The Killing Dance

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Summary: This book totally rocked!!!!
Review: Hi! I just finished reading the best series of books I've ever read. No, I'm not talking about the Chronicles of Nanya. I'm talking about the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series written by Lauell K. Hamilton. Some of you might not like all this vampire and lycanthrope mumbojumbo, but I do. For all you who like to read about romance, humor, gore, and fantasy plus, check out these books! There are 7 books in this series which must be read in this order: Guilty Pleasure, The Laughing Corpse,Circus of the Damned, The Lunatic Cafe, Bloody Bones, The Killing Dance, and her newest one, Burnt Offerings. I remember as if it were yesterday...My friend, Keri, found the book Guilty Pleasures on her desk in music one day. She told me about it and let me read some of it in class. I loved it so much I bought the book. It took me 3 months to get to the store, but once I started, I couldn't stop! These books are like an addiction. I really want you guys to read these books because they're thrilling, suspenseful, fast-paced, and Anita, one of the main characters, always has more than one problem on her hands. Hamilton gives a very vivid description of the characters. For example, when Anita met Jean-Claude for the first time, the way uses Hamilton uses words carefully, it makes you feel as if you're sitting in the room with them. If I had to rate this book using the same scale as movie director's, I would give it an "R" because of its graphic violence, adult language and content, and nudity! Do yourself a favor - read these books!

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Summary: *Shudder* What happened?!
Review: Laurell K. Hamilton has ruined a perfectly good character as far as I'm concerned, Anita Blake was awesome, snappy punch lunchs, a true heroine to be admired! But now? First off, what happened to "not sleeping with the monsters." She broke that rule! Richard is a whiny baby, Jean-Claude just plain sucks, I find nothing sexy about the loser! N E way, Anita is now having sex with "one of the monsters", she's lost her snappy punch lines, her stories are getting monotonous, and she's turned into a psychpath! I liked it better when she was just a necromancer, aren't they rare enough as it is without her being the absolute best! I still have yet to read Burnt Offerings but if it and Blue Moon suck I'm done with Anita Blake 'cuz it'll all be mindless dribble if this keeps up!

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Summary: This book was fantastic! The best yet!
Review: I love the first person narrative and the constant action. Anita is a very funny and also a tough take names and kick butt kind of chick! I think Richard is definitely sexy! Killing Dance and Lunatic Cafe are my favorites!

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Summary: An excellent addition to Hamilton's "Anita Blake Series".
Review: Burnt Offerings was great! It has a lot of surprises and twists in it, but definately falls in line with the other books. After reading it, you will definately want more from Hamilton on this series!!!

Rating:
Summary: Just as expected, unexpected!!
Review: After reading many of the reviews I can't believe how upset people are over the ending. I think the author led us down this road, thinking that we would believe Anita would choose Richard then at the very end going for JC. It was perfect. Makes me want to find out what her next move is. Richard may have too many morals for Anita's lifestyle. I can see her getting hurt or killed trying to deal with his view of life. I think the perfect person for her is Edward. That would be an interesting mix-up.

Rating:
Summary: Inconsistent!!!
Review: The series was excellent up to this book. I feel that Anita got sold out at the end of this book. With all that was given to us about Anita, her character would NEVER have taken to Jean Claude's bed, NO MATTER WHAT!!!!!!. And her getting all sqwimish over Richard's changing and eating Marcus, doesn't seem like the same character that was able to pick apart half eaten bodies and raise zombies. The writing was excellent, but the plot lost something in this book. I'm certainly hoping Ms. Hamilton comes to her senses and gives our heroin the "spunk, fire and passion" back that she had in the previous books and HOPEFULLY Anita will come to her senses and realizes she made a HUGE mistake going for Jean Claude

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Summary: Anita at her best, and her worst!
Review: I think that Laurell has done, and has been doing, and excellent job. She is one of the best authors I have ever read books by, and the world she created is fascinating...except for the timie she mentioned Dragons and Gargoyles existing..I mean, I can live with a Gargoyle, but a dragon is a bit much. Oh well. I love Anita. SHe is so interesting, and seems to be evolving, into something evil, or something with morals, and a conscious person. Overall, I thought the book was great, and have just ordered "Burnt Offerings," which I can't wait to get. If anyone wants to talk about Anita and the gang, drop me an email, or, I have aol im, my SN is: X Aeros X

Rating:
Summary: A bump in the road
Review: Starting with tightly-plotted books featuring plenty of action and character, now the series begins to devolve just a bit around the edges. It starts to look like a Dungeons & Dragons setup, with a new and worse scene around each corner. (Burnt Offerings goes to the extreme in this.) In addition, there seems to be an emphasis on description of what people are wearing. But the series' universe is peopled with such interesting characters and monsters, it's easy to overlook things... until Anita chooses the wrong man! I couldn't understand her reasoning (she's seen far worse things than her boyfriend eating his leader), and from a view of character evolution, she needs Richard to bring her back to her own humanity, just as he needs her inhumanity to make him a better leader. (Jean-Claude wears too much lace!) If in the future Ms. Hamilton could return to a tighter murder mystery, include the RPIT squad more, and tell us how Anita's family is taking all this, I will be firmly hooked once more! Reading this made me move to the next book in the series to see if Anita came to her senses over Richard. Maybe I'll give her one more chance. Hey, Anita -- grab him before you lose him permanently!

Rating:
Summary: Good series
Review: I understand some of you thinking that Anita has lost her morals or something in this book. But I don't think its that. I think that the reason she slept with Jean-Claude (besides her overwhelming lust and love for him) is because she wanted something solid to feel bad for. She couldn't handle Richard being a werewolf, especially a non-violent one, and she didn't think that was a good reason for feeling bad and not being intimate with him. So she did something really bad, so she could have something concrete to feel bad for. You get what I'm saying? She was also searching for comfort with sex. Not that I'm upset or anything. I love Jean-Claude. Richard's getting a bit annoying. I just wish Laurell Hamilton would've stretched out the sexual tension a bit longer , but oh well. I guess that's just because I've read all the books within a week, so that defeats the purpose. Oh well.

Rating:
Summary: change is necessary, but consistency must dictate
Review: I have thoroughly enjoyed each book of this series until now. I understand that characters must evolve over the course of a series, otherwise the stories become predictable and monotonous. However, it is sometimes a mistake to tamper with a hero(ine) too much. Such was the case with this book. The focus of this book, intended or not, was the triangle between Anita, Richard, and Jean-Claude. Throughout the prior books, Anita was very clear in her opinion that while Jean-Claude was very pretty and she fantasized about him, it could only ever be sex. It has also been made clear that Jean-Claude is an arrogant jerk whose pursuit of Anita has more to do with her rejection of him than any feelings of love (not to be confused with lust). Ms. Hamilton has made it clear, even in the current work, that winning Anita would soothe only Jean-Claude's pride, not his heart. Richard, on the other hand, is someone who Anita feels she could settle down with. It is her decision to choose Jean-Claude over Richard that causes me to give this book such a low mark (compared to 10s and 9s for the others). This decision was, I felt, completely inconsistent with everything we knew about Anita before. That Anita cannot handle Richard's beast but can raise zombies (involving blood sacrifice) and execute vampires (along with other ugly, violent actions) is completely inconsistent. One would think, from reading the series, that having one's boyfriend metamorph on top of one would be relatively mild and mundane. Anita succumbing to lust in the tub with pretty boy was also out of character. Was it a human reaction? Perhaps. Ms. Hamilton has always let us know that her protagonist was just as fallible as the rest of us. But having a strong, intelligent, feisty heroine who is usually wading in gore get upset over a boyfriend's physical transformation (a situation she knew existed, so it could not have possibly been such a huge shock to her; plus she'd seen it before with other people) give in to another man's embrace, a man she barely respected and tolerated, seems nothing more than a sellout of her fans. I am sure a lot of doe-eyed fans of Anne Rice were bugging Ms. Hamilton to "let the vampire win," but I think Ms. Hamilton is the better writer and should not have sold out Richard and her readers. I am also sure that some fans, in reading this review, will argue that if it were a male protagonist no one would bat an eye. Again, I say Ms. Hamilton is better than that. Her Anita is better than that; don't lower her to the level of a male protagonist. It was, in short, an insult. I hope that this sudden change in character is remedied in future books.