Book links:Amazon, Goodreads

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Craig Schaefer writes about witches, outlaws, and outsiders. Whether they’re weaving tales of an occult-shrouded New York in Ghosts of Gotham, the dimension-hopping adventures of Castaways, or the gritty streets of a noir future in the Neon Meridian series, their protagonists are damaged survivors searching for answers, redemption, or maybe just that one big score.

Publisher: Aethon Books (May 19, 2026) Page count: 358 pages Formats: audiobook, ebook, paperback Genre: Urban Science Fantasy

At this point Craig Schaefer has basically become an instabuy author for me. Whenever a new book appears, I buy it, move it straight to the top of my TBR pile, and assume I’m about to have a good time. So far this strategy has worked quite well. I don’t think Schaefer has actually disappointed me once.

Catch and Kill definitely continues the streak.

This book feels like Schaefer operating in peak form again: fast, tight, funny in the right places, surprisingly charming, and full of twists that keep the story moving without turning it into nonsense. It’s also definitely adult. People get shot, cursed, murdered, manipulated, and occasionally reduced to a warning. But if you’re picking up cyberpunkish urban fantasy involving magical corporate espionage, that's probably what you're looking for.

Magic became public knowledge decades ago and people decided to monetize it. So now Hell has embassies, corporations employ witches and undead accountants probably exist somewhere off-page filing cursed paperwork forever.

Emily Yeats is a blue-collar Brooklyn witch running security audits with her team by staging elaborate magical break-ins for clients. She may not be the strongest person in the room physically, but she compensates with skill, stubbornness, and enough magical talent to make very dangerous people regret underestimating her. Her team is fantastic, and it includes a sentient android who moonlights as a dominatrix, a hacker/catgirl genius, and a hardened military operative who balances out the team’s collective tendency toward chaos.

Also, Emily shares her apartment with venomous spiders. Weirdly enough, they are excellent roommates. Quiet. Helpful. Probably better at cleaning than most humans.

The whole thing is insanely readable. Schaefer throws cyberpunk elements, urban fantasy, corporate conspiracies, magical contracts, supernatural assassins, and heist elements into the same blender and somehow the story never feels overloaded. It just moves. Every chapter pushes forward cleanly, and before long you realize you read half the book in one sitting.

And while this is clearly the start of a series, the actual story feels complete. There's no massive cliffhanger or "to be continued" ambush right as things get interesting. The central plot wraps up properly while still leaving plenty of room for future books.

Which is good, because I absolutely want future books. Book two. Book three. Book seven if sales permit. I’d happily keep following Emily and her dysfunctional little team through magical cyberpunk disasters for quite a while.