Nameless, the first novel by Matthew Rossi kicks off his Nameless series.
Thea Mendel is living in her car because her mother's ghost is haunting her house and may have killed her father. Thomas Willrew survived a car accident that killed both his parents and changed him. They meet and fall together into a world of ghosts, magic, monsters and wickedness called up by a woman who wants Thomas dead, and Thea worse than dead. The magical chaos soon drags in Thomas' best friend Bishop, Thea's cousins Joe and Seri, and Dasslia's unwilling agents Morgan, James and Byron. This woman, Dassalia, is tied into both of their pasts and the deaths of their parents, and together Thea and Thomas managed to end her plans and fall in love.There's a lot of high weirdness - vampires are real, a shoggoth attacks Thanksgiving, and Santa Claus gets in a fight.
This book provides examples of:
- Action Girl: Mostly Thea, although Seri gets in a few licks.
- Battle Couple: Thomas and Thea absolutely fulfill this trope especially by the end of the book.
- Beta Couple: Joe and Bishop.
- Clap Your Hands If You Believe: The magic in the setting is very much based on both personal and general belief. The more people who believe in an idea or have believed in it the stronger it can be.
- Conveniently an Orphan: Subverted to a degree in that Dassalia is the reason most of the cast are orphans but there are still a lot of orphans in the cast.
- Destructive Romance: Dassalia's romancer with Thomas's Grandfather
- The Dulcinea Effect: Thomas meets Thea and within two hours is helping her confront her mother's ghost, which involves a Hound of Tindalos.
- Eating the Eye Candy: Thea and Thomas both do this with each other, and just about everyone does this to Bishop.
- Flirting Under Fire: Thea flirts with Thomas directly after a monster appears in her kitchen.
- Her Boyfriend's Jacket: Thea is wearing Thomas' jacket within five minutes of meeting him.
- I Love You, Vampire Son: Played straight with Akivasha and most of her offsrping, especially Mercy. Mercy also has a similar relationship with Stuart, her offspring, but it's more fraught as he hates being a vampire but still loves her.
- It's Not You, It's Me: Seria to her long term boyfriend David at the end of the book.
- Kissing Cousins: Subverted because while Seria and Morgan, who is revealed to be her cousin display signs of attraction, they are repulsed by the idea.
- Love at First Sight: Thea and Thomas meet the day before Halloween and by midnight have moved in together.
- Love Makes You Evil: Dassalia just wants the people she loved most back and she'll do anything, and I mean anything, to make it happen.
- Love Revelation Epiphany: She kind of knew, but after Thomas confesses Thea realizes she feels the same.
- The Missus and the Ex: Subverted in that Thomas's ex Evvie meets Thea but there's no real friction nor does she become particularly tight with Thea.
- The Mourning After: Dassalia, although she has a hard time admitting she ever loved anyone.
- No Guy Wants an Amazon: Subverted. Thea is over six feet tall and studied kickboxing (she beats up two men at once at one point) and Thomas is absolutely fine with that.
- Orphan's Ordeal: Not only Thomas (his parents die in a car accident a year before the book starts) and Thea (her mother committed suicide, her father possibly died because of her ghost) but Thea's cousins Seri and Joe, the antagonistic Morgan, Jimmy and Byron, and even the villain Dassalia are all orphans.
- Summoning Ritual: Both Thea and Dassalia summon a great many things throughout the book, it's Dassalia's primary means of magical attack and Thea's as well. The end of the book involves a ritual to summon C'thulhu.
- Walking Shirtless Scene: Thomas either takes his shirt off or has it torn off several times in the book.
