Rating: 
Summary: She Crawls Before She Walks
Review: True, at first glance there may seem to be differences in the book and Anita's character, but when you look at the pattern of the books you can see that Anita's power is always expanding and we as readers are learning with her the limits or lack thereof to her power. Certainly Anita acts out of character and does less than moral things in this book, but just as she needed training and practice to become a sure-shot and fast-draw, she will need to learn techniques to quell new desires and experience to bring fledgling abilities to second-nature skills. I thought the ending was a bit abrupt and that there could have been less sex, but overall I'm excited to see Anita to grow as a tough character and anxiously await the next installment.
Rating: 
Summary: Different, but good
Review: I absolutely love the Anita Blake series. Her previous books usually included a mystery to solve or a bad guy to conquer. Anita herself and her emotions seem to be the "bad guy" this time and it is her struggle with herself which moves the story along. It is interesting to see that all of the characters are evolving. Hamilton's books are always a fascinating read and this is no exception.
Rating:
Summary: Great book, great series
Review: Anita Blake has been avoiding the other members of the triumvirate for six months now. She has been trying to come to grips with her new and her old and growing powers. She is also taking care of the very damaged wereleopards. She allowed them to go out one night and got a panicked call that they were in trouble at an D & S club called Narcissus in Chains. She calls an unhappy Jean Claude to meet her there to save them. Richard shows up also and they "marry" their powers. Anita, saves her leopards, being badly injured in the process. That causes all kinds of problems. Jean Claude ends up in jail for killing her, Richard goes nuts and threatens the leopard who accidently scratches her, a disgruntled pard member is inviting potential Nimiraj to be interviewed, and she wakes up with Jean Claude's incubus urges. While she was away, the boys have had their positions challenged, Jean Claude has handled it, but Richard is having difficulty. The new Nimiraj seems too perfect and has secrets, and his pard is nearly as damaged as Anita's. Anita must mend her relationships and is worried that she might become furry herself on the next full moon. This novel opens up many possibilities for the future. Micah is an interesting addition. La Belle Morte seems to be interested in the triumvirate. Asher's character is becoming more interesting. Jean Claude's character is also developing nicely. I also liked the new assortment of werecharacters. The next novel should be very interesting.
Rating: 
Summary: I hope this is part of a longish plot line that goes on
Review: First of all, I don't mind normally reading a steaming chapter or two of sexual encouters, but this time it was just to much of the same.
Too darn much sex, sex, sex and not much else - especially when LKH needs 10 to 15 pages to describe one sexual encounter.
It gets to the point where you ask yourself where the story is ?
The fact also that LKH in her intro says her usual clique of writer friends didn't see this one due to time constraints, points sort of the way to a novel that was quickly written.
All is not lost, if you're an optimist like me though - this could also be the book that describes Anita's descent into 'hell' and in the next book her fight against it and her climb back out of it. How to get rid of the marks ? How to get rid of the sex ?
I'll wait for the next one to check if Anita as we know it survives...
I'll be sorely disappointed if the next one doesn't
Rating: 
Summary: Sex & Violence, and not much else.
Review: I've read all the Anita Blake books, and enjoyed them all, except this one. I've thought for several books that Anita was getting too violent, but in this one, she loses the last shreds of her morals, and appears dedicated to pursuing all the sex, violence, and violent sex she can get. This book is almost totally plotless! Anita used to be a great character I could love and admire- the Anita in this book is just a bloodthirsty ...
Rating:
Summary: WOW!
Review: THIs books totally rocks!
Anita gets more powers and she kicks everyones ...!
Furthermore, a bunch of new characters are introduced and Anita
developes a new relationship... I have read this book three times
and still I am not tired of it! Its a really really great read and if you like female characters
that are smart, witty, and totally up front, then
read the entire series...
Rating:
Summary: Good, Sexy fun
Review: This books is definitly a change from the old Anita Blake books. It's a great read, much more sexually charged than the earlier, though a few things are missing, namely Edward everyone's favorite psychopath, and Anita's job as an animator is barely touched on.
Rating:
Summary: A sad, sad waste of an interesting character...
Review: I discovered the Anita Blake series a few years back on a suggestion. I was thrilled by the first book I read went back and hungril consumed the rest of the series. I knew from the start that the Blake books weren't high literature, but as escapist fantasy, they sure were fun.
Flash forward three increasingly disappointing books and we get to the latest dreck in the previously entertaining line, Narcissus in Chains. Any scrap of individuality that Blake had is totally lost in a book that a few hundred pages of muddled plot that's just a backdrop for Anita to have sex with anyone who walks past her, with the flimsiest excuse ever invented. Our once quirky heroine has become just another bimbo- and a psychopathic bimbo to boot. I suppose that would excuse her behavior, except that Hamilton has spent most of the last 9 books setting up a personality for her. There's no sign of it anywhere. Oh, and fans of the hard boiled detective angle should just skip this volume- Anita doesn't even come within spitting distance of her job. It amazes me that she can afford to support all the people who've moved in with her, or that the investigative agency hasn't fired her by now for never showing up at work. Oh, wait... her boyfriend pays for everything. Yep, that's one strong willed feminist there.
If I really wanted to read about grossly over powered characters with no believable actions, no consistent morals, a sudden lack of motivations or background, I'd play more D&D. If I wanted graphic sex scenes with no plot, I'd just buy soft core porn. I expected better of Hamilton and Blake.
Rating:
Summary: The Greatest Mystery of Any Anita Book
Review: Narcissus in Chains came across more as a dark version of some teenager spewing out sexual fantasies on a spiral notebook under the cover of night than a book fit of a professional author and publisher. Every man is endowed enough to make an elephant envious, and every male character (often instantly) wants to have sex with Anita. Those who don't, are just in love with her. Does this not sound like a hormonal teenager's dream? Heck, it would work for me, however..... Any night now, I expect to see Edward shower her with roses and drop to one knee professing his eternal love to her, and of course he'd be the most endowed of any of them, considering he "has all the best toys." All the men are wonderful lovers, and even better, there's ample chance to have all the great effects without even having actual sex in weird versions of supernatural sex. All the better for those orgies.
I've read (although I haven't reviewed) all of the Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series from the first book to this one. The things which attracted me to them were the roller coaster ride pace they set, how the author kept me guessing to the very end on whichever mystery or situation Anita set out to solve, and the characters themselves. Everything I've reviewed to date has one common factor - it deals with shapeshifters in some ways. The good, the bad, the ugly, the adult fiction, the children's fiction, science fiction, gothic horror, romance, legends, or chiller, I've likely read it. I also like vampires, and something else which attracted me to the series was the closeness Anita's world has to the World of Darkness, a Role Playing Game by White Wolf Studios. Although I never played the game seriously, the world which it created was in many ways a mirror image of Hamilton's -- with one huge difference -- the "monsters" aren't in hiding. Fascinating concept, and wonderful characters as the readers began to get to know Anita, Jean-Claud, Richard, the Pard, Edward, and the others. I never liked the fact that every single book either had someone raped in it or at the very least the treat of rape. Where this isn't particularly offensive except in one case, I found it drearily overused to the point it was losing its impact and it seldom seemed to have any actual purpose. Some more creativity would be nice, as after all, there are considerably more horrific things a person can be threatened with. I overlooked the sexual violence, as did many of my friends, because the story was so great. Then we got to Narcissus in Chains, and the greatest mystery presented to the "old" readers ever. Where's the plot, and where did the characters go who we got to know?
Anita has devolved. Every good character should grow and change. They should lose their innocence, grapple with tough choices, and perhaps become someone we no longer recognize. However, all of this happening in a single book, to all the main characters, along with utter loss of plot is a bit much. Where once Anita was adamantly against casual sex, she's now bopping from orgy to orgy, man to man, bed to bed. Because of the ardeur, you say? When was the last time headstrong, stubborn Anita simply tossed the towel in at the first sign of trouble without digging her heels in either turning the situation around, or at least fighting it? Richard almost kills his own pack? Not the Richard we knew. Jean-Claud has gone from Master Vampire to some clingy Harlequin Romance figure gushing his eternal love (although he'll have to get in line, Eddie is probably waiting in the wings for the next novel.) Nathaniel, who Anita has always treated more as a sibling or child is suddenly her lover. Just as he was starting to heal and get himself started in a healthy direction, she jumps into bed with him. That's not the Anita we knew, who once cared about things like that, as well as her friends, all the way up to the last book. The book was almost over before anything of consequence happened - aside from sex, sex, and more sex. Even Anita's humor fled the scene for (you guessed it) sex. Part of her charm was doing minor things like lifting the cow cookie jar just to see if it would moo. She must have been too breathless to be bothered with those minor details. The idea of a Panwere was fascinating, but it was skimmed over for more (to borrow White Wolf's phrase) "way kewl powerz" via Anita, and of course, sex. The shower scene with Micha also left me a bit disturbed. In any major city, you have radio advertisements and ads which stress a woman's right to say "no" to sex, and no means no in an attempt to prevent rape. With Anita, no obviously means yes. What kind of signal is being broadcast here? Anita who never has casual sex, and says "no, no," and "no" thrice but then goes for a rough frisk around the shower with a stranger -- who makes great pubescent, heart throbbing hunk pin-up wallpaper, I might add. Of course there wasn't much else to him, but that's not unusual for this book. As for the rest of it, personally, I have no problem with erotica either realistically or supernaturally. It isn't the contents of the book itself which gave this novel an all time low rating with me, but the fact it didn't fit in with the rest of the series in any way. If Ms. Hamilton wants to write erotica, more power to her, but how about doing it in another series where it at least makes sense? It was wonderfully erotic, particularly if you're teased and tantalized by 'playing rough', but I'm not someone who does. This also isn't what I read the series for. Due to a recent interview which Ms. Hamilton more than hinted that the reader's opinions hold little sway, I will never buy another book by this author. If I wanted to read porn, I'd save myself the cover price and surf the internet for it.
Rating:
Summary: not sure what the rest of you expected
Review: i just finished reading narcissus in chains, and immediately went back to read it again. i found it the most interesting and challenging addition in the series yet.
imagine my surprise at all the negative or at best lukewarm reviews i found here-- the main complaints seem to be that the book wasn't just like the earlier installments, and that anita isn't the same character she used to be.
imagine how boring things would get if an unchanging anita moved from one cookiecutter book to another. the part of the vampire hunter novels that i most enjoy is watching anita morph into someone deeper and more complex with every offering. my interest is not contingent on whether she stays "human enough"-- i can't wait to see what else it is she's turning into!
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