part of its setting, at its heart it’s a detective story that sets the scene for 
future adventures with its protagonist. The detective elements and gaslamp setting should appeal to fans of Krystle Matar’s Legacy of the Brightwash, as well as TV shows like Penny Dreadful.
Parasitic Omens centers an investigator named Law as he takes on the case of the missing daughter of a wealthy local family. Unbeknownst to the girl’s desperate mother, however, Law has already happened upon the unfortunate young woman’s corpse, largely at random. A number of things bother Law about the case right from the jump, including the fact that the corpse appears to have hosted a monstrous parasite and that his boss clearly knows more about what happened to the girl than she’s willing to reveal. As Law’s grip on the truth tightens, he comes to suspect that the victims’s disappearance and death aren’t the work of a random woodland beastie, but someone–or something–closer to home. To catch the culprit, Law must employ supernatural tactics of his own, including calling on the duplicitous (though lovable) Cait Sidhe.
A truly plot-focused story, Parasitic Omens hits its stride about midway through, once Law begins investigating in earnest and is joined by the deliciously fun Cait Sidhe. Law’s quite a dry protagonist and I initially had a hard time getting a feel for his personality or motivations, but Cait Sidhe’s sly antics did a great job providing contrast, and her presence kept me guessing whether she might double-cross Law. If future installments include her, I’ll be rushing to grab the next one, and the levity McMinn injects into the story through Cait did wonderful work adding tonal layers to the novella as a whole.
Plot-wise, and despite the novella’s fantasy trappings, Parasitic Omens is a pretty classic detective story, and McMinn does a good job balancing the setting’s supernatural elements with its mundane ones. One of more common issues I see in fantasy mysteries is that there’s a lack of investment in the outcome of the mystery part of the plotline, but I never had that impression here, and while it’s not quite a story where its feels as though the point is to solve the case, by the halfway mark I was clipping along with the book, interested in how McMinn’s ending would unfold. It’s a novella that will leave you wanting to read more in the setting, with a sense that future entries will enrich the lore of Law’s world in meaningful ways.
“Law found this the hardest part of his job: the unbridled emotion of clients riddled with grief. “
While I do recommend Parasitic Omens, it’s not a perfect book, and I did find myself craving just a little more depth from its characters, themes, and its treatment of certain aspects of its subject matter. Without giving away specifics, there are some key plot elements that form part of the mystery’s resolution that I was salivating to find out more about. I don’t want to blame Parasitic Omens too much for not cluing up its plot threads, since it is the beginning of a series, but a slightly meatier, weightier ending with a bit more intention about it would have helped the book truly sing. As it stands, with a little bit of a meandering first half and a conclusion that doesn’t quite feel fully fleshed, the novella isn’t as structurally sound as I was expecting. There’s a lot that’s fairly standard about the plot and setting, the benefits of which are typically that the structure is very strong, but I had a bit of a sense that McMinn had created a lot of fascinating individual pieces (Cait Sidhe, the culprit, the visual of the corpse) and maybe wasn’t as sure how to combine them into a story that felt deliberate and specific. McMinn’s one of those writers, though, who’s got such full command of her line-level writing, that this is the kind of nitpicky stuff that stands out. It’s a testament to her skill in other areas that these are the issues that come to the fore for me. It’s also very possible that these issues are a result of Parasitic Omens being a lead-in novella.
As indie authors and reviewers, it can be daunting trying to make a name for yourself or for indie books at large. There’s a presumption that indie books will be poorly written or edited. Parasitic Omens is one I’d recommend to mainstream fantasy readers as a first foray into indie fantasy. It’s accessible, well-written, and has some genuinely fun moments. I said it in my review for McMinn’s earlier novella, but she’s consistently an author I feel I can trust. While I’ve offered my own suggestions as to who might most enjoy Parasitic Omens, I’ve also seen it compared with the Witcher franchise. I’ve only played the first game, so can’t speak to how much like the Witcher books it is, but certainly the investigative element, bounty-hunter/monster-of-the-week feel, and playful folklore could be compared with what I know of the series.
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