I just couldn't wait to see what happened to Pia, her Dark One Kristoff, his DO pal Alec, the Council of Vampires, The Brotherhood of the Light, the Icelandic ghost Ulfur (and his ghostly horse Ragnar), not to mention Pia's friend Magda and her beau Ray. I was lucky to be able to access the e-book through my library (and no one had beaten me to it).
The slapstick continues, as Pia tries to make everyone play nice. Since she is both a Zorya of the Brotherhood and a Beloved of the Dark Ones, she can see both sides and will smite the recalcitrant. There are several plots running concurrently, making things murky, but as Kristoff tells Pia, she will work through the details one step at a time. In the meanwhile, she has fun with their telepathy by tormenting him with erotic fantasies.
One of the best parts of the book (in my opinion anyway) is when Pia is brought before the Vampire Council at the beginning of the novel. It becomes very clear that she has chosen to come of her own accord and that she will take no shit from any of them. I believe that this is a parody of authors like Christine Feehan, whose vampires (oh, excuse me, Carpathians) drag their women around by the wrist, talk down to them, and tell them what to think and feel. Feehan’s heroines think they are smart, but act really dumb and put up with abuse. Pia may appear ditzy, but she's a helluva lot smarter than she lets on and she moves the investigation along. MacAlister's Beloveds definitely rule the roost and spend time deflating large egos, calling a spade a spade, and generally cutting the arrogance down to size!
Not to everyone's taste, but is anything ever? The combination of slapstick and feminism makes this series great fun.
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