Georgina Kincaid has a cat, an apartment and a job as an assistant manager of a bookstore. That’s the life she lives, but it’s not who she is. She’s a succubus – an immortal, a shapeshifter and professional seductress. Georgina yearns for a different life, but as payment for a mistake she sold her soul and any chance of home and hearth. That decision, made a lifetime ago, led Georgina to her current role of soul gatherer through sex.
The soul-for-sex exchange sounds cold and heartless. In other hands, the idea could condemn Georgina with a high unlikeability factor and doom the book. However, in the world created by Mead, the role of a succubus is a matter-of-fact reality. One that blurs the lines between good and evil, giving depth to the players on both sides of the debate. Demons, angels, vampires and other immortal forms walk the streets of Seattle. Many of them land in Georgina’s bookstore. Almost all cross her path in some way.
The cast of characters here is plentiful and varied. Jerome, Georgina’s demon boss. Carter, the head angel in town and a constant companion of his dark counterpart Jerome. Seth Morgenstern, the writer-in-residence at Georgina’s bookstore and secret reader crush of Georgina, who also is cursed with the ultimate male problem in a romance book – he’s a nice guy. Roman, the hyper handsome and mysterious hottie who makes Georgina’s blood boil. Warren, the married bookstore owner who looks to Georgina for sex not knowing that she is using him as a form of succubus refueling. And, Doug, Georgina’s co-worker. But that’s not all. Georgina’s pals and companions – Hugh, Peter, Cody, Erik – and the fellow immortals who roam around annoying Georgina and work together to round out the cast. A significant number of characters, all of whom get page time in Succubus Blues and all of whom the reader gets to know through Georgina’s first person narration. Despite this singular point of view, the characters – most of them male – take on a range of characteristics and play different roles here. This is a credit to Mead. Her strong, clear voice shines through a flawed and very real heroine. Using Georgina’s perception and through action and description, Mead sets apart each of the other players, creating a world that is deep, charged with excitement and compelling.
Georgina and her internal conflict in wishing to be someone other than the something she is has the potential to propel the book all on its own. Georgina fights off attraction to males she likes. The fear of sucking the soul right out of them is a strong motivation for her to live a solitary life. Despite her immortal calling, Georgina has a moral core and is conflicted, yet realistic, about what she must do to survive. So, she captures the souls of the dregs of society – a fact not appreciated by Jerome – and, even then, only does so when her need to recharge her energy overwhelms her. One complaint is that these aspects of Georgina’s character come out through a series of flashbacks that, at times, break the momentum of the overall plotline. The information, while vastly important, is handed out in such small bits and over such a long period of time that the lack of information early on leads to some confusion. When the integral information does come it adds layers to an already complex heroine.
Succubus Blues travels beyond Georgina’s internal war to delve into broader concept of good versus evil. Mead does not take the easy way out and have individuals be all good or all evil. Rather, this story deals with the not-so-comfortable middle ground, the points at which good people do bad thing and evil people demonstrate good intentions. Little is all good or all bad. Mead does not judge nor does she allow Georgina to do so. Rather, the reader is left to draw the conclusions, making this debut book smarter than many that have gone before. Despite these heavier theoretical ideas at work here, they never weigh the book down, likely because they pass by with a subtle touch.
Filling in the remainder of the book is a murder mystery. Someone is killing Seattle’s immortal population and, just so happens, the dead immortals are same immortals Georgina views as enemies. Jerome and Carter know more about the situation than they’re telling. Georgina, never one to follow the demon rulebook, refuses to stop poking around even after Jerome warns her to do so. Georgina’s search takes her on a journey through, including a brief research of Bible passages, and lands her in danger.
That’s the plot of the book. A fast-paced and highly energetic race to figure out who is the real “bad” guy murderer. What makes this book so utterly readable is the combination of an interesting plot, impressive worldbuilding, intriguing characters, clever writing and a unique heroine. The other positive factor at work here is the “what it’s not” aspects of Succubus Blues. It’s witty but not cutesy, serious but not dour and paranormal but not otherwordly to the point of being unrelatable.
There are aspects about which readers should be aware. Aspects which may not work for some. To the extent immortals can even have a happily ever after, Georgina doesn’t get one here. The reality is that this is not a romance. It is at times sensual and at time romantic, but it’s not a romance in the traditional sense. In fact, there isn’t even a clear-cut hero until the very end and even then… Sure, Georgina gets plenty of sex – most of which takes place off stage – but this is not about a couple working together to build a relationship in the traditional romantic sense. This is Georgina’s book. Her journey. Her struggle. Also, as the first book in a series, there’s a “just wait” feeling to the ending. For the most part, the mystery wraps up, but the loose ends do open the door for future chaos.
Whatever missteps happen here – and there only a few, some might say none – nothing takes away from the enjoyment of this hard-to-define but very strong urban fantasy read.
You can visit Richelle Mead here and buy her book here or here.

The Rest Falls Away centers on a young woman, Victoria Grantworth, whose story begins with echoes of another universe and another heroine. Victoria, just like Buffy Summers of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, has been chosen as a Venator, called to fulfill a vampire killing legacy. Where Buffy juggled slaying with high school (the obvious metaphor being high school is a horror filled with monsters), Victoria hunts vampires while also husband hunting among the ton (metaphor open to interpretation). Buffy and Victoria embark with the same setup, but the immediate allusion to Buffy quickly falls away as Gleason sets up a universe, conflict, and story arc that would indicate this book is the opening chapter of a several-books-long larger story.
The world building and unfolding are measured; not slow, but there is the constant sense of something larger at play. It is as if the first book in the Gardella Vampire Chronicles sole purpose is to establish instead of being a self contained story. This makes for a read the reader must decide early on to stay with, as little is laid bare (or is explosive enough to seize attention), in the opening pages. What eventfully comes into play amidst the introduction of characters, plot lines, and morsels of backstory is that fledging Venator Victoria must keep the Book of Antwartha (an ancient text containing unspeakable evil) from the most powerful of vampires: Lilith. This task is in addition to staking the rank-and-file, learning a new way of life, and not giving up on her old one. Victoria is up for all those challenges. She is something unto herself: a young woman who frets over dresses, dances lightly, and falls in love easily, all while being ruthlessly practical enough to hide her vampire-killing stakes in an up-do.
It’s the falling in love aspect, the most expected of turns in romance, where Gleason throws the clockwork frame away. In the typical Regency, Victoria’s hero would emerge from the ton; in a typical paranormal her hero would emerge from, well, a coffin. Gleason, however, chooses instead to force elasticity into the romance leaning aspects of The Rest Falls Away. A clear hero does not emerge in this chapter of Victoria’s story. There are three men in her life, all possible candidates for hero: Phillip, a Marquee and member of the ton; Sebastian, a character of some mystery, whose allegiances are not quite clear; and the emotionally damaged yet rich (depth-wise) Max, a fellow soldier in the war on vamps. In this early chapter of Victoria’s story, Phillip emerges as the front runner for her affections, but it’s clear that Phillip is a symbol of Victoria’s non-Venator past, something that cannot be held onto (though in a deliciously flawed and selfish move, Victoria attempts to have Phillip in her life only to face the most dire of consequences for those actions). Sebastian is, again because this is so early in the tale, easy to root for as he is the most sexually forward of the three and because there is so much yet to uncover regarding him. Is he a good guy or bad guy? Time and books to follow with tell (though it would seem that if Phillip is the aristocracy, and Max is a Venator, the options for Sebastian’s character are clear). In the long run our money is on the easily ired Max to stand happily with Victoria at the series’ conclusion.
What is absolutely certain is that Victoria’s story will need to be read until that conclusion (whenever that might come). Knowing what happens to her and the universe she inhabits becomes imperative in The Rest Falls Away despite a somewhat distant narrative style. Gleason relies heavily on dialog and action largely eschewing the internal dialog that is the hallmark of most fiction and the result is an experience more like watching TV than reading a book. It’s a different and surprisingly successfully style.
Hopefully the genre bending framework and surprises that Gleason lays as groundwork here in The Rest Falls Away will continue on throughout the series. The series next installment can’t hit shelves soon enough.
You can visit Colleen here and purchase this book here and here.

What readers will find is a story and protagonist reminiscent of – without at all resembling – Kim Harrison’s Hollow’s series. Kessler builds a two planed world (one realm earth, the other Hell) in which succubae, incubi, and various demons of greed, vanity, and wrath are unleashed upon human beings, tempting them with their greatest weaknesses and leading them to gates that are not pearly. The telling lacks the clichéd trappings and conventions of romance, presents a world unto its own, and stars a likable protagonist who is untroubled by all those things heroines are supposed to be. Jezebel, the succubus at the center of Hell’s Belles, is on the run from Hell. After a few thousand years of seducing men, taking their souls and then escorting them into the fiery ever after – and being quite thrilled with the job – a shift in managerial philosophy sends Jesse into mortalsville seeking to hide as a “flesh puppet” (aka human being).
Kessler structures her tale in an inventive and creative – if not entirely successful – manner. Jesse’s story comes in two parallel tellings. The A story is Jesse’s present, takes place on earth, begins the moment after Jesse decides to runaway from home, and proceeds for two days as Jesse parades as a mortal and hides from Hellish creatures determined to return her to The Pit. The B story is Jesse’s past, set in Hell, the days (moments?) leading up to Jesse’s decision to flee. It’s an interesting manipulation of the story that gives, what would otherwise be back story, plenty of forward momentum of its own, but it also raises the question of just where the story is. Is Jesse’s story about being human, applying her skills as an eons old creature of lust in a modern day strip club, and falling in love with a mortal? Or is Jesse’s story her decision to ascend from Hell? Jesse’s story is, of course, both those things, but the back and forth, present then past telling detracts. The transitions, for example, are always disorienting. The chapters are labeled with the locations for action, but even this doesn’t go as far as orienting within the narrative could.
As for the striking young heroine, yes, Jesse is that and sass and luck do extricate her from a sticky situation or two. But, if there is such a thing, Jesse is an antiheroine. Far from the thoughtless, virginal young thing depicted-to-death in romance, Jesse is imbued with a dark undercurrent (perhaps being a demon does that) that propels her and, in turn, her story. She is clear eyed in a way women are seldom depicted in this genre of fiction. Since she was a succubus and seduced countless men, Jesse naturally turns to stripping (and not a sanitized version either) as a means of support; she even contemplates prostitution. Jesse is so comfortable in her own skin (she is a girl who can shrug off being called a slut), the narrative so lacking in condescension on the matter, that the bold choices Kessler makes never chafe.
Within hours of taking mortal form, Jesse finds a strapping stud to tumble, Paul Hamilton. Whether or not Paul is The One in the strictest romance definition of happily ever after remains to be seen. There is another man, well, incubi really, Daunuan, that Jesse has a long relationship (if one counts a sex buddy as a relationship) with and that relationship continues even as Jesse falls for Paul. So the tenderness and love and springs between Jesse and Paul is balanced (or marred depending on one’s view point) by Daunuan’s presence. As Jesse’s story is to continue into future books (there’s no end book cliffhanger here, the conflicts of Hell’s Belles do find conclusions), Daunuan’s will likely turn up again. And he’ll likely continue to complicate the romance with Paul.
Hell’s Belles is smart and well done, an arresting debut by all accounts. Kessler’s tale of a succubus escaped from hell is far richer, daring and dark than the weightless back cover plot summary reveals. The choices made are incredibly bold and unique lending excitement to the read. Jezebel is a character intriguing enough to follow into future books and Kessler is a star on the rise.
You can visit Jackie here and purchase this book here and here.

It would be easy – too easy – to spend several hundred words on just how little McCarthy knows Las Vegas and to further speculate that if she’s spent any time in the city, her experience off The Strip consists of the cab ride to and from McCarran Airport. The lack of understanding is there in both the details presented (September temperatures rarely top out at 80, closer to a hundred is more accurate) and the details that are left out: the infectious abandonment of reason, the dark undercurrent of desperation that rears up, and the ease with which an otherwise rational person can be swept along in the flow of alcohol, luck, and sex that permeates the air. That is what Las Vegas is, but that the characters of Bit the Jackpot are not products of that environment, or that the setting isn’t integral to their story, makes the backdrop useless scenery, a good idea squandered.
McCarthy’s heroine, Cara Kim, is a stripper. But Cara is to strippers what McCarthy’s Las Vegas is to the actual city: a fanciful rendering that doesn’t really exist. Cara is that pillar of heroine purity: a virgin. That in itself is a point too contemptuous to comment on. And, while Cara takes off her clothes and dances around a pole for money, she does so behind a scrim. No one actually sees her naked and in turn Cara can pretend no one is watching her. There is potential in the exotic dancer angle, but the conceit blunts under this execution. Cara’s job makes for an arresting opening, when vampire hero Seamus Fox “sees” her on stage and the chase is on. But, Cara’s watered down job is quickly moved to the back burner as she’s caught up in a street fight between Seamus and assassins.
Predictably, Cara is killed and Seamus must choose between letting a woman he’s lusted after for twenty minutes die, or turn her into a vampire for all eternity. Seamus is a four hundred year old vampire and it could be assumed that he’s been present at the deaths of a mortal or two over that time (perhaps even brought death upon a few people). For reasons that lack solid footing, Cara cuts through whatever it is Seamus has seen in the past or currently believes in and he chooses to give her eternal life. From here, the book moves into the heart of its story, which consists of Seamus keeping Cara safe from bad guys who are of very little actual threat. For his part, Seamus is a likable, surprisingly tender hero who isn’t surrounded by a plot that would allow him to shine.
Seamus, those who seek to do him harm, the entire world of Vegas Vampires, it is assumed, are built and expounded about in the series’ first book, High Stakes. Bit the Jackpot isn’t less for the lack of world building, it’s easy enough to understand who and what the players are as this isn’t the sort of paranormal that needs introduction via a glossary. However, salient point about Seamus’ character (again assumed to be dolled out in the first book) are told in after-the-fact fashion here which lessen the impact of his decision to turn Cara and drive the story into off-the-page-action territory.
When Cara and Seamus finally come clean with their feelingsfor one another, admit to their pasts, it’s a point of clarity in the book. For one moment, gone is the sense that McCarthy was guided by writing a romance and following whatever rules might apply to that. The scene is straight forward, full of depth and completely lacking in the cloy coyness that elsewhere permeates. Which begs the question: why isn’t the rest of the book written with the same sobriety, the same lack of pretense?
Bit the Jackpot has charming moments, but that charm manages to chafe as there is nothing to accompany it. If McCarthy could combine the effortless magnetism she sometimes writes with, with powerhouse storytelling and avoid the pitfalls of sloppy craft, she could be an author for the keeper shelf. Until then, her light and simple reads are easy to pass the time with and easier to forget.
You can visit Erin here and purchase this book here and here.

In the early fourteenth century, Alex was murdered by Colin MacDougall (alternant spelling deliberate). The end of Alex’s life came by both ambush and betrayal, as he traveled to marry Isobel MacDougall. There was a piece of magic jewelry, not involved in Alex’s murder so much, as simply on the scene, The Bloodstone of Dalriada, that’s rumored to grant its holder three wishes (this isn’t important at this juncture, but manages to reemerge just in time for the smoke and mirrors ending). As Alex goes down under his enemies’ swords he vows to haunt the MacDougalls, specifically vowing that no one will ever sleep in the bed he intended for his bride-to-be. Of all the things Alex could have threatened, he chose to doom himself to haunting a bed.
And that’s how, seven hundred years later, Alex in his non-corporeal form ends up with his bed in an English antique shop. An antique shop Mara just happens to stumble upon, whereby encountering both bed and ghost (though she doesn’t know that last bit) just hours before inheriting the MacDougall homestead castle from a woman she has only the most tenuous of nonfamilial ties to. If one of the most basic strifes of this story is that Alex and Mara are ancestral enemies, why not allow them to be that? Wouldn’t it be more believable for Mara to inherit her bit of Scotland through a blood tie and then have her stumble upon Alex once inside the castle? What better place for Alex to haunt the MacDougalls than in their home? The bed angle is silly and adds needless stress to the story.
The lack of solid foundation is only the first stumbling block here, Highlander in Her Bed goes on to fail as a romance because MacKay keeps her principles separated from one another for the majority of the book. To fill the pages Mara and Alex spend great oceans of time contemplating and brooding over each other. Their ponderings are circular and repetitive. Alex hates Mara because she’s a MacDougall and is further perplexed by his attraction to her. Mara doesn’t understand how Alex keeps appearing from the ether and disappearing back into it, but she’s sure he’s deranged and she’s perplexed by her attraction to him. Time spent lost in thought doesn’t allow for much action and as such the story is largely interior and struggles to stay in the physical. After a few brief and pointless encounters (including one in which Alex molests Mara; let’s agree that below the belt touching needs consent and buildup), their hatred transmutes to lust, then their lust transmutes to love with large steps missing in between. Alex and Mara have sex and their feelings for one another are instantly and unexplainably of the forever and ever deathless variety. Alex even gives up his nearly millennia long abhorrence for the MacDougalls without the benefit of the vindication he deserves.
The setup for Highlander in Her Bed is cute and should be rife with inherent conflict (the hero, after all, is dead). However, the story suffers as what should be sharp story points blunt under MacKay’s ministrations and the book falls short on the most elementary of principles. From the outset a romance involving a ghost asks for a tremendous suspension of disbelief from the reader (even from a reader all too happy to be whisked along with the premise). Given that, keeping the rest of the story as convincing as possible would seem to be of the utmost importance. That Highlander in Her Bed doesn’t otherwise aim for credibility perplexes throughout the story.
You can visit Allie here and purchase this book here and here.

The disagreement over this title – disagreement being a genteel description of what actually happened – did not center on plot execution, craft concerns or author choices since the PBR reviewers actually had not read the book prior to chatting about it. No, with the anthology Hell With The Ladies, the title and cover blurb sent the reviewers scurrying to their respective corners with gloves up and fighting words ready. The reason is quite simple. The heroes in these novellas are the illegitimate sons of the Devil. The “baddest of the bad boys” who never pretend to be anything else. Dearest daddy is ready to name his successor. To determine if any of his sons are worthy of his title, Satan challenges each to perform a task where the prize is the right to rule Hell. The only thing standing in the way of Satan and his retirement plans is a woman. Three women to be precise. Women equally determined to find the good in Satan’s sons Jack, Nick and Marcus.
The issue: Making a hero out of Satan’s spawn. After all, there is a difference between a bad boy and an evil one. An immortal in the form of a vampire may be the new “in” thing, but an immortal in the form of a demon is always troublesome. And, the need for definite and identifiable character growth within the confines of an approximate 100-page novella, well, that’s the challenge.
The breakdown at PBR: The Skeptic (we’ll call her Wendy) who doubted the authors would be able to pull off redemption for the sons of Satan; The Pessimist (Lorna) who had a problem with the notion of any heroine agreeing to be the daughter-in-law of the Devil; The Rational One (LJ) who merely pointed out that the sons of the Devil would, by definition, be illegitimate so that references to the illegitimacy on the cover seemed repetitive; The Reviewer Playing The Role Of Switzerland (you guessed it, that’s Kassia) who piped in with feigned disinterest but clearly was chuckling while reading the email discussion; The Newbie (our yet unrevealed reviewer – she’s busy, so be patient) who added the tidbit that a sequel to Hell With The Ladies was in the works; and, The Excited One (me) who was intrigued from the second the book hit the front porch.
Picking up a book based on the pure excitement of a cover blurb, on the interest in a kernel of an idea, is a dangerous thing. The potential for disappointment is great. The Excited One being brave (or a complete idiot) stepped up…
Kathleen O’Reilly’s tackles the evolution of Jack, the oldest of Satan’s son and the presumed next-in-line to the throne of Hell. Jack Vassago spends his days (and nights) running a casino, bedding women, fixing the stock market for his gain, bedding more women and generally feeding off and enhancing the depravity of Las Vegas and the world around him. Jack assumes the reward for his hard work will be nothing less than his father’s empire. Satan being Satan, the little devil he is, has other plans. Jack must first pass a test before he qualifies to receive what he believes to be his birthright. His task appears simple enough – find the Book of Souls and return it to dad. A simple task except for the location of the book and the sexy guard unknowingly holding it. Bored bookseller Gabriella D’Angelis (notice the last name) toils away each day in her family’s business, longing for the opportunity to break free to a more glamorous and glitzy life and away from her grandmother’s bible preaching ways. Jack offers her the fun he knows she craves but nothing deeper. Gabriella wants more and Jack must choose between the power that comes from pleasing his father and the pleasure that comes with Gabriella.
Being a romance novel, the ending to Jack’s story should not be a mystery. To the extent it is, know that Satan then moves on to his second son, Nick, and offers a different test. In Julie Kenner’s Nick, Satan challenges his son, the renowned artist and international playboy Nick Velnias, to do what he does best – paint a portrait that captures a piece of the subject. Specifically, to paint a portrait of Delilah Burnett, the daughter of one of his enemies, a well-known Reverend who attempts to turn lost souls away from sin, and steal her soul. Between Nick’s charm and Delilah’s yearning to become a model, the set-up for soul-sucking seems easy. Then Nick begins to paint, Delilah begins to change and Nick is forced to make a decision between his father’s offer and the woman he can’t forget.
Satan finally turns to his last son in Dee Davis’ Marcus. A pirate in earlier years – those years being measured in terms of centuries – and present-day collector (otherwise known as thief), Marcus Diablo is accustomed to taking what he desires. Being a bit of an expert at his craft., Marcus prefers to catch his prey without the use of any special powers. Satan offers Marcus the keys to the kingdom (so to speak) if Marcus obtains a prized jewel, the Devil’s Delight, a 24 carat ruby said to be formed from a drop of Christ’s blood and to give the owner’s soul to the Devil. In general, the perfect gift for the demonic evildoer who has everything. To grab Devil’s Delight, Marcus must join forces with Celeste Abbot, a former conquest, collector and a woman who has bested him in the past. With Celeste is her father, a scholar who can decipher a journal said to lead to the jewel and who has a secret or two of his own. As with the earlier novellas, true love must triumph over the soulless and Satan.
The binding force here, not surprisingly, is Satan. As the patriarch of this clan he holds the power. Jack, Nick and Marcus do not have a relationship with each other or much of a relationship, other than a begrudging and dutiful one, to dear old dad. Satan, while evil and responsible for the plague, the stock market dip, soul stealing and other very bad things, floats in and out of the novellas. Despite this malignant presence, the stories stay focused on the romance between the sons and their women. In part this is a set-up straight from the Prologue where Lucifer takes on a bit of a guy-in-black-socks-with-shorts persona as he worries about his fading looks and toys with the idea of sitting back on the beach and enjoying his spoils in retirement. All three novellas point to the evil deeds of Satan with passing reference, but Satan only appears at the beginning to issue his challenge and at the end to show his displeasure. That displeasure never extends to ruining his sons when they betray his wishes likely because killing off the hero, while fine in Romeo and Juliet, isn’t all that satisfying in a genre prefaced on a happy ending. In all three stories, Satan rides off leaving his sons mortal and poor, but fully intact.
This strangely paternal non-interference combined with a nodding recognition of the sons’ non-evil (and dead) mothers makes the idea of Satan’s sons finding and deserving happiness easier to accept. As does the odd underlying premise handed to the reader that the all-powerful Lucifer could not obtain his desired items on his own despite his power. In many ways, Satan plays like the nasty family matriarch or patriarch often seen in novels where greed and money rule the day and family ties turn into vice grips. The difference here, of course, is Satan’s ability to appear and disappear, freeze time, unleash Hell on earth and a few other not so nice tendencies.
With the general but-they-are-pure-evil concern tucked away, the heroes in these novellas boil down to edgy, rough, naughty, bold, attractive and, yes, sinful, men felled by a force greater than evil. For Jack, the attraction to Gabriella is quick and not all that clear since, frankly, she comes off as shallow and not all that likeable at the beginning of the story. Putting aside that flaw, the strength here is in the subtle interplay of Gabriella’s changing priorities with Jack’s inability to separate the “things” he provides to Gabriella from the man he could be with her absent those material items. Since the attraction lacks depth at the start, the powerful ending suffers. However, the overall effect is one of love conquering all, wrapped up in a basic but fast-moving plot that remains eminently readable.
The romance in terms of punch heightens in Nick’s story. Nick, a man more interested in his paintings than the throne of Hell, grows and matures as the reality of Delilah’s destruction at his hands becomes apparent. Delilah’s increasing soullessness corresponds with her budding interest in mindless sex with strangers – a fact that seems to suggest committed sex is good and sex without boundaries or commitments is bad, but that may be an overstatement of the message here. What is clear is Kenner’s expertise at creating compelling and moving relationships. The contrast of Delilah’s disintegration with Nick’s awakening contains a complexity and reality that transcends the idea of evil and good. The true triumph of this story is Nick’s believable evolution in the context of an enjoyable tale that manages not to take itself too seriously.
Marcus’ story unfolds more in keeping with a sense of chase-catch-release. Marcus and Celeste have a history which ratchets up the tension from one of initial attraction to one of simmering heat. They share similar interests (except for the whole descendant to the throne of Hell thing), challenge each other and fight off their more intense feelings for each other. Celeste’s tendency to melt into a giant puddle of goo every time Marcus is around does seem a bit too much, especially in light of her otherwise sturdy disposition. What helps to save what could be her over-the-top reaction to Marcus is the glimpse of human frailty Marcus shows separate from Celeste. Marcus, unlike his brothers, has been in love with a woman in the past and on the verge of forsaking the nature handed down from his father. His failure in that instance plagues him but adds a dimension to him that is missing from Nick and Jack.
The anthology, like most romance novels, requires a suspension of belief and a naive hope that people can change, at bas, who they are. The manner in which the love of a good woman beats back evil in these stories is both charming and believable. Yes, the realities of having Satan as a father-in-law and a husband with true skeletons in the closet are not explored, but what would be the point? Hell With The Ladies doesn’t pretend to be a study in religion. It purports to be an engaging romantic tale, and on that score, it succeeds.
You can visit Julie Kenner here, Kathleen O’Reilly here and Dee Davis here. You can buy this book here or here.

For those tired of witty tales of single vampire women looking for love and acceptance, stop reading. For those who believe any writer attempting to write about a well-dressed, designer-crazed single vampire woman is only trying to rip off MaryJanice Davidson’s Undead series, this probably isn’t for you so wait for the release of Undead and Unpopular in December. But for those who enjoy smart dialog, an engaging voice and a clever play on society’s class system, read on.
Countess Lilliana Arabella Guinevere du Marchette (Lil) is a member of vampire royalty. She is pure having been born a vampire rather than made a vampire. With that purity comes a seat in vampire Upper Class. Her wealthy family owns Midnight Moe’s (think Kinkos). Her brothers followed the family path and now work in dad’s company. Lil prefers Prada and Jimmy Choos to a lime green polo shirt with Midnight Moe’s stitched across the pocket, so she forges her own way. In order to pay the rent without help and separate from her meddling family, she moves into her own closet-sized apartment in Manhattan and starts a business – Dead End Dating – a matchmaking service for humans and vampires both born and made.
While romance is not a major goal in the vampire world, procreation is. In a comparison to the intermarrying of wealthy non-vampire families like the Rockefellers and DuPonts, born vampires bond with their own kind. Upper crust marries upper crust. Rather than mating for the purposes of keeping the prestige and money within the family, born vampires find eternity mates in order to create future families. Born vampires can reproduce if the circumstances are right – men need a high fertility rating and women need a high orgasm quotient (OQ). The more times a woman can orgasm during a sexual encounter, the greater the chances of conceiving. Conceiving is the goal, which means the OQ drives upper-crust males as the main component in finding a mate. As a result, men of the born vampire class start conversations with quesitons about fertility and OQ rather than private school backgrounds, college alma maters and stock portfolios. Not the most romantic notion in the world, but an intelligent play on the concept of marrying within class.
Lil’s begins her business with first client Francis Deville, a geek with a big heart (if he had one), low fertility rate, no sense of style and vampire connections back to Napoleon. He’s a dweeb in an adorable puppy kind of way. His lack of pretense contrasts with Lil’s love of all things expensive. The banter as Lil tries to work her My Fair Lady magic on Francis is sharp and funny. In desperation, Lil matches Francis with a human woman. A no-no, but just a test. One that backfires in a way that’s predictable but still manages to feel fresh due to Raye’s reluctance to transform Francis into the perfect hero.
While matching others, fighting off grandchildren pressure from her parents and generally making a hash of her credit rating, Lil meets Ty Bonner, a bounty hunter on the trail of a serial killer. Someone is targeting young single women through personal ads. Ty fears the killer has switched his method of finding victims to matchmaking services and enlists Lil’s help to watch for the killer. Ty wants help. Lil wants Ty. Ty being a made vampire is all wrong for her, of course. The classic opposite-sides-of-the-tracks attraction is the perfect set-up for the thrust and parry of a romantic chase. Lil both fights and encourages. After all, Ty has that bad boy look and nonchalant attitude Lil can’t resist. Seeing Lil as a snob but a cute one, Ty encourages right back.
In the “what it’s not” category, Dead End Dating is not romantic suspense. The serial killer angle is a subplot used to throw Lil and Ty together where normally they would not run in the same social circles. It’s also not a mystery. The killer reveal reads like an add-on. In many ways, it is. The focus here is not on suspense or mystery. It’s really not on romance either. The sexual tension between Lil and Ty builds and sparks, but stays G-rated and unfulfilled at all times. Keeping the focus on the chase adds intrigue and desire to read on. Since this is the first in a trilogy, wanting more is a requirement and in that Raye is successful. The expectation here is that the “real” romance will come later in the series. That the romantic chase will step to another level. That is not the only expectation. The real hope is for a bit more character growth on Lil’s part, a bit less designer-name dropping and a better explanation for the inclusion of Lil’s two friends (both named Nina) in the series – a hope that all of those components will come later.
Until then, the reader is left with a quirky heroine, humorous dialog, future hero potential in Ty and a relatable vampire take on social classes. Under Raye’s guidance and gift for chat, the chick-lit feel and general theme of woman-finding-her-way-on-her-own is enough. For now. For one book. For a momentary forgiveness of what Dead End Dating is not. The rest is up to book two – Dead and Dateless.
You can visit Kimberly Raye here and buy this book here and here.

Readers familiar with After Midnight will well remember Portia Cabot. At seventeen she was the youngest Cabot sister, in love with gothic literature, hoping against hope that werewolves, fairies and vampires existed. While her sister Caroline was busying falling in love with Adrian Kane, Portia developed a heart-wrenching, world-ending crush on Adrian’s younger brother Julian. Even as Julian affected the role of parlor vampire, reciting Byron to dewy eyed girls, he was a very real vampire in search of his soul. His feelings for Portia evolved from indulgence to interest, but as a soulless vampire he had nothing to offer her. Things culminated between the two when Duvalier (the vampire then in possession of Julian’s soul) locked Portia and Julian together in a crypt hoping that Julian would finally kill a human, and finally give up the last of his humanity. Medeiros kept the details of the crypt scene to herself, giving the reader only Julian’s retelling of events as he explained the puncture wounds on Portia’s neck: “I only took what I need to survive.”
What was stingily held back from the reader, are the heart-pounding details readers of romance love. What exactly happened? It’s on this primed stage, where familiar characters are balanced on the precipice of romance, that Medeiros revisits Julian and Portia. It’s been five years since Julian left home, and family, and Portia on the continuing quest for his soul and in those five years Portia has grown into a woman. Her schoolgirl crush has matured into an emotion that hovers somewhere between a woman’s love, worry for Julian’s unknown safety, and seething anger over Julian’s decampment. When Julian returns to London – at the same time women begin to turn up dead and drained of blood – Portia needs to know if Julian lost his humanity in the search for his soul.
The Vampire Who Loved Me is infectious, forcing the giddy turn of every page as Julian and Portia reunite and Medeiros moves them through a plot that doesn’t break ground, but is none the worse for it. Initially, Portia fears Julian is behind the string of dead women and wants to prove his innocence, only to suddenly suspect him of the crimes. Things become complicated when Portia learns who is really behind the murders, a Parisian woman, Valentine, who turns out to be Julian’s obsessed lover and the vampire who now holds Julian’s soul.
What keeps this couple compelling – even through a series of stock romance scenes: Julian and Portia hold tight and pretend to be married to ward off the advances of other men; Julian and Portia whirl around a dance floor pretending to be vampire and eternal bride to enrage and draw out a jealous Valentine; Julian and Portia seeking shelter for the night in a place where they can be alone and uninterrupted – is that this couple is tortured by their love for one another. Portia learns that she’s had Julian’s heart all along, but that’s meaningless because he’d allowed Valentine to keep what stands between him and being human. For his part, Julian loves Portia enough to want something better for her than himself. This pair has to fight themselves, one another, and Valentine for their happily ever after.
Where After Midnight read like a crossbreeding of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and Jane Austen, The Vampire Who Loved Me is a regency paranormal that stays tightly focused on the love story, with little-to-no time devoted to the inner workings of society or subplots. It is unlike other paranormals in that’s it more quaint than dark. Medeiros never takes the possibility of redemption from Julian. Vampirism need not be permanent or final. There is always hope that he could be human again. While Julian and Portia’s story lacks the complexity and nuance of After Midnight’s plot – all the same characters are present, but Portia’s sisters and their now husbands exit the stage for their siblings’ starring roles – in all, the reading experience for The Vampire Who Loved Me stands apart from its predecessor, but not to a lesser degree.
The Vampire Who Loved Me is a delightful read. It’s a traditional romance that never feels staid, it’s familiar without feeling retread. Medeiros crafts a story that succeeds with compelling characters, a well laid back story, and pacing that keeps the pages turning. The only down side is that after reading, the anticipation is over.
You can visit Teresa here and purchase this book here or here.

Singh’s single title debut, Slave to Sensation brushes up to the science fiction subgenre cyberpunk. Set one hundred years into a dystopian future, Singh’s world is populated with humans – who seem to be the least important forms of higher intelligence – changelings, which are human/animal shape shifters and Psy, human-like beings with advanced mental capabilities who have squashed emotions from their lives. Whereas cyberpunk focuses on society as ruled by computers and vast networks of cyberspace, Singh tweaks this model for a mentally controlled society, where the Psy’s vast network, PsyNet, is completely telepathic, a cyberspace where minds connect without the need for technology.
The world Singh builds is complicated. At times it’s easier to go along with the plot than to stop and figure out exactly how the components of this world fit together. It’s furthermore difficult to ascertain where Singh’s futuristic California leaves off and her own lack of understanding of the state begins. San Francisco is described as a gem by the sea, when in fact it is rather famously a city by the bay. A hundred years in the future, has the city migrated those few miles to the coast? Or, is it simply an error in word choice? Likewise, Singh describes great forests that encroach toward the city and fill California’s great inland valley, but doesn’t mention a climate shift that would allow great forests grow in what is currently an arid climate. In the end, the world building doesn’t really matter as the shining star of this work is Singh’s ability to travel over familiar territory and make it her own.
Paranormal romances with shape-shifting or were-animal characters delve into the beast within the man metaphor without subtly or filter. There is literally a beast within the man. Singh handles this better than most by juxtaposing her changeling hero, Lucas Hunter – part man, part panther – with a Psy named Sascha Duncan. The Psy race is as cold and calculating as machines which makes this this juxtaposition interesting for the natural conflict it offers. He is animal, she is machine. It seems so natural and so easy a pitting of characters that it’s difficult to understand why this hasn’t been done to the point of cliché yet. Sascha and Lucas are caught in the centuries old strife of their natures and a very new and immediate threat: a Psy serial killer.
When several changeling women are tortured and killed, including one from the DarkRiver pack, Lucas, as alpha to that pack, decides to infiltrate the Psy. Lucas knows the Psy are mentally linked and though the races do not mix and each has limited information about the other, he feels certain information about the killer is bouncing around PsyNet. He simply needs someone to access the information so the killer can be caught and brought to justice. Lucas targets Sascha because she’s a cardinal, an extraordinary Psy with an unusual gift.
What Lucas doesn’t know is that Sascha isn’t like the other Psy. Her mental skills like telepathy and telekinesis are average at best. After a hundred years of a Psy program know as Silence – conditioning aimed at obliterating emotion and the animal instinct that leads to violent crime – Sascha shouldn’t feel anything. And yet, she does. Knowing she’s broken, she lives in fear that she’ll be found out and mentally reconditioned. Sascha is a fascinating heroine not simply due to the race of people she comes from or the world Singh builds for her, but because she is a heroine who is not the ultra-feminine antithesis of the ultra-alpha hero. Sasha doesn’t mother or nurture. She is uniquely her own character; a refreshing change of pace for a heroine and the best example of Singh taking familiar material and owning it.
Singh brings Sascha and Lucas together slowly and beautifully. Lucas is distrustful of Sascha, convinced she harbors a serial killer; and Sascha is distrustful of Lucas, convinced he will be able to see through her defenses and expose her as a the damaged and broken Psy she fears she is. And yet – it’s the and yet that’s the best part of romance – they are attracted to one another and feel compelled to be together. Eventually, Sascha and Lucas trust one another enough to team up and hunt for the serial killer. To do so, Sascha spends a considerable about of time on the PsyNet, which Singh describes as being similar to a network of stars against a black sky. It would seem Sascha’s time in the PsyNet would be plagued with a lack of action, as though the reader were staring into black, but Singh avoids this by keeping Sascha’s mental activities well painted. During the search Sascha comes to see her Psy world and the hierarchy within it as completely negative and the changeling world as completely positive. This is too easy a conclusion for the complexities Singh has built. While the story isn’t lesser for this, it does stand at odds with the rest of the work.
The search for the serial killer propels and sustains the story, even though the killer’s identity is easily guessed. The meat of the book, however, is the love story, an age old tale of opposites attracting and finding balance in those very differences. The result is captivating. Slave to Sensation straddles genres and succeeds because Singh takes seeming literary opposites, cyberpunk and romance, and blends the fields to makes something that is stronger for the pairing and uniquely her own own.
You can visit Nalini here and purchase this book here and here.

But finite or open-ended, a series has the same rules as most fiction: the overarching story has to move towards a resolution of some kind. The ring is destroyed and Middle Earth is saved, all the Bridgerton siblings find soul mates, Eve Dallas overcomes her scarred past and discovers what it means to love and be loved. (The only exceptions that I know of are mysteries, perhaps because they’re mostly plot driven. Rex Stout’s Archie Goodwin and Nero Wolfe are the same in the last book as they were in the first, written some forty years earlier; their fans would’ve rioted otherwise.) If there’s no forward motion—no storyline and character arc reaching towards a logical conclusion—then the series becomes static, visiting the same problems and issues again and again, each time turning a bit more stale.
What happens, though, when an author abandons her series’ storyline to zoom off into left field?
Danse Macabre, is the fourteenth book in Laurell K. Hamilton’s Vampire Hunter series. Not quite romance, traditional fantasy, or mystery, the Vampire Hunter is part of a relatively new subgenre: urban fantasy, which is a blend of all three with a large dollop of horror mixed in. Urban fantasy is set in our modern-day skyscraper and techno-gadget world, except there be dragons—and vampires, werewolves, wizards, witches, fairies, demons and other folks that go bump in the night. It’s a sort of Hans Christian Anderson meets Dracula in a Raymond Chandler setting. Though not the first, Hamilton was one of the earliest authors to write in this subgenre, and her Anita Blake is a forerunner of Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden, Charlene Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse, and Kim Harrison’s Rachel Hunter, among many others, most of whom use Anita’s edgy, first person voice that invites the reader into the protagonist’s stream of noir consciousness as she or he routinely deals with things that would have us go screaming for our mothers.
When we are introduced to Anita Blake in Guilty Pleasures, she is working as an animator in St. Louis, Missouri, raising zombies from the dead. As Anita points out, animating is an innate ability that is a curse, a religious experience, or a nuisance; however, she and her coworkers at Animators, Inc., have turned zombie-raising into a business that pays well. Anita also is a preternatural consultant and a licensed vampire hunter. While the Supreme Court has declared vampires “alive” and legal citizens, there is only one sentence for a criminally inclined vampire—death—and Anita has racked up so many kills that vampires call her The Executioner, an epithet she accepts and claims as her own.
Small and delicate-looking, Anita has a black belt in martial arts and packs enough weaponry to give Rambo pause. However, while able to rumble with the best of them, she is rather solitary; she has a few close friends, but no man in her life. Even if there were, she would still sleep in a chaste bed because, after having a relationship go painfully sour in college, she believes in remaining celibate before marriage. Anita is a woman of strong convictions, and her world is starkly divided into black and white, right and wrong, human and monsters—and she’s carrying too many battle scars not to know that vampires are monsters, no matter what the Supreme Court says. When Jean-Claude, the new Master Vampire of St. Louis, indicates a romantic interest, she turns him down, stating, “I don’t date vampires. I kill them.”
Still, despite her stated aversion to the fanged crowd, Anita is attracted to the beautiful Jean-Claude. And Jean-Claude, his reasons deliciously ambiguous, does not let up in his pursuit of Anita. For she is more than an animator; she is a necromancer with power over all the dead (Hamilton doesn’t exactly explain the difference between the two; I assume it’s a matter of degree), and controlling her would drastically increase Jean-Claude’s own power. Almost immediately, he imposes on Anita two of the four marks that would make her his human servant, and is looking for any opportunity to give her the remaining two. No hand-wringing ingénue, Anita flatly tells Jean-Claude that if he forces her, she would kill him. But bit by bit, she finds herself allowing Jean-Claude into her private, chaste world while being drawn into his darkly sensual one. And perhaps in trying to escape her fascination with the Master Vampire, Anita turns to another, Richard Zeeman, Ulfric of the St. Louis werewolf pack. But the wolf is Jean-Claude’s animal to call, and so the two-way tug of war between Anita and Jean-Claude becomes a triangle, and Jean Claude damn near gets what he wants as the three of them form a triumvirate of Master Vampire, Necromancer and Ulfric.
With their lives tangled in a Gordian knot, it seemed that Anita would have to resolve her relationships with Jean-Claude and Richard by cutting one loose. She does eventually sleep with both of them—one at a time—but that does not ease the sexual or relational tension. Richard will not share and Jean-Claude wants Anita to take the final marks that would bind her to him forever. In each subsequent book, it was a question of which way she would go, or if she would able to find a third choice, some sort of compromise that would allow her to have both and keep her soul intact. All of this is interwoven with Anita’s adventures first as an animator and consultant, and later on as a Federal Marshal traveling the country investigating preternatural crimes.
Then the ardeur hit.
In the eleventh book, Narcissus in Chains, Anita returns to St. Louis to discover that she has “caught” a power from Jean-Claude, the ardeur, which has turned her into an incubus (there is some serious mixing of mythologies). She has to have sex often, with multiple partners all at once, to feed the ardeur, else she will lose control and, uhm, “love” someone to death. No, really. Metaphysical sex, Anita calls it. She also calls it feeding and she calls her bed partners food. It is a radical change of direction, made all the more disconcerting by its suddenness. Overnight, fastidious Anita who had issues with casual hugs is boinking anything male. Well, not quite anything. All of Anita’s sex partners are young—or young-looking—and beautiful, with the stamina of satyrs. (We should be so lucky.) But the change in Anita goes far beyond her sexual appetites, for she’s doing the same thing that she’d once called vampires monsters for doing—treating people as sheep.
In Narcissus and the next two books, Cerulean Sins and Incubus Dreams, the focus shifts away from the darkly brooding mysteries that explore the preternatural world, moving instead to Anita’s romps between the sheets and anywhere else the ardeur hits. Incubus Dreams, in particular, is one long, sex-soaked monologue as Anita bemoans the dizzying wrench in her values, her beliefs, herself even as she gets it on—and on and on. But even more wrenching is what happens to Jean-Claude and Richard. No longer the dangerous lovers who had matched Anita strength for strength, at best Jean-Claude is just one of the many studs in Anita’s stable and at worse he is her procurer, while Richard is marginalized and replaced by Micah, a small man with a big—member—who doesn’t mind sharing. But then, no one matches Anita. Her powers are, at this point, so great that she is able to single-handedly wipe the floor with most opponents. The sense of danger and menace to her has greatly diminished, if not disappeared altogether, along with the dramatic tension that it created.
Anita Blake The Executioner has become Mary Sue the nymphomaniac.
To tell the truth, I was a little hesitant to review Danse Macabre not only because of my disappointment with Incubus Dreams, but also because of the vitriol splashed about by Hamilton’s readers at the abrupt change in the series. There are three camps: those who passionately (hah!) love the new Anita, those who despise her, and the rest of us who keep hoping that the old Anita, along with the old Jean-Claude and Richard, would once more reassert themselves. Based on the last three books, there’s little chance of that happening. However, like Kassia, when it comes to series—especially those I’ve greatly enjoyed in the past—I’m weak. I can’t help it. It’s something about having to have the complete set. So I bought it, in hardback, telling myself that I could review it divorced from the previous books. (I’m very good at justifying. You should see me at Coldstone Creamery.)
And so, Danse Macabre:
Due to her intense sexual activity, Anita is afraid that she might be pregnant, and she has no idea by whom. It could be any of the several men she’s been having sex with (except Micah; he’s been fixed). While Anita is dealing with the crisis of a missed period, Jean-Claude’s guests are arriving. The Master of St. Louis has invited the masters of other cities to St. Louis to celebrate the tour of the first ever vampire dance troupe (sounds hokey, but trust me, the ballet is the best part). Both Jean-Claude and Anita are understandably nervous. It will be the biggest vampire meet and greet in the history of America, and the chances for power grabs are great. In fact, Anita has to deal with two almost immediately, one from the siren wife of the Master of Atlanta, who wants to use Anita’s ardeur to release the inner siren of her sons. The other grab is from the Master of Chicago, who’d tasted the ardeur centuries before and wants it again, even if he has to take down Jean-Claude to get it. And in the middle of the power plays and booty calls, Belle Morte, Jean-Claude’s maker and former master, and Marmee Noir, the Mother of All Vampires, make their own appearances, eager to take Anita and all her powers for themselves.
For those who’d hoped that Danse Macabre would return to its Vampire Hunter’s roots, be forewarned: Jean-Claude still stands by as Anita goes at it like a bunny hyped on aphrodisiacs with as many as she can, Richard still slinks the edges around like a sullen wolf, and the only hunting done is by the ardeur itself as it seeks new partners to add to Anita’s sex posse. There isn’t any resolution of the many threads left dangling in Incubus Dreams; there isn’t any sort of mystery at all. In fact, Danse Macabre reads like a romance, with the story being advanced mainly through dialogue and character interaction. And as a romance—a twisted and deviant one, true—it surprisingly succeeds.
One reason for its success is Hamilton’s writing style. It is straightforward and smoothly non-intrusive, allowing each character’s voice to be their own. Another reason is the way Hamilton capably uses the basic premise of a romance: two lovers trying to overcome whatever obstacles that are in their way to fulfillment. (If they succeed, then we have a happy ending. If they don’t, then we have a French art house film.) Okay, so “two lovers” is quite a stretch (no pun intended) and the happily ever after is more like survive until the next crisis, but Danse Macabre does have enough sympathetic characters dealing with enough conflicts and obstacles that I wanted to find out how Anita, et al., overcame the crisis du jour.
But Danse Macabre also has a common failing of many romances: the secondary characters are weak. When the ardeur hit, Jean-Claude, Richard, and the rest of the strong males were in a sense emasculated and made subordinate to Anita’s appetites, and all the strong female characters who could’ve counterbalanced have disappeared. (Anita’s best friend Ronnie did make an appearance at the beginning of Danse, but she and Anita immediately argued and she disappeared again.) All the weight is given to Anita, who looms very large while everyone else are much smaller and less than. Another common problem is that we’re always in Anita’s head. Of course, that’s partly because the narrative is in first person. But in the b.a. (before ardeur) books, we were shown that the other characters had lives beyond Anita. We saw them at the office, saw them partying, saw them getting married, saw them grieving at funerals, saw them with loved ones, friends and with enemies. Now Anita has become the sun around which everybody orbits and, to mix a metaphor, anything that happens outside the solar system is off stage.
More importantly in the characte development department, though, is that Anita herself is still bellybutton-gazing. There’s a lot of space given to her explanations of who she is now versus who she was b.a. But the fact that she has to explain herself, especially after thirteen prior books, means that her current character arc is not true and her “now” self did not organically grow out of who she was in those past books. Hamilton introduced a deus ex machina in the form of the ardeur to take the repressed and controlling Anita and turn her into a free-love sex fiend.
Well, not exactly love. While Danse Macabre reads as a romance, it is not romantic. The inclusiveness of Anita’s bed precludes intimacy. There is no pillow talk that isn’t about the ardeur, there is no sharing of hopes, dreams and aspirations, there is no sense of building towards a future, or even leaving the past behind. The one person who offers exclusivity is rejected; Anita sneers at Richard’s desire for a white picket fence, saying that she’d rather have a spiky black wrought iron one. She also says that she loves the men she sleeps with, but as stated above, she also calls them food. Adult love means that the one loved is at least a potential equal who complements the other. It’s kind of hard to be equal with someone you equate with lamp chops. Beyond that, though, why does she love them? After the physical attraction is sated, what else is there? We don’t know—we aren’t shown any meeting of minds, any sense of kindred spirits, anything that would say “when you’re old and ugly I’ll still want you.” The ardeur might not presently be the glue binding them, but it is what pushed them into bed in the first place and no matter how fervently Anita embraces her lifestyle now, she was forced into it by something she never sought. Instead of metaphysical sex, the ardeur has overtones of metaphysical addiction or, worse, rape. Whichever it is, it crowds out everything else, including free will.
Now, lust can work great as a plot device. I’ve stated in another review that there is nothing like a well-written sex scene, or better yet, the promise of sex, to drive a story. Anita didn’t tumble with anybody until book six, and the sexual tension in books one through five was just as riveting as whatever mystery she was uncovering. In contrast, Anita tumbles early and often in Danse Macabre, many times interrupting crucial moments to feed the ardeur, even taking time out to do the deed in the middle of a fight (although in one instance the sex scene was the fight scene). After the fourth—or was it the sixth or tenth?—description of Anita’s ambidexterity and multitasking, I found myself scowling impatiently as I read, wanting everyone to hurry up and finish so we could get back to the real story. Wading through all the sex in Danse was like being forced-fed a box of Sees’ chocolates (yes, I know, but work with me). By the time I was finished, not only was I rather queasy, but I was ready to give nuts and chews a rest for a long while.
But not Anita. Her sexual appetites are here to stay. She has admitted to Richard that even after she controls the ardeur, she will still want her stable of beautiful men. She has also clearly indicated that while she is still ridden by the ardeur, her investigations are on hold. However, there is hope—Anita reminded a Master Vampire that not only was she a Federal Marshal and preternatural expert, but she also was The Executioner. Maybe one day she’ll go back to ferreting out monster crimes and misdeeds. In the meantime, she is working her way past her obstacles to whatever happily ever after that awaits her and her studs. The question is, will I be there when she does? I don’t know. Despite my above-stated impatience and discontent, I am intrigued by the confrontation building between Anita and Marmee Noir and Belle Morte. I am also interested in the changing vampire politics in America and in Europe, curious what shape they will eventually take and what the fallout will be. I wish Hamilton had taken more time to explore that instead of whether Anita has mastered the art of using both hands and mouth simultaneously.
You can visit Laurell K. Hamilton here and can purchase Danse Macabre here or here.