Rating: 4/5, good
If you’re looking for a comfort read with supernatural characters, look no further…
Strange Practice is about Dr. Greta Helsing, daughter of Wilfert Helsing. Greta inherited her father’s practice when he died a few years ago. She works to keep the undead in good “health”—in this universe, vampires and ghouls can suffer from the same ailments as human beings.
Enter the Rosary Ripper, a ruthless murderer who leaves cheap plastic rosaries on their victims…
Greta treats Varney, a vampire who got attacked by a group of monks that the heroes suspect are the group behind the Rosary Ripper’s murders. Greta teams up with her old supernatural friends Fastitocalon and Ruthven as well as Ruthven’s human friend August Cranswell to get to the bottom of the scourge sweeping London.
This is a pretty simple story and the prose is just kind of okay, but it’s fun. This is a very character-driven, female-gaze kind of series with lots of the hurt/comfort trope (to the point where it gets a little bit repetitive at times…). The plot could fit into a Buffy episode and moves a touch slowly (especially if you’re a slow reader like me).
There are a couple moving scenes, like when Greta is thinking about her father:
“She had asked her father how he could bear the entire responsibility alone, how do you stand it, how do you know you’re not going to make mistakes with no one else there to help you, and he had laughed a little. I don’t, he had said. I don’t know for a fact. But I know that I know how to do this job. I trust in my own skill and experience to help me make good decisions. When it comes right down to it, you must be able to trust yourself, before asking your patients to place their trust in you. If you cannot do that, do not pursue medicine as a career. She had shivered. But I don’t trust myself, yet. Not entirely. You will get there, Gretalina. Confidence comes with practice and reinforcement of learning. You have the right kind of brain for this, and you also—he had tapped her solemnly on the chest—have the right kind of heart.”
Greta is very much still missing her father and looking for guidance from other older men around her like Fastitocalon and Ruthven. Greta’s closeness to Fastitocalon is really sweet and if I read the later books, it’ll be to experience more of their cuteness (and find out what happens with Greta and Varney, as Varney’s attracted to her but it doesn’t develop much in this volume…).
The dry humor at parts is really fun, too:
There wasn’t a lot in the literature about the use of antidepressants in ghouls.
I’d say this is a satisfying first installment. It’s a complete story arc that sets up the worldbuilding, characters, and structural expectations but leaves the reader with a few residual questions. If you don’t mind the slowness or simplicity, I’d recommend it! (If those things bother you, I would skip it, though)
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