Mill Avenue Vexations
An ongoing series, with new episodes sporadically.
If you walk the streets of Phoenix during the day, you see a city, built by strong hands and strong minds. Her spires of glass and steel pierce the blue skies and scintillate in the blazing Arizona sun. Cars rush through the streets, billowing dust and desert scents. And once and a while you’ll notice a black and silver cab ferrying citizens from place to place.
At night, the city is a different place for most. Behind the hush of burnt out buildings, buried by the sound of booming bass from night clubs, and lurking in the young stone edifices of a city still growing up the restless ambitions of occultists and spirits writhe against the shadows.
As with all rising stars, Phoenix’s cometary coat-tails are more than long enough to ride on—and the shadows she casts longer.
Meet Vex Harrow, taxicab driver and occult investigator. A girl with a dark past and possibly a darker future; in a city that sometimes feels like it has no past, and expects a lot from its future.
Mill Avenue Vexations
Gothic style, taxi driving, and magick after dark
Tags: magic modern supernatural past tense series third person urban fantasy
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Editorial Reviews
Far from run of the mill…
(Review written after reading volumes 1-4).
Mill Avenue Vexations is brilliant. There. I said it.
Instead of reading the first few chapters, keeping a track of what I liked and what I didn’t, I was caught up in the story and was already at volume four by the time I looked up.
The story starts with a bang, but doesn’t fizzle out from there - it moves along quickly, but not at the expense of characterisation.
The mythology appears to be simple (for example, tarot cards are a large part of the plot), but subtle complications are weaved in - such as Vex’s inner demons. (Also, the tarot is explained as you go along, so there’s no need to worry - you won’t be left wanting for explanation as to what each of the pertinent cards mean).
Vex, and her supporting cast, are great - all are well-drawn from the get-go. (I also love the references to the many times Vex has punched people out - the world needs more feisty goth chicks).
Gore is alluded to, but not shown explicitly - this is a good technique, as one grows tired of reading in-depth descriptions of exactly how a body was mutilated.
I highly recommend it, and I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the volumes.
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Most Helpful Member Reviews
Algorythm
As a follower of Kyt Dotson’s for a couple years now, I find that the more I read of Kyt’s work, the better I like it, the more interesting it is and the more richly layered the world of Vex Harrow becomes.
Vex, the understated hero, part goth taxi driver, part detective, part potent magik-weilding mage, part Phoenix historian and part hard-bitten right-hook-throwing butt- kicking babe. Plus she’s beautiful and she’s got enough attitude to power a small city.
She’s hot stuff and when her powerful magiks aren’t enough or when she just wants to get up close and personal, she’s fast with her hands and even faster with a wand or two when the elemental forces of nature get twisted out of shape in the world around her.
I expect big things from Vex and feel pretty confident she will continue to amuse and impress her fans for years to come.
5 star multi layer entertainment with many twists and lots of crackly elemental mystery, suspense and action enough to boil the tires off her taxi on her way to her next nightmare.
Vex picks up and delivers in style. She’s someone you want in your corner the next time you come across series of human sacrifices and a possessed construction crane designed to recreate the ley lines of Phoenix, or if you just happen to be late to your next flight.
Keep them coming Kyt! peace d
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vexing tales
I have a friend who, as a gift periodically sends me a box of books from Amazon. Often included are books of a type I would not have cast an eye over when surveying a bookshop shelf and many are delighted finds for me. One of these was a book called The Specter in the Spectacles by a writer called Kyt Dotson.
I then discovered that she has an on-line series of tales about a Vex Harrow . . . and who might she be?
Do take a look here - http://www.millvexations.com/read/index.php
Vex drives a taxi and encounters all manner of threats, problems and oddities in her journeys around Gotham . . . wherever it might be. It is world containing magic, adeptly or clumsily enacted and startles the reader by appearing in the most commonplace of situations.
Vex is creative . . . she sees what needs to happen and she makes it happen. She deals with standard woes and more often than not ones that are deeper, darker and more beset with the casual stance practised evil takes.
Voices speak to her and are often ignored until their message becomes more urgent, more realised or enticing.
She carries on with an uneasy persistent feel that no matter what efforts are taken the rot is out there.
And she is not alone . . . there are continuing characters in various guises that offer support, comfort and often ripples of the light of laughter.
The stories are Innovation and modern with tags of those fears that all feel . . . and provide a delicious sense of dread and deepening dark . . . and her taxi . . . a most astonishing vehicle.
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Get Vexed!
Mill Avenue Vexations blends the rich street culture of Tempe’s Mill Avenue into a vibrant fantasy macrocosm involving the dark supernatural, an occult-powered taxi cab, and a Goth named Vex.
Remarkably engrossing, these volumes are not your ordinary work of dark fiction. They offer unique characters and strong plotlines that engage the reader into the eerily playful world of the paranormal.
As these adventures unfold, we learn more about Vex’s past and how it has shaped her career as a pentacle-wearing, wand-wielding cabbie. Besides the published volumes with the absolutely gorgeous cover art, there are some short stories on the fansite that are just as enjoyable, such as "I Do Not Want Fries With That" and the ever-popular "Hello Cory".
Vexations is a good read for us Phoenicians or anyone interested in tales of the paranormal with a dose of comedy and Gothic style!
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Mayhem in the Desert
The metro Phoenix area is a place quite different from anywhere else I have ever been. Each piece is so independent from the rest. Mill Avenue Vexations is set in a small college town, or at least, that’s what Tempe feels like. Vex protects the students and others there, whether they realize it or not, and she’s awesome. She’s this kinda crazy chick with some definite personal issues. It’s so easy to believe in her, and root for her. I have been reading this story since the beginning, and was drawn in immediately. Each volume shows improvements in the story and Kyt really settling in to his storytelling style. I’ve reached a point where I even know the different characters’ names, which is a feat and a half for me, even when I care about them. This is a great story line, with some interesting side volumes as well. I’m always eager for the next volume, and while I never want it to end, I’m also incredibly curious to find out why in the heck Vex is standing there with a gun.
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