Rating: Summary: Not bad at all, but it has a few flaws. Review: This is not your average vampire book. It definitely has some plot elements that are unique to this author. It was quite enjoyable; what kept me from giving it five stars is the lack of proofreading and copy-editing.Let's see, BunRab's usual analysis of vampire books: Is it part of a series? It claims to be the first one in a series; the back page says that Book Two is "coming soon." What's the author's main genre? I haven't read anything else by this author; she doesn't, as far as I know, write any other types of fantasy or science fiction, nor murder mysteries, nor in the romance genres. This book has some romance features in it, but is definitely not a romance per se. Vampire powers: Does daylight kill these vampires? Direct sunlight does; indirect (e.g., being awake but inside during the day) doesn't. Do the vampires have any supernatural powers? The usual ones of supernatural strength, and being able to make people not see them. Also, telepathy occurs in most of them. In addition, they have the power to create "thralls," humans who have tasted some of their blood and are therefore longer-lived and faster-healing than other humans. Oh, and they can also enthrall dogs! Do the vampires need to drink blood? Does it have to be human? Yes, and yes. Most lines of vampires exist only on blood, and need to feed every day, therefore; the line of vampires, or clan or family, whatever you want to call it, that are our main characters are unusual in that they can still eat regular food, and can get up to 2/3 of their sustenance from regular food, needing only about 1/3 of their intake to be blood. Does drinking the blood have to do with sex? Are vampires a metaphor for humanity's sexual fears? Yes, and no. Drinking blood can involve sex, and apparently is better for the vampires if it does, but they can feed without it, and can leave the humans not remembering that they were fed on. Vampires actually have personalities of their own, and are not merely dark, brooding and evil- although some other families than our heroes' do seem to specialize in evil and death, it isn't a requirement for being a vampire. The book is not deadly serious (pardon the pun) but has several touches of humor. There are sibling squabbles and long-standing family jokes, there are amusing moments in the Pagan shop that Paul and Marcie run; even a few of the vampires and thralls have senses of humor. The tone is not entirely different from Laurell Hamilton's earlier books, before they turned entirely to sex. There are serious and deadly moments, but also light-hearted ones. Now, if only someone would run off a second edition, in which the lack of commas in many places got fixed, while some of the run-on sentences with too many commas got turned into separate sentences, or at least had a few semi-colons added, and if the occasional use of "hadn't of" were fixed, and the kind of word substitutions that spell-check doesn't catch (too for to, it's for its, and so forth) were corrected by a human proofreader (or a vampire one, for that matter- just not a computer one!) I would be even more satisfied with the book.
Rating: Summary: This is bad... Review: When I thought about writing a review for this book, I tried very, very hard to think of something positive to say. Really, I did. But when the highest praise that you can give comes to, "I lasted halfway through before reading the end and tossing into the Salvation Army donation bin", you can probably guess the tone of the review. Now while this book isn't as bad as a can of munga beans, or shoes with the soles falling off, it still is very dodgy. It almost feels like a 'pay-to-publish' job.
The plot is thin, the main charactera are weak and poorly developed and the only strong impression I got was that the author was trying to shove their personal bandwagon regarding the acceptace of witchcraft and SM through my poor overtaxed frontal lobe. Perhaps a little less preaching and flag waving and a little more story would be nice.
In short, don't get this - watch a re-run of a REALLY bad episode of Buffy and you'll get more value for money.
Rating: Summary: HUGELY overrated by reviewers on this page! Review: Which is why, in the interest of fairness, I thought I'd let you know MY take on this book. First of all, the writing is terrible. Even the punctuation is terrible. Now, we all know that some writers who lack technical skill can still put out a damn good yarn. Not this one. There is no emotional punch to the story. Character development is flat as the proverbial pancake. Now, at this point I must say I was so distracted by the lack in these areas, I could have missed some plot stuff that MIGHT have been interesting. But I sincerely doubt it. Oh, yeah. The romance in the book? NOT! Here is yet another author who engineers a "Fated Love," in order to avoid the development of relationships. A total waste of money & time. Since I see no potential in this author, I will NOT be troubling to check out subsequent books in the series.
Rating: Summary: HUGELY overrated by reviewers on this page! Review: Which is why, in the interest of fairness, I thought I'd let you know MY take on this book. First of all, the writing is terrible. Even the punctuation is terrible. Now, we all know that some writers who lack technical skill can still put out a damn good yarn. Not this one. There is no emotional punch to the story. Character development is flat as the proverbial pancake. Now, at this point I must say I was so distracted by the lack in these areas, I could have missed some plot stuff that MIGHT have been interesting. But I sincerely doubt it. Oh, yeah. The romance in the book? NOT! Here is yet another author who engineers a "Fated Love," in order to avoid the development of relationships. A total waste of money & time. Since I see no potential in this author, I will NOT be troubling to check out subsequent books in the series.
Rating: Summary: Wow! Fun Read! Great Characters! Complex Plot! Review: WOW! I HAD to finish this book as soon as possible. I was trying to read it at work. Bravo! Kudos to the author! I am just sorry that bigtime publishing didn't pick her up and pay her loads of money! Well worth the time and money! Excellent!
Rating: Summary: What a book!! Review: Wow, this book is nothing what I expected! I had heard that it was a 'vampire' book, and it is, but it's nothing like the other one's I've read in the past. This will take you on a new adventure, with new twists and turns, and there is so much passion behind the writing it's hard not to get caught up. I started reading this book and couldn't put it down for two days, I had to know what was coming next, and I was held captive. The Authors description on the back is GREAT it's the whole reason of why I picked it up in the first place. But for those worried about the 'warning' don't let that stop you from reading this wonderful work, if you do worry then you are missing out on a book that will keep you begging for more. Trust me, I WANT MORE!! Where's the next book in this series??
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