Guilty Pleasures

Rating:
Summary: Fabulous
Review: I'm not much of a writer, but I read this book and couldn't put it down. Anita Blake is one the toughest characters I've seen or read about. I couldn't wait to read the next book in the series. I would recommend this book to any Fantasy/SF reader out there.

Rating:
Summary: A reasonably good beginning.
Review: Conrary to usual, this first book in the Anita Blake series is not exactly as good as the rest of the books. Still, it is a wonderful introduction to the Anita Blake's universe, where vampirism is legal and lucantropes is a minority frequintly discriminated against. When you raise zombies and kill vampires for living you tend to get involved in some very strange events. Now, if you'll only manage to survive them

Rating:
Summary: One of the most entertaining reads in its genre.
Review: Hamilton's "tough-as-nails" heroine Anita Blake takes the reader on a wild ride through the streets of St. Louis as she battles vampires, were-rats, AND humans in a classic struggle of good-against-evil. Blake's fierceness makes her a force to be reckoned with among things-that-go-bump-in-the-night and is balanced by an unrelenting razor-sharp wit in the face of danger. A page-turner to the last, GUILTY PLEASURES, is an action-packed adventure that will have the reader scrambling to read Blake's further exploits in THE LAUGHING CORPSE, CIRCUS OF THE DAMNED, and THE LUNATIC CAFE

Rating:
Summary: This is only an 8 in comparison to the rest of the series...
Review: The rest of the series are 9s and 10s. Welcome to an Alternate US with zombies, vampires, and their court appointed executioners.(OH MY!) It's swift and campy, leaving the reader waiting anxiously for the next Anita Blake adventure.How can one resist a 5'1" kick ass executioner/necromancer?

Rating:
Summary: Jeans and sneakers are not inspiring as ceremonial garb!
Review: The Executioner has arrived. In this well-penned tale, we are introduced to a character who has become one of my all time favorites. Vampire hunter and animator, Anita Blake is dead set in her ways and views of the preternatural world as a whole. Vampires aren't things you date, they're things you kill. But little does she know all of that could change with one encounter with the enigmatic Jean-Claude, a vampire who's powerful in his own right. This is gripping tale that you won't want to put down!

Rating:
Summary: The beginning of a beautiful relationship
Review: Laurell K. Hamilton's style of writing is unique...not many writers are able to use the first-person perspective effectively. The telling of the story from Anita Blake's point of view is quite compelling and offers insights to the fiesty necromancer's motivations. LKH's attention to detail, and obvious research, create a believable world and believable characters that readers will respond to with enthusiasm.

The consummate "bad boy", Jean-Claude is a wonderfully created character with depth and a great potential for growth, even if he is a walking corpse. Sexy and intelligent, he's a romantic vampire at heart with a head for modern business. Readers can't help but falling in love with Jean-Claude...and hating themselves for it.

The social structure LKH establishes for her vampires to work within is quite interesting. They are part of modern society but retain their own sense of "culture". Part of that culture is seen in the Master of the City, Nikolaos, a wonderfully sadistic character...all the knowledge and abilites of a powerful, centuries old vampire with the demanding nature of a child driving her psyche.

Guilty Pleasures establishes the beginning of a beautiful relationship between Jean-Claude and Anita Blake. The entire series is worth a read to see this relationship evolve and unfold, but this one is a must for any vampire fiction fan.

Rating:
Summary: Best dark novel you could start reading!
Review: I've read all the Anita Blake books up to The Killing Dance so far and I am enthralled. This is the best series I have ever read and by the time I reached The Laughing Corpse this series officially became my past-time. I'm more of a video game and movie person myself, but these books stole me away. If you're too timid and can't read gore or sex you probably should'nt start reading it because it gets more explicit as the series progresses. Otherwise, I guarantee you'll get caught up in this series. If you're really into Werewolves, Vampires, etc, you'll enjoy it even more.

P.s. Edward rules...

Rating:
Summary: Compelling reading, horrible writing
Review: The problem with this book, and others in the series, is that Hamilton has absolutely no skill at writing dialogue, little skill at developing plausible characters, and the vocabulary of a high school drop out. Her books are rife with cliches and poor diction, and the heroine herself is so utterly unbelieveable AND unlikeable, it's hard to imagine anyone getting through the first paragraph...

That being said, Hamilton redeems herself to some extent with her knack at writing formula in an engaging way, and an imagination that leaves many authors in this genre in the dust. The story lines and characters (other than the deficient and unappealingly hostile heroine) are so compelling, and sexy... and dangerous... and well, you never know what's going to happen next. I think as readers, we're just dying for Anita Blake to give up her mortality. But then, we have to wait for the next book to see if that's actually going to happen, and it never does, so we keep reading.

One book mutates into another, with slight twists and turns along the way. There is no point in reviewing more than one, as they all kind of congeal into an amorphous blob that oddly enough keeps the brain-dead (like me right before bed) intermittently amused.

Would I recommend this book, or others in the series? Certainly, if you just want a little bit fluffy, kinda scintillating, kinda nasty read but don't want to think about it.

Rating:
Summary: A Fabulous First Title
Review: Ah - the book that began it all. And what a beginning it was. I was initally turned off by the cover title, which gave the impression it would be one of those cliched pieces of sexually flooded, vampire goth cheese.
Instead, this book breathed a gale force wind of fresh air into the genre. A plain old fabulous, fun read, with a heroine the likes of which I had never before encountered; ferocious, blunt spoken, humorous, tough as nails - Anita Blake was the new role model for female action leads. Hamilton's writing fairly crackles with energy and a clean, sharp vitality. It is not elegant but she is astoundingly good at characterization and her descriptive turns can be enthralling at delivering the feel of a scene. This book was striking, nearly shockingly fresh in its attitude and portrayal of a woman lead. It had a fast, swift paced storyline, never meandering, never dull and never predictable. The alternate reality it sets up is wildly interesting and chock full of facts on everything from police procedure to vampire habits. The characters were fabulous, and the feel was streamlined and realistic, as if you had just stepped into the ongoing events yourself. Though mostly action, it laid in bits of everything from mystery, to comedy, to romance to horror. A truely original and exciting debut.

Rating:
Summary: An action-packed page-turner.
Review: Laurell Hamilton's "Guilty Pleasures" is definitely a "pleasure" to read. It is fast-paced and straight to the point, just like her main character, Anita Blake, the animator/vampire hunter. Anita is hired (somewhat against her will) to investigate a series of vampire murders. Her client is the most powerful vampire in the city whose need for Anita's talent surpasses the desire she has to destroy her. In an exciting series of events, Anita recruits the assistance of humans, wereanimals, and vampires but, as the ending proves, Anita works on her own. Hamilton creates an interesting alternative world where we are "not alone": there are vampires, ghouls, zombies, wereanimals, and humans who coexist and even interact. Hamiliton also creates a main character who can be admired for her physical and emotional strength, as well as her vulnerabities which makes her character a lot more believable.

I have not met a person who read the book and did not like it!