Fang Fiction / Kate Stayman-London

 

3 out of 5 stars 

Halloween Bingo 2024

Not nearly as much fun as I anticipated. I liked it, but it could have been so much better.

Have you ever daydreamed about visiting your favourite fictional world? If I'm having trouble getting to sleep, I imagine having a conversation with one of my favourite characters. It relaxes me enough that I'm soon out like a light. Tess not only gets to dream about it, she is sent through a portal to experience it, but what was meant to be a quick message delivery turns into something rather more complicated.

Tess's beloved book is Blood Feuds which describes the lives of vampires, banished to an alternate reality overlaying mundane Manhattan. When she gets there, everything seems familiar. She recognizes the major players and the landmarks. But does she really know them? This all seemed like a good idea when Octavia, an accidental escapee from the Island, talked her into it, but now she's one lone, tasty human among a lot of bloodsuckers. Will she find safety with Callum or with Felix?

The additional wrinkle is that Tess has trauma in her past. The author flirts a long time with the details, but any woman will recognize the situation—date rape drugs. She experiences panic attacks and leaves the university where she and the man in question both study and teach. (And in real life, it doesn't usually wrap up so positively.)

So, on the surface, this a story about Tess falling in love with a vampire, but really it is a rather thinly disguised sermon on consent and the way women are treated when they report sexual assault. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but I prefer messages such as this to be less blatant. Tell me without spelling it out directly. I mean, it's a good lesson, but I want a fun novel more than I want a moral to the tale. In addition, once this point is hammered home, the rest of the plot is rather tepid and paint-by-number. Disappointingly, the vampires aren't too much different from mortals.

I read this book to fulfill The Carpathians square of my Halloween Bingo card.

The Fake Mate / Lana Ferguson

 

3.5 out of 5 stars 

Halloween Bingo 2024

So this was and wasn't what I expected. I mean with a title like The Fake Mate, I knew that faking would backfire on Mackenzie and Noah. The fun would be in watching it happen. That was the expected part.

The unexpected part was the werewolf part. I'm glad I had previously read (and obsessively re-read) Bride, so the whole idea of knotting wasn't new to me, but in that book the woman of the couple is a Vampyre. No going into heat for her. That was a new (somewhat horrifying) concept. And werewolf sex is … um….juicy? There are an awful lot of bodily fluids involved. I have never been so pleased to be plain vanilla human!

Ferguson also portrays the roles of alpha and omega much differently than my other instructor, namely Patricia Briggs. You couldn't get much different from Charles and Anna Cornick. But I liked Mackenzie's smart aleck sense of humour and her teasing of the initially grumpy Noah. I also enjoyed watching them deal with Noah's mother and Mackenzie's gran, all while trying to maintain the nonchalant façade.

So, reluctant romance reader that I am, I must admit that I enjoyed this quite a bit. Still not as much as Bride—I don't think it'll be in my re-reading queue—but I'm glad I picked it up. (And if this had just been humans in a similar plot, I'm pretty sure it would have bored me to death.)

I read this for the Shifters square on my Bingo Card.

Filthy Rich Fae / Geneva Lee

 

4 out of 5 stars 

Well, if I didn't already know that I'm a visual learner rather than audio, I surely would now. Once again, my library only had this title available in audiobook format. I think the only reason that I remember enough to write a review at all is because this is complete fluff and there's not a helluva lot to have to recall. This romance is also proof (once again) that paranormal trappings make romance novels enjoyable to me.

I had a good time listening to this despite a lot of repetition and the heroine, Cate, being very nearly TSTL. What a centuries old fae would see in her is beyond me, but I still enjoyed the banter and the story arc. But I swear, if she had “lifted her chin" one more time….. Plus, her foster brother, Channing, is even dumber than she is.

Channing starts the whole plot off by being a stereotypical foster care graduate and getting involved in organized crime. Cate is a nurse and is on duty when Channing arrives in hospital while she's on duty. Despite the fact that the crime boss, Lochlan Gage, pretty much owns Gage Memorial Hospital, Cate decides it would be an excellent idea to go to a sketchy area of town to confront him and settle her brother's debt. See what I mean about TSTL? For reasons of his own, Gage releases Channing and takes Cate's soul instead. The relationship starts adversarial, which is my favourite trope, so I was willing to put up with the stupidity.

Warning to cliffhanger haters: there's a dilly! If my library won't order the next book, I'm going to be forced to spend my own cash (and they've rejected my request to purchase the second book of the Filthy Rich Vampire series, so……). Being weird in my own way, when I realized how much I want to read the next book, that added a fourth star to my rating. Perhaps I'm just as contrary as Cate.

Angels' Blood / Nalini Singh

3 out of 5 stars 

Vampire hunter Elena Deveraux knows she’s the best—but she doesn’t know if she’s good enough for this job. Hired by the dangerously beautiful Archangel Raphael, a being so lethal that no mortal wants his attention, only one thing is clear—failure is not an option…even if the task is impossible.

Because this time, it’s not a wayward vamp she has to track. It’s an archangel gone bad.

The job will put Elena in the midst of a killing spree like no other…and pull her to the razor’s edge of passion. Even if the hunt doesn’t destroy her, succumbing to Raphael’s seductive touch just may. For when archangels play, mortals break…

I read this book to fill the Diverse Voices square of my 2019 Halloween Bingo Card.

This was fascinating in that Singh’s world varies so wildly from what I would have expected of angels. Lots of different cultures believe in them, but I come from an evangelical Christian background and let me tell you, the folks that I went to church with back in the day would have been quite shocked at these angels! Angels who casually drop the F-bomb in their conversation and make sexual demands of mortals. Not to mention that they are the source of vampires, something which the evangelicals that I know would likely consider to be heresy!

It’s refreshing to read something that takes an entirely new look at something which I thought I knew about. Just like her Psy/Changeling books, the main point of this book seemed to be getting Elena into a hot, romantic relationship. In this case, Elena is a Guild Hunter, who has a natural aptitude for rounding up errant vampires. The vampires are created by the angels and have signed contracts for a certain term of service in return for the near-immortality. If they skip out early on those contracts, people like Elena track them down.

Of course, Elena is fabulous at what she does and she draws the attention of the ultra-hot archangel, Raphael. This is both good and bad, especially since Elena can’t seem to keep her opinions to herself. Fortunately for her, Raphael needs her assistance enough to put up with her lip.

I should reiterate at this point that I am not a huge fan of the romance genre. I like it when romance is included in strong mystery series (Deanna Raybourn) or in a fascinating fantasy world (Ilona Andrews), but Singh’s fantasy worlds just don’t speak very strongly to me. I like her stuff, but her plots are overly concerned with getting the heroine into bed with someone, not on her solving a crime, with bedroom time as a pleasant side dish. I persist in thinking of her work as more appropriate to the straight-up romance reader and less for the fantasy enthusiast.

Having said all of the above, I can see myself continuing on with this series, although not in the driven way that I read series like Hidden Legacy by Ilona Andrews or Mercy Thompson by Patricia Briggs

Discount Armageddon / Seanan McGuire

4 out of 5 stars 

Ghoulies. Ghosties. Long-legged beasties. Things that go bump in the night...

The Price family has spent generations studying the monsters of the world, working to protect them from humanity—and humanity from them.

Enter Verity Price. Despite being trained from birth as a cryptozoologist, she'd rather dance a tango than tangle with a demon, and is spending a year in Manhattan while she pursues her career in professional ballroom dance. Sounds pretty simple, right?

It would be, if it weren't for the talking mice, the telepathic mathematicians, the asbestos supermodels, and the trained monster-hunter sent by the Price family's old enemies, the Covenant of St. George. When a Price girl meets a Covenant boy, high stakes, high heels, and a lot of collateral damage are almost guaranteed.

To complicate matters further, local cryptids are disappearing, strange lizard-men are appearing in the sewers, and someone's spreading rumors about a dragon sleeping underneath the city...

I read this book to fill the Cryptozoologist square of my 2019 Halloween Bingo Card.

Hail! Cake and cheese for all sapient rodents!

I still love this silly little series and the Aeslin mice. Verity Price may not be the world’s sharpest detective and Domenic De Luca may not be the most desireable romantic partner for her, but the mice fix everything with their charming presence throughout the book.

My memory is obviously not what it used to be, because I had completely forgotten the book’s opening, in which the mice feature prominently. Somehow, I didn’t think they appeared until Verity’s adventures in the Big Apple. I also had forgotten the significance of cake and cheese even in this very first book. Once again, I thought that the emphasis on these two foodstuffs came in later books. They were probably overshadowed in my memory by the whole take-out chicken scene! Showing that it does pay to re-read your favourites.

I still enjoy this series, featuring a manic family of ardent cryptozoologists and their crazy adventures, featuring any mythical beastie that you can think of and some which the author must have made up (like the Aeslin mice). I love the snark, the cute, and the smart. Each book is a lovely little vacation from reality.

Breath of Fire / Amanda Bouchet

3.5 stars out of 5

SHE'S DESTINED TO DESTROY THE WORLD... 
"Cat" Catalia Fisa has been running from her destiny since she could crawl. But now, her newfound loved ones are caught between the shadow of Cat's tortured past and the threat of her world-shattering future. So what's a girl to do when she knows it's her fate to be the harbinger of doom? Everything in her power.

BUT NOT IF SHE CAN HELP IT
Griffin knows Cat is destined to change the world-for the better. As the realms are descending into all-out war, Cat and Griffin must embrace their fate together. Gods willing, they will emerge side-by-side in the heart of their future kingdom...or not at all.

Better than the first book but not one that I will ever likely re-read. What improves this offering, in my opinion, is that it veers away from the Kate-Daniels-like pattern that the first volume followed. Cat gets to be her own kind of reckless and crazy in this one. I still found the dialog to be a little too modern for the Greek-mythology-type setting, but it didn’t grate quite so much in this one. Either I’m getting used to it or the author toned it down some.

Although there isn’t a doubt about the Cat/Griffin romance (that’s settled at the book’s beginning), there are new relationships budding. Griffin has sisters and they have admirers (and those they admire) and Bouchet uses those to add the romantic tension here. I’m already fond of Jocasta and hope that she can convince her man to declare himself in the next book.

And that right there is why this book doesn’t rate more highly with me. I’d really like the fantasy-part of the plot, the quest to build a new kingdom with better governance, to take the foreground and have the relationships recede to the midground, please and thank you. Books aren’t realistic without relationships and the lead-up tension can be lots of fun, but really the romance shouldn’t overpower the actual plot. Love and sex are both great as seasonings, but they should never overpower the entire story.

Somewhere between “clueless about relationships” and “totally devoted to romance,” that’s my happy place. (Read Ilona Andrews’ Hidden Legacy series or Innkeeper series to see this done well.)

Blood Curse / Kat Flannery

2.5 stars out of 5

Four years after the Blood Curse, Pril of the Peddlers vows to protect her child against the evil men who hunt her. With her clan unaware of the branded girl among them, Pril has to keep the identity of her daughter a secret. When her child is kidnapped, she is forced to ask Merchant runner, Kade Walker, for his help. 
Kade Walker needs to find the gypsy child. Blackmailed and pushed beyond his own moral code, he is determined to do whatever it takes. When he comes across the Peddler clan, he is sure the girl is there, however all hope is lost when the gypsies capture him. Time is running out-until Pril makes him an offer he cannot refuse. 
Amidst greed, lust, revenge and love, Pril will need to trust Kade. But as the evil nears and doubt creeps in, will she discover that the enemy has been standing next to her all along?

I chose this book because the author is coming to a conference that I’m attending in August. I like to have some idea what the keynote authors have to offer, so that I know which panels and discussions that I want to attend.

I had to order this book on interlibrary loan--my public library doesn’t have anything by this author. On the basis of this book, I’d have to say that they’ve made the right decision. Not that the ideas were bad, they weren’t. But the expression of them wasn’t what I would expect. In fact, I was disappointed.

The first pages were confusing, as the action went too fast for the exposition. It all figured itself out in subsequent pages, but it was an inauspicious beginning. Add to that some clumsy sentence structures, where I wasn't sure which pronoun referred to which person, and some questionable word choices--I’m sure in one sentence the author meant “condescension” but instead “condensation” was printed. Also, on several occasions, the men are described as having “meaty fists.” Now, I know what that means, but I think there are many words that would describe large, powerful hands better than that. It was (thankfully) not a long book, but it made the entire story feel rushed, which may be why so many plot points were telegraphed very early in the narrative, leaving little for the reader to discover or be surprised by.

All in all, I’m glad that I read the book--I now know the author’s level of skill and it took me only a partial evening to finish the volume. I’m truly sorry that I didn’t enjoy the novel more, but I will see what the author has to say in her keynote address, but I imagine that I’ll be spending my conference time listening to others.

The Falconer / Elizabeth May

4 out of 5 stars

One girl's nightmare is this girl's faery tale

She's a stunner.
Edinburgh, 1844. Eighteen-year-old Lady Aileana Kameron, the only daughter of the Marquess of Douglas, has everything a girl could dream of: brains, charm, wealth, a title—and drop-dead beauty.

She's a liar.
But Aileana only looks the part of an aristocratic young lady. she's leading a double life: She has a rare ability to sense the sìthíchean—the faery race obsessed with slaughtering humans—and, with the aid of a mysterious mentor, has spent the year since her mother died learning how to kill them.

She's a murderer.
Now Aileana is dedicated to slaying the fae before they take innocent lives. With her knack for inventing ingenious tools and weapons—from flying machines to detonators to lightning pistols—ruthless Aileana has one goal: Destroy the faery who destroyed her mother.

She's a Falconer.
The last in a line of female warriors born with a gift for hunting and killing the fae, Aileana is the sole hope of preventing a powerful faery population from massacring all of humanity. Suddenly, her quest is a lot more complicated. She still longs to avenge her mother's murder—but she'll have to save the world first.

I read this book in one evening and completely enjoyed myself, hence the 4 star rating. It was really quite predictable—aristocratic girl in a steampunk Victorian timeline who is vowed to avenge the death of her mother. At a swanky event of some kind, a banshee has killed Aileana’s mother and left Aileana drenched in blood. Since then, she has acquired a pixie sidekick (Derrick) and a Fairy mentor and fight instructor (Kiaran).

Very reminiscent of Karen Marie Moning’s Fever series or Sarah J. Maas’ Court of Thorns and Roses series. I blundered into this volume, not realizing that it is first of a trilogy—if you abhor cliff-hanger endings, you either want to skip this book or have book two queued up and ready to go.

There is a very obvious paranormal romance element to this novel, telegraphed from extremely early in the book. In this respect, both Moning and Maas were better at the build up to the relationship, letting their heroines struggle with the concept longer and creating better tension in the stories. May throws in an old flame of Aileana’s—she may be a Falconer (a hunter of the Fae), but Gavin is a Seer. Aileana needs a magic flower in order to see the Fae, so she and Gavin are a natural team. This sets up a quasi-love triangle between Aileana, Gavin, and Kiaran.

The end of this first installment may have been a cliff-hanger, but it’s a very effective one. It left me wishing I had the second book already in my hands to see what is meant by those last couple of pages! I was relieved to find out that my public library has both of the remaining books, so I will eventually get to discover the outcome.

Use of Scots dialect was sparing, just enough to remind the reader of where the action takes place, a feature which I appreciated. Also the dust jacket art is gorgeous. Recommended for fans of Fae paranormal romance fiction.

That Ain't Witchcraft / Seanan McGuire

4 out of 5 stars

Antimony Price has never done well without a support system. As the youngest of her generation, she has always been able to depend on her parents, siblings, and cousins to help her out when she's in a pinch--until now. After fleeing from the Covenant of St. George, she's found herself in debt to the crossroads and running for her life. No family. No mice. No way out.

Lucky for her, she's always been resourceful, and she's been gathering allies as she travels: Sam, fūri trapeze artist turned boyfriend; Cylia, jink roller derby captain and designated driver; Fern, sylph friend, confidant, and maker of breakfasts; even Mary, ghost babysitter to the Price family. Annie's actually starting to feel like they might be able to figure things out--which is probably why things start going wrong again.

New Gravesend, Maine is a nice place to raise a family...or make a binding contract with the crossroads. For James Smith, whose best friend disappeared when she tried to do precisely that, it's also an excellent place to plot revenge. Now the crossroads want him dead and they want Annie to do the dirty deed. She owes them, after all.

And that's before Leonard Cunningham, aka, "the next leader of the Covenant," shows up...

It's going to take everything Annie has and a little bit more to get out of this one. If she succeeds, she gets to go home. If she fails, she becomes one more cautionary tale about the dangers of bargaining with the crossroads.

But no pressure.

Let me just warn you up front, that I am an InCryptid fan and cannot be expected to be too critical of my beloved series. I enjoy the Price family, in their weirdness and their oddly chosen purpose, to protect the cryptid species in their vicinity. I love the wide selection of creatures than McGuire has dreamed up for them to interact with and run interference for. I enjoy their opposition to and reluctant engagement with the Covenant of St. George. The Prices fight against prejudice in all of its forms.

I must confess that I miss the Aeslin mice. (Hail, cake & cheese for all!!) But I have a feeling that Annie will be able to rejoin the family fold soon and be reunited with her rodent worshippers. This is a consummation devoutly to be wished. In fine family style, Annie will be returning with a new adoptive family member and a potential spouse. Parr for the course among these crytozoological ninjas.

As long as Ms. MaGuire chooses to write these adventures, I will continue to read them. They are a wonderful little hit of fun, frolicking among the gorgons and bogeymen and traveling the ghost roads with likeable characters.

Now that the Covenant is fully aware of the Prices' existence in North America, the plot will no doubt thicken. I can hardly wait for the next story!

Dead Ever After / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Sookie Stackhouse finds it easy to turn down the request of former barmaid Arlene when she wants her job back at Merlotte’s. After all, Arlene tried to have Sookie killed. But her relationship with Eric Northman is not so clearcut. He and his vampires are keeping their distance…and a cold silence. And when Sookie learns the reason why, she is devastated.

Then a shocking murder rocks Bon Temps, and Sookie is arrested for the crime.

But the evidence against Sookie is weak, and she makes bail. Investigating the killing, she’ll learn that what passes for truth in Bon Temps is only a convenient lie. What passes for justice is more spilled blood. And what passes for love is never enough...

2019 Re-Read

I have been heard to say (not seriously, but when having a hissy fit) that when a woman is done with a man, he should die. That would be how he knew that the relationship was over. Now, may I also say that I’ve never enforced this idea of mine, it was temporary insanity after the end of a particularly frustrating pseudo-relationship. But it would seem that Sookie agrees with me:

“In books, the hero was gone after the big blowup. He didn’t stick around in the vicinity doing mysterious shit, sending messages to the heroine by a third party. He hauled his ass into oblivion. And that was the way things should be, as far as I was concerned. Life should imitate romance literature far more often.”

I anticipated this ending practically from the first book. It’s not how I would have ended the series, but I was just the reader, not the writer. I’m proclaiming my undying love for Bill! But that’s just me. When I read this series the first time, I read the last three books in a frantic binge. As a result, I didn’t remember a lot of details, so it was pleasant to read a little slower this time around and soak in the final moments of a pleasurable series. I have absolutely no doubt that I will read this series again at some point, but now I hope to get on with other books, due at the library in a few days.

Bill forever, y'all.

Deadlocked / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Growing up with telepathic abilities, Sookie Stackhouse realized early on that there are things she'd rather not know. An now that she's an adult, she also realizes that some things she knows about, she'd rather not see--like Eric Northman feeding off another woman. A younger one.

There's a thing or two she'd like to say about that, but she has to keep quiet--Felipe de Castro, the vampire king of Louisiana (and Arkansas and Nevada), is in town. It's the worst possible time for a human body to show up in Eric's front yard--especially the body of the woman whose blood he just drank.

Now it's up to Sookie and Bill, the official Area Five investigator, to solve the murder. Sookie thinks that, at least this time, the dead girl's fate has nothing to do with her. But she is wrong. She has an enemy, one far more devious than she would ever suspect, who's set out to make Sookie's world come crashing down.

2019 Re-Read

Sookie is trying to wish away some aspects of her life and makes the mistake of asking Bill about his favourite fantasy:

“My favorite fantasy? You come down into my daytime resting place stark naked," he said, and I could see the gleam of his teeth as he smiled. "Oh, wait," Bill said. "That's already happened.”
“And that's your fantasy? That I come into your house naked and have sex with you?"
"After that, you tell me that you have sent Eric on his way, that you want to be mine forever, and that to share my life you will permit me to make you a vampire like me."
The silence now was thick, and the fun had drained out of the fantasy.
Then Bill added, "You know what I'd say when you told me this? I'd tell you I would never do such a thing. Because I love you.”

This is where Bill proves to me that he understands Sookie perfectly. He knows that she’s a creature of the sun and would never be happy in the darkness of the undead world. And that he still loves her.

It’s Sookie’s birthday, and she receives a delegation of the undead when darkness falls:

“We came to wish you a happy day,” Eric said. “And I suppose, as usual, Bill will want to express his undying love that surpasses my love, as he’ll tell you—and Pam will want to say something sarcastic and nearly painful, while reminding you that she loves you, too.”
Bill and Pam looked decidedly miffed at Eric’s preemptive strike, but I wasn’t going to let anything dim my mood.
“And what about you, Eric?” I asked on counterattack. “Are you going to tell me that you love me just as much as Bill, but in a practical way, while finding some way to subtly threaten me and simultaneously remind me that you may be leaving with Freyda?”

Once again, Pam is perfect: “Sookie, I brought you something too. I never thought I’d want to spend time with a human, but you’re more tolerable than most.”

There’s also a showdown with Freyda, the Queen who is courting Eric. She visits Sookie to size up her competition. Bubba is perfect as her guide—when she asks what people see in Ms. Stackhouse, the normally addled Bubba speaks right up, telling Freyda that Sookie is kind. And that’s it in a nutshell. She’s kind to everyone who allows it—even when they don’t really deserve it. Forget being a Christian, Sookie, you’re working on being a good Buddhist.

Almost there—I will be free of this re-reading trap with one more book!

Dead in the Family / Charlaine Harris

4 stars out of 5

Sookie Stackhouse is dealing with a whole host of family problems, ranging from her own kin (a non-human fairy and a telepathic second cousin) demanding a place in her life, to her lover Eric's vampire sire, an ancient being who arrives with Eric's 'brother' in tow at a most inopportune moment. And Sookie's tracking down a distant relation of her ailing neighbour (and ex), Vampire Bill Compton.

In addition to the multitude of family issues complicating her life, the werewolf pack of Shreveport has asked Sookie for a special favour, and since Sookie is an obliging young woman, she agrees. But this favour for the wolves has dire results for Sookie, who is still recovering from the trauma of her abduction during the Fairy War.

2019 Re-Read

The “Pam is Awesome” volume.

'Pam. Listen.'
'The phone is pressed to my ear. Speak.'
'Appius Livius Ocella just dropped in.'
'Fuck a zombie!”

This is the book where Pam becomes my favourite vampire (though Bill is still in the running). I love the deadpan lines that Harris writes for this cold blonde.

As in this conversation between Sookie and Pam:

Pam: “How is Eric?'

Sookie: 'Very tightly wound. Plus, a lot of stuff happened that he'll tell you about.'
Pam: 'Thanks for the warning. I'll go to the house now. You're my favorite breather.'
Sookie: 'Oh. Well ... great.'
She hung up.”

Dead and Gone / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

The vamps have been out for years, and now the weres and shifters have decided to follow the lead of the undead and reveal their existence to the ordinary world. Sookie Stackhouse already knows about them, of course - her brother turns into a panther at the full moon, she's friend to the local were pack, and Sam, her boss at Merlotte's bar, is a shapeshifter.

The great revelation goes well at first - then the horribly mutilated body of a were-panther is found in the parking lot of Merlotte's, and Sookie agrees to use her telepathic talent to track down the murderer. But there is a far greater danger than this killer threatening Bon Temps: a race of unhuman beings, older, more powerful, and far more secretive than the vampires or the werewolves, is preparing for war. And Sookie is an all-too-human pawn in their ages-old battle...

2019 Re-Read

“I added to my mental list of the odd things I'd done that day. I'd entertained the police, sunbathed, visited at a mall with some fairies, weeded, and killed someone. Now it was powdered-corpse removal time. And the day wasn't over yet.”

I’m enjoying the inherent humour in this series. Harris knows that she’s writing soap opera story lines and she’s enjoying it. Especially when Sookie arms herself to deal with malevolent fairies—with a garden trowel and a squirt gun of lemon juice! And Sookie saying to herself, “What had set the fae world off? I’d never seen one. Now you couldn’t throw a trowel without hitting a fairy.”

And once again, I’m carrying a torch for Bill:

“As I watched Bill, waiting with apparent calm for death to come to him, I had a flash of him as I'd known him: the first vampire I'd ever met, the first man I'd ever gone to bed with, the first suitor I'd ever loved. Everything that followed had tainted those memories, but for one moment I saw him clearly, and I loved him again.”

From Dead to Worse / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

After the natural disaster of Hurricane Katrina and the manmade explosion at the vampire summit, everyone human and otherwise is stressed, including Louisiana cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse, who is trying to cope with the fact that her boyfriend Quinn has gone missing.

It's clear that things are changing whether the weres and vamps of her corner of Louisiana like it or not. And Sookie, Friend to the Pack and blood-bonded to Eric Northman, leader of the local vampire community is caught up in the changes.

In the ensuing battles, Sookie faces danger, death, and once more, betrayal by someone she loves. And when the fur has finished flying and the cold blood finished flowing, her world will be forever altered.

2019 Re-Read

”The security light made me feel safe, though I knew that was an illusion. If there's light, you can just see what's coming for you a little more clearly.”

How true! We all try to arrange our lives to keep ourselves safe and sound, but in reality we have little control over those matters. But as John Lennon wrote, “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Ms. Stackhouse could write a dissertation on this subject.

This is the volume where I fell in love with Bill Compton. Yes, he’s a vampire, so inherently untrustworthy, but I just love that fact that he stays in Sookie’s life and just keeps on quietly being her friend and admirer. I adore his loyalty.

All Together Dead / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Louisiana cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse has her hands full dealing with every sort of undead and paranormal creature imaginable. And after being betrayed by her longtime vampire love, Sookie must not only deal with a new man in her life—the shapeshifter Quinn—but also contend with the long-planned vampire summit.

The summit is a tense situation. The vampire queen of Louisiana is in a precarious position, her power base weakened by hurricane damage to New Orleans. And there are some vamps who would like to finish what nature started. Soon, Sookie must decide what side she'll stand with. And her choice may mean the difference between survival and all-out catastrophe.

2019 Re-Read

Another evening, another Sookie Stackhouse book. At least I managed to cook some dinner last night, although my kitchen is still a mess. I have to find a way out of this groove I have found myself in—there are other things I need to be reading and other tasks that need my attention. But I may only find the way out by finishing up this series as a re-read.

I’ve always felt that this is the book where Sookie proves that she has good judgment—she seems to understand the plots and conspiracies of the vamp world better than they do, perhaps because she’s an outsider to that world and able to observe it dispassionately. This talent of hers, which Eric calls “thinking outside the box,” attracts unwanted attention from the Queen and her sidekick, Andre. Staying unbound to them is proving difficult. Instead, she ends up bound to Eric the Uncertain.

Eric runs hot and cold towards Sookie, unwilling to admit that he’s unusually attracted to a human woman. It seems kind of like the men who’d like to sleep with a woman but don’t want to be seen with her in public. Good for Sookie, standing up for herself and her right to be acknowledged.

I think just about everyone has been unappreciated at a job at some point in their life. Sookie gets her moment of this as she holds a bomb that she’s scared to set down, waiting for the bomb squad to show up, talking to a bystander about her status in the vamp scene:

”Ha,” I said. “Oh, ha-ha. Yeah, ‘cause they love me. You see how many vampires are up here? Zero, right?”
“One,” said Eric, stepping out of the stairwell.

Lots of foreshadowing for upcoming installments. On to book 8, From Dead to Worse this evening.

Dead to the World / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

When cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse sees a naked man on the side of the road, she doesn't just drive on by. Turns out the poor thing hasn't a clue who he is, but Sookie does. It's Eric the vampire—but now he's a kinder, gentler Eric. And a scared Eric, because whoever took his memory now wants his life.

2019 Re-Read

Just as telepath Sookie enjoys resting her mind around Vampire Bill, whose thoughts she can’t hear, I enjoy resting myself in this series that I’ve read and enjoyed before.

"It's probably a bad indicator of your lifestyle when you miss your ex-boyfriend because he's absolutely lethal."

Wherein we learn that Sookie can certainly handle a shotgun or a baseball bat should the need arise. But she still wishes for a bit more back-up. Despite her misgivings, she proves repeatedly that she’s in many ways more street-smart and a better tactician than most of the supernatural beings that she hangs around with. Probably as a result of being a single woman, responsible for her own safety—an escape plan is a necessary fashion accessory.

Everyone keeps judging Sookie, thinking that she’s blonde & stupid, but she proves them misguided. She may not have the best taste in men (she tends toward the controlling, violent sort), but she’s an excellent practical psychologist (figuring out how people will act & why). Being a telepath has given her some insights that the rest of us could certainly use. Her general lack of experience in romantic relationships shows, but she’s learning gradually that she doesn’t need to put up with poor treatment. Amnesiac Eric shows her a bit of what a good relationship could be like—but I think Sookie is right, that it feels fake, knowing how proud the Viking vampire is when he’s himself.

As a friend of mine often says, “You get what you put up with.”

Club Dead / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Things between cocktail waitress Sookie and her vampire boyfriend Bill seem to be going excellently (apart from the small matter of him being undead) until he leaves town for a while. A long while. Bill's sinister boss Eric has an idea of where to find him, whisking her off to Jackson, Mississippi to mingle with the under-underworld at Club Dead. When she finally catches up with the errant vampire, he is in big trouble and caught in an act of serious betrayal. This raises serious doubts as to whether she should save him or start sharpening a few stakes of her own ..

2019 Re-Read

Just as telepath Sookie enjoys resting her mind around Vampire Bill, whose thoughts she can’t hear, I enjoy resting myself in this series that I’ve read and enjoyed before.

Although Sookie spends a lot of time in this book rescuing Bill, despite the fact that he’s a lying, two-timing vampire, I like it because she finally takes ownership of herself. She starts to realize that she’s being played: Half of me (pathetically) wanted to let him know I'd kept the faith; half of me wanted to get in the toolshed and sharpen me some stakes. Yes, Sookie, I think we’ve all “sharpened some stakes,” in our fantasies!

“They found the corpse in the closet of Alcide's apartment, and they hatched a plan to hide his remains." Eric sounded like that had been kind of cute of us.

"My Sookie hid a corpse?"

"I don't think you can be too sure about that possessive pronoun."

"Where did you learn that term, Northman?"

"I took 'English as a Second Language' at a community college in the seventies.”

Also:

Bill said, "She is mine."

I wondered if my hands would move. They would. I raised both of them, making an unmistakable one-fingered gesture. Eric laughed, and Bill said "Sookie!" in shocked admonishment.

"I think that Sookie is telling us she belongs to herself," Eric said softly.”

Oh how clearly Harris shows us how complicated our relationships are and how badly we can be hurt when they go awry.

Living Dead in Dallas / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse is having a streak of bad luck. First her co-worker is killed, and no one seems to care. Then she comes face-to-face with a beastly creature which gives her a painful and poisonous lashing. Enter the vampires, who graciously suck the poison from her veins (like they didn't enjoy it).
The point is: they saved her life. So when one of the bloodsuckers asks for a favour, she obliges - and soon Sookie's in Dallas, using her telepathic skills to search for a missing vampire. She's supposed to interview certain humans involved, but she makes one condition: the vampires must promise to behave, and let the humans go unharmed.
But that's easier said than done, and all it takes is one delicious blonde and one small mistake for things to turn deadly...

2019 Re-Read

Just as telepath Sookie enjoys resting her mind around Vampire Bill, whose thoughts she can’t hear, I enjoy resting myself in this series that I’ve read and enjoyed before.

I find myself really curious about Charlaine Harris’ writing practices—did she have this series planned out well in advance or did she just sit down at her desk each day to see where the characters took her? Maybe a hybrid somewhere in between? I feel like the general arc of the story must have been laid out in advance, but then some characters (the maenad, for example) just seem to appear without warning or explanation.

But Harris delivers some on-the-nose commentary about American society, despite the supernatural elements. Take for example the lawyer Hugo that Sookie is teamed-up with to investigate the Fellowship of the Sun:

I could tell Hugo was convinced that he would get to walk back up these stairs: after all, he was a civilized person. These were all civilized people.

Hugo really couldn't imagine that anything irreparable could happen to him, because he was a middle-class white American with a college education, as were all the people on the stairs with us.

I had no such conviction. I was not a wholly civilized person.

I’ve made assumptions like this—that life is safe and that bad things won’t happen. It’s these little observations that make this series more than just fluff. Just as Agatha Christie’s Jane Marple could gauge people from her village experience, Sookie has good psychological experience from being a woman, a telepath, and a bar maid in a small town. It’s true what they say, that everybody knows your business in a small town and this gives anyone who is paying attention a chance to educate themselves in the field of human behaviour!

Dead Until Dark / Charlaine Harris

4 out of 5 stars

Sookie Stackhouse is just a small-time cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana. Until the vampire of her dreams walks into her life-and one of her coworkers checks out....

Maybe having a vampire for a boyfriend isn't such a bright idea.

2019 Re-Read

I don’t know how other people handle stress, but my favourite diversion is to re-read books that I know that I will enjoy. When my life is uncertain, I love the certainty of an entertaining book. So, as I prepare for major life changes, I picked up Dead Until Dark a few nights ago and found myself completely immersed in the life of Sookie Stackhouse in Bon Temps, Louisiana. How can you not have a good time in a town called Good Times? It’s silly, soap-opera type fun.

Since Sookie knows a thing or two about life changes, I started to wonder if that wasn’t why I had zeroed in on this particular series. In this very first book, we meet her when she is still an ordinary person. Or at least as ordinary as a telepathic bar maid in a small town can be. This is the first installment of the changes that open up her life, giving her access to a whole new world that she hadn’t previously been aware of.

I love the very first sentence: I’d been waiting for the vampire for years when he walked into the bar. Well, I’ve been waiting for years for retirement and I will achieve it shortly. As I watch Sookie change and adapt as her world opens up, I feel like I can change and adapt too, and adjust to this new reality.

Innkeeper Chronicles / Ilona Andrews

March 2019 Re-Read

When life is getting me down, I turn to Ilona Andrews.  I powered through the Hidden Legacy series and still needed an infusion of light-hearted fun and fantasy.  Enter the Innkeeper Chronicles.  I debated long and hard before I sank my cash into these volumes, but I’m so glad that I did.  There’s nothing like Dina, Caldenia, Sean, and Arland to make me smile and feel better.  I am so relating to Dina missing her parents right now—my mother’s last sibling passed away at the end of January and I am missing her, my parents and all the other aunts & uncles.  Spending time in Red Deer, Texas, helps me feel a little less lonely.

So yes, I’m avoiding life right now and re-reading old favourites.  I’m not sure when this tendency will end, but I’m enjoying my vacation from reality.