Cerulean Sins: Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 11

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Summary: Anita Blake puts herself dead in the path of Belle Morte
Review: "Cerulean Sins," the 11th novel in Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake series, takes its name from the silk sheets covering the bed of our heroine's love the Master Vampire of St. Louis. By choosing something associated with Jean-Claude's bed the title reinforces the controversial direction of the series towards the erotic. For several volumes now the climax of each novel usually involves Anita discover some new aspect of her power, which helps save the day and propels her further into the ranks of being a monster, to the amazement of her circle of friends and the strong disapproval of Dolph the cop. This also further complicates the vampire politics in which she is embroiled. However, that transformation seems rather insignificant compared to Anita's sexuality. The change wrought by the "ardeur" in the formerly prime and proper Anita is the most radical of all, and one that is not embraced by many fans of the series. In "Cerulean Sins" the "ardeur" plays a key elements, so that Hamilton can at least claim she is not just writing soft porn.

As is usually the case, the novel begins with Anita juggling the responsibilities of the human and the magical world. A mysterious guy shows up wanting a dead ancestor raised and she has to bring back another corpse to settle whether or not the death was a suicide. Then there are the series of gruesome murders apparently committed by a shape-shifter. But all of this becomes back burner concerns because Musette, the emissary of Belle Morte, has shown up three months early and it is clear that the "sourdre de sang" of Jean-Claude's bloodline is making a power play in which Asher is a pawn. Once again, Anita is caught between what she thinks herself capable of and her absolute commitment to protecting her people.

It is probably about time that somebody puts out a companion guide to the Anita Blake series that will help readers understand the increasingly complex rules of the game when it comes to vampire politics. Anita can cross-examine Jean-Claude, Asher and the others as much as she wants as to what is expected and allowed in terms of all these intrigues, but when everything explodes in the final scenes it gets a bit difficult to follow all the pieces coming together in terms of which vampires can call which were-animals, what constitutes an insult, and how to translate ancient vampire traditions expressed in French into the down and dirty vernacular of the America of Anita Blake.

Looking back over the series from this point we can get a sense of how the original current through the early novels, which started with the stormy relationship between Anita and Jean-Claude, and which evolved into the most dysfunctional love triangle in horror literature when Richard, Ulfirc of the local werewolf clan entered the picture, has now given way to Anita ongoing evolution and an ultimate confrontation with Bella Morte (or something worse) down the road. For the first time in "Cerulean Sins" we have the notion of prophecy entering the picture, which would indicate that Anita Blake is more than just good at what she does, and while Richard is still in the picture doing the wrong things for (usually) the wrong reasons you have to think he is old news at this point.

Fortunately, Anita Blake remains an engaging character and her sense of humor remains intact. I have to admit that I am glossing over the sex scenes much the same way I did years ago reading John Norman's Gor novels, because as much as Hamilton is trying to make them integral to the novel the problem is not that I am bothered by the sexuality but rather than it pales in comparison to the gut wrenching horror that filled the earlier novels. Any Anita Blake movie would have to be rated NC-17, not because of the sex, but because the horror and violence was on a level that exceeded "The Exorcist." At her best, Hamilton makes Stephen King, Clive Barker and the rest look amateurs, and it is because of the heights that she has scaled in the past with her heroine that we will continue to wade our way through the sex to get to the good stuff.