She'd better watch her hair.
The Morgan Detective Agency by C.T. Phipps and Michael Suttkus is a series of Urban Fantasy action-adventure novels set in the The United States of Monsters.
Ashley Morgan is a former trainee for the House, but missed her opportunity to become one with the breaking of The Masquerade. After a failed attempt at being a superhero, she's since become a Private Detective with a specialization in the supernatural. Well, that's what her business card says. In truth, she mostly makes her money bringing in bail jumpers as a Bounty Hunter.
After a chance encounter with the vampire sheriff, Peter Stone, Ashley discovers her missing brother Arthur is still alive and ends up involved in a case with her ex-boyfriend Alexander Timons. This is just the start of her changing her views on the supernatural and going from enemy to ally.
Tough times.
The series contains the following books:
- Brightblade (2019)
- Brighteyes (TBA)
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Series
- Action Girl: Ashley is certainly one, being a trained spy and ex-superhero.
- Ancient Conspiracy: The House was one. For thousands of years, it protected humanity from knowledge of the supernatural but ultimately collapsed in 2008.
- Boomerang Bigot: Ashley's bloodline is actually infused with vampire blood to create dhampyr. She becomes a full half-vampire after being fed blood after a near-death experience.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: Ashley was subject to this by Sophia Baron. Sophia made her into a Sex Slave and a obedient perky girlfriend until her brother freed her.
- Cool Sword: Ashley has one, being a sword with an angel bound to it.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Ashley has one of these due to having lost her boyfriend, Mac, when they took on a supernatural serial killer that turned out to be working with a demon. She then became The Alcoholic and was briefly a vampire's slave.
- Dating What Daddy Hates: Ashley loathes Ashura and that her brother is married to her.
- Detect Evil: One of Zadkiel's abilities. He's notably rather reserved by it and avoids Fantastic Racism even when dealing with vampires or other monsters.
- Dhampyr: The protagonist, Ashley Morgan, is unknowingly a dhampyr as is her best friend Tracy.
- Fantastic Noir: This is a series about a Hardboiled Detective who just so happens to walk the beat of a city filled with supernatural horrors. Ashley Morgan is a Broken Ace and struggles to rebuild herself after her trauma as a vampire's slave.
- Fantastic Racism:
- Ashley has a serious case of it due to being raised by the House. This is especially noticeable when talking about vampires, which she can't stand.
- Averted by Zadkiel who, despite being a holy weapon, doesn't condemn monsters out of hand. The exception being ghouls and other The Soulless.
- Fantasy Kitchen Sink: Part and parcel for the United States of Monsters books but this book has a psychic, a magic sword with an angel, a wizard, vampires, dhampyrs, and more in the main party alone.
- Flat-Earth Atheist: Averted with Ashley who comes to accept Zadkiel is an angel even if it doesn't mean that she's inclined to convert.
- Fragile Speedster: Ashley is one of these due to her telekinesis making her lightning fast.
- Government Conspiracy: The Men in Black are this despite being a supernatural organization first and foremost.
- Heart Is an Awesome Power: Ashley has very low level telekensis that can only levitate a human being. She uses it to make her body extremely fast and able to punch things incredibly hard by doubling her weight.
- Happily Married: Arthur and Ashura are this.
- Holy Burns Evil: The entire purpose of Zadkiel is to assist heroes in killing monsters.
- Irony: Zadkiel the Holy Sword ends up in the hands of Antihero atheist Ashley.
- Pop-Cultured Badass: Alex and Arthur more than Ashley, though she holds her own.
- Psychic Powers: Ashley is a "bright" which is her nickname for psychics.
- Mafia Princess: Sophia Baron is effectively one, despite being second in command of a vampire crime family.
- The Masquerade: The end of it is what put Ashley out of a job. Humorously, this bothers her more than the resulting societal upheaval.
- The Men in Black: Are an actual organization in the world and apparently the remnant of the Red Room.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Surprisingly, God in this universe according to Zadkiel. The Council of Angels is apparently very far from being The Fundamentalist.
- Rich Bitch:
- Sophia Baron ticks all the boxes and holds her wealth over Ashley every bit as much as her vampire status.
- Ashura is also one and is a Nominal Hero at best.
- Token Evil Teammate: Ashura is totally amoral and only cares about Ashley because she's important to Arthur (her favorite husband).
- Vampires Own Nightclubs: Arthur lives above The Scarlet Woman, which is a stripclub. It's implied to be only one of several that he owns (and Ashura is the chief financier of).
- Working with the Ex: She is teamed up with her ex-boyfriend Alex.
- World of Snark: It wouldn't be a C.T. Phipps novel if it wasn't one of these.
Brightblade
- A God Am I: The Nakozo is quick to claim to be one. It turns out he has a claim to this as he's Lugh Longarms.
- Artifact of Doom: The Wand of the Nakozo is one of these and is a magical enhancer so powerful that it can bring vampires Back from the Dead. Ashley destroys it to keep it out of the government's hands.
- Big Bad: Sophia Baron serves as this for the majority of the book. But ends up Hijacked by Ganon in the end.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: The Barons are one of these, transforming only the best of every generation while killing or selling into slavery the other members.
- Bittersweet Ending: The Nakozo is permanently destroyed along with his wand. Unfortunately, two of the Terrible Trio are dead and Sophia Baron is a Karma Houdini. Ashley has managed to reunite with her brother but he's still a vampire and Ashley is now partially cursed with the condition to. Indeed, no one will ever be healed of the condition now that the wand is destroyed. Bryce and Minji are also both exposed as The Mole. Then it ends with Ashley catching her gravely injured sister.
- Driven to Villainy: The Terrible Trio have been cursed with Body Horror for decades and had to rob banks in order to survive. Now their only chance of recovering their original appearances is to gain an Artifact of Doom for an evil criminal.
- Gambit Pile Up: Ashley bumps into one of these as by the time she becomes involved, everyone is planning on betraying everyone else. Sophia Baron intends to resurrect the Nakozo with the help of the Terrible Trio in order to take over New Detroit. The Terrible Trio intend to betray her to Samvrutha in order to get their curses lifted and stop the Nakozo's resurrection. Except Sophia has intimidated one of them into betraying her fellows. The Nakozo, of course, is a Physical God and doesn't intend to do any of this. That's not even getting into the double agents and triple crosses that happen.
- Hijacked by Ganon: The Nakozo returns to full power and effortlessly casts away the attempt to dominate him.
- Honey Trap: Minji was sent to be one of these for Arthur. It failed because he saw through it and is also Happily Married.
- I Have Your Wife: Minji's mother and brother are held prisoner by Sophia Baron.
- The Mole:
- JP Morgan's detective agency is riddled with these. Both Trucy and Bryce are working for the Arthur and the Men in Black respectively.
- Minji turns out to be spying for Sophia Baron.
- Physical God: The Nakozo is worshiped as one despite "just" being a Fairy Lord that was turned into a vampire.
- The Reveal: Bryce turns out to have been a spy sent to watch over Ashley the entire time.
- Sex Slave: The Nakozo kept a harem of these. Saul Baron and other vampires are said to do the same.
- Spanner in the Works: This entire complicated mess (See Gambit Pile Up comes falling apart because Ashley went to the bank to make a deposit.
- The Stinger: Anna and Ashley reunite in the final page—but she's been shot by an unknown assailant.
- Villains Act, Heroes React: One of the funny parts of the plot is the fact that Ashley is caught up in a complicated chess match between Arthur, Samvrutha, and Sophia Baron. One she's completely unaware of until she stumbles into it.
