Omnibus edition which contains books 5 & 6 of the series.

Paths Not Taken is the first of these and continues pretty much from where the previous one ended. Now that John Taylor, the Nightside’s resident private detective, has discovered who his mother is and seen a future devastation that she causes John decides he needs more information and plans a trip back in time to the very creation of the hidden city within a city. He knows such a journey won’t be easy so enlists some help to deal with the perils that are bound to occur. Shotgun Suzie is again along for the ride and they are accompanied by Tommy Oblivion, an existential detective. After dealing with some local unpleasantness they’re off to see Father Time to see if he’ll be willing to send them on their way and that’s when the fun really begins.

Sharper than a Serpent's Tooth is the 2nd part of this duology and deals with the consequences of what they found in the first and concludes the Lilith arc in an epic confrontation.

Despite being so far into the series I still have no real affinity for the characters. The lead is still pretty much the same person he was at the outset despite all that’s happened to him and the supporting cast are almost just cardboard cut-outs to use as cannon fodder or bounce plot points off. The stories themselves are okay though with plenty of action and imaginative use of varying magical implementations to get through some sticky situations. This is probably the end of this series for me though as I’m not looking to seek out the next book and it’s as good a place as any to leave. ( )

Paths not Taken

Still, forewarned was hopefully fore-armed, and I had some truly powerful computers on my side. They were supposed to be Artificial Intelligences from some potential future, on the run from something they preferred not to talk about. Cathy picked them up in a really good deal, the details of which she preferred not to discuss. Business as usual, in the Nightside. The AIs put up with being owned and used because they were datavores, information junkies, and they'd never seen anything like the Nightside.

John Taylor has discovered his mother's identity, and knows that she was responsible for creating the Nightside. He is determined to find out why she will end up wishing to destroy it, and decides to travel back to the founding of the Nightside, over two thousand years ago, taking bounty hunter Shotgun Suzie and existential detective Tommy Oblivion for support. Things do not go well, to say the least!

Sharper than a Serpent's Tooth – Simon R. Green

Just another day on the Street of the Gods, then- until dead angels began dropping out of the night sky. They fell gracelessly and landed hard, with broken wings and stupid, startled faces, like birds who have flown into the windows of high-rise buildings. They lay on the ground, not moving, creatures of light and darkness, like a child’s discarded toys. Everyone regarded the dead angels with awe and some timidity. And then they looked up, the worshippers and the worshipped, to see a greater dark miracle in the starry night sky.
A moonbeam extended lazily down into the Street of the Gods, shimmering silver starstuff, splendid and coldly beautiful, just like the great and awful personage who sailed slowly down it like an ethereal moving stairway, smiling and waving to the crowds below.

On his return to the present, John Taylor decides that he needs to travel forward in time, to meet the enemies who have been trying to kill him his whole life. He needs them to tell him what it is he will do to cause the destruction of the Nightside (and possibly the whole world), so that he can act differently and change the future.

Books 4 to 6 in this series tell the story of Taylor's search for his mother's identity and its repercussions, but that story arc is now over. Apparently the next book is a stand-alone story like the first three, which is a bit of a relief. It was enjoyable up until Taylor found out who his mother was, but his subsequent attempts to change the future were getting a tiny bit tedious. ( )