Posts Tagged ‘vampires’
Friday, August 17th, 2012
Pros: Enthralling story, entrancing romance, and lush, evocative setting and characters
Cons: …
Rating: 5 out of 5
Review book courtesy of Penguin Group
Jason is Archangel Raphael’s spymaster, and he has a most unique affinity for shadows and whispers. When Archangel Neha’s consort is viciously murdered, Jason agrees to bind himself to Neha’s niece, Mahiya, while he helps to figure out who could have and would have gotten away with such an act. Mahiya seems to be a quiet, powerless princess who fears Neha and refuses to stand up to her—but there’s much more to her than there seems, and Jason, as the spymaster he is, can’t help but notice. For the first time in hundreds of years, he’s found something that fascinates him.
The killings don’t stop when Jason arrives, and they seem to make no sense. They’re horrifying in their nature, and the killer is impossibly quick and powerful. Jason and Mahiya are running out of time—Neha won’t tolerate failure for long, and with each killing she becomes more agitated and dangerous. The unexpected feelings that develop between the two angels only make things worse, endangering them both.
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Tags: angels, erotica, Guild Hunter, Guild Hunters, Nalini Singh, paranormal, romance, vampires
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | 1 Comment »
Monday, March 5th, 2012
Pros: Interesting world and some enjoyable characters (particularly Matthias)
Cons: Stilted/awkward beginning; self-absorbed heroine; one-dimensional bad guys; annoying take on psychiatric medicine
Rating: 2 out of 5
Review book courtesy of Penguin Group
Jillian Conrad lived a boring, routine life—until she got caught between a scientist and a killer, and was injected with the only prototype of a serum designed to kill vampires. Her scent is an irresistible lure, drawing vampires to kill themselves by drinking from her. Now she’s a one-of-a-kind commodity, needed by the vampire hunters and feared by vampires (who of course want her dead). A half-vampire hunter named Declan has kidnapped her away to the group of scientists who had the serum created, with assurances that they’ll try to help her. The serum had never been tested before and her body is trying to reject it. In short, it’s killing her.
Declan is an emotionless killing machine, thanks to a serum that suppresses the violence of his vampiric tendencies. He’s driven by a need to kill Matthias, the king of the vampires, as Matthias is responsible for his mother’s death. Jillian annoys him with her constant questions and rebellious streak, but she also introduces him to a world of emotions he’d long thought he’d never have access to. Now he has to keep the vampires from killing her, and make sure his own people save her from dying.
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Tags: erotica, Michelle Rowen, paranormal, romance, vampires
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | No Comments »
Wednesday, February 22nd, 2012
Pros: Sexy, gripping story
Cons: …
Rating: 5 out of 5
Review book (uncorrected proof) provided by the author
Expected publication date: April 3, 2012
Century-old vampire Sylvia is a mercenary who prefers a certain kind of work. This time her task is to kill a pedophile who escaped human justice. She isn’t a Hunter, and usually she manages to skate under their radar. This time, however, they need to stop her. If they don’t, they’ll never find out what happened to the several other children the man might have kidnapped, and Hunter/werewolf Toronto wants that closure for their families. After all, he knows what it’s like not to have answers—he was found as a teenager being attacked by five werewolves, and he has no memory of who he was before that.
When Toronto decides that the best way to beat Sylvia is to join her, the two find themselves reluctantly teaming up to find a monster. They’re both loners, however, and the situation seems to keep spiraling out of control into ever-larger messes. There’s evidence of a sex ring being run out of a high school. There’s a mad vampire running around who’s somehow managed to avoid the notice of the local Hunters. And both Sylvia and Toronto are about to get bitten by their respective pasts…
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Tags: paranormal, romance, Shiloh Walker, The Hunters, vampires, werewolves
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | No Comments »
Tuesday, February 14th, 2012
Pros: Some of Ms. Singh’s best work yet, and that’s saying a lot
Cons: …
Rating: 5 out of 5
Review book courtesy of Penguin Group
Nalini Singh’s Angels’ Flight
is a collection of four novellas set in her unusual and fantastic Guild Hunter universe, in which the world has been ruled since time immemorial by inhuman, lethal angels and archangels, served by vampires and humans alike.
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Tags: angels, erotica, Guild Hunters, Nalini Singh, paranormal, romance, vampires
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | 1 Comment »
Friday, December 9th, 2011
Pros: Absolutely loved this no-holds-barred wild tale of a vampire forced to protect humans from zombies in order to preserve his food supply
Cons: Some zombie apocalypse tropes, but they’re given enough good window-dressing that I really didn’t mind
Rating: 5 out of 5
Disclaimer: I consider Chuck an “internet friend”, so I might be biased. But I try not to be.
Coburn’s never had much of a conscience to interfere with his vampiric proclivities. He’s perfectly happy seeing people as convenient food supplies. Unfortunately for him, he got sloppy—and wound up “asleep” for several years after being attacked.
It’s amazing what can happen during that time. Certainly he never imagined he’d wake up to a zombie apocalypse, with delicious warm-blooded humans few and far between. He might be smart, he might be super-fast and super-strong, but the zombies are legion—not to mention inedible.
So it is that Coburn eventually finds himself forced to protect humans rather than wantonly prey on them, shepherding his little group toward a supposed safe-haven and happily eating any bad guys they come across along the way. Unfortunately for him, even during a zombie apocalypse there are serious threats to a vampire’s existence…
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Tags: apocalypse, Chuck Wendig, Horror & Paranormal, Humor, vampires, zombies
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Humor | Permalink | No Comments »
Friday, September 16th, 2011
Pros: Great interaction between characters, and a wonderful world-building concept.
Cons: It felt at times like I would have gotten more out of the story if I’d read the previous Ones novels.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Uncorrected proof courtesy of Penguin Group
Expected release date: October 4, 2011
Corazon Ferreira’s day is not going the way that she’d planned. A chance encounter while photographing a house for sale has left her transported to the Akasha, with no hope of getting home without finding some help. The only assistance she can find is that of Alec Darwin, vampire, and though she’s loath to accept his aid his knowledge would be of great help to her. Now he’s determined to protect her, and she’s determined that she’s not going to give into temptation. But for a woman who’s lived by her head for so long, it would be nice to listen to her heart for once…
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Tags: contemporary, Dark Ones, Katie MacAlister, paranormal, romance, vampires
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | No Comments »
Wednesday, August 24th, 2011
Pros: Wonderful tale of two fascinating characters and an unlikely relationship
Cons: Not as removed from everyday paranormal romance fare as the other books have been
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
Review book courtesy of Penguin Group
Dmitri is the Archangel Raphael’s right-hand man—or rather, vampire. He has a reputation as a ruthless, cold son of a bitch, so old that no one is even sure when he was born. And that makes him very, very powerful. In his work for Raphael he has come across a severed head with a distinctive tattoo on the cheek, a tattoo that seems familiar to him—so he calls in a Guild expert on ancient languages, Honor.
Honor is terrified of vampires ever since the several months during which she was captured, held, and tortured by them, but it’s time for her to leave the safety of the Guild’s complex and get back to work. She wasn’t expecting to work with Dmitri himself—a vampire she used to be nearly obsessed with, and one whose power and sexuality threaten what peace she’s managed to stitch together for herself.
Things take a turn for the strange as soon as the two meet. Dmitri becomes obsessed with hunting down the vampires who harmed Honor. Honor finds herself able to elicit details of Dmitri’s past that no one else knows of. And both of them find each other strangely familiar.
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Tags: angels, erotica, Guild Hunter, Nalini Singh, paranormal, romance, vampires
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | 5 Comments »
Wednesday, May 25th, 2011
Pros: Interesting characters & plot
Cons: Definitely doesn’t stand alone; vampires seem like fairly standard supermen; mind-reading is unevenly depicted; surfer vampires
Rating: 2 out of 5
Review book courtesy of Penguin Group
Tattoo artist Riley Poe allied herself with a vampire in order to get her brother back alive in Afterlight. Her spirit and unusual blood type, however, made her a target for some particularly vicious vampires. Now she has some vampiric tendencies such as strength, reflexes, and heightened senses, but she also seems to have a telepathic link with a rampaging vampire who’s creating an army of new followers. She’s going to need all of her new allies if she hopes to stop the killing without ending up dead herself—or worse.
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Tags: Elle Jasper, erotica, paranormal, romance, The Dark Ink Chronicles, vampires
Posted in Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | 2 Comments »
Thursday, February 17th, 2011
Pros: Fascinating paranormal take on Tudor court life.
Cons: Villain feels too crazy to really be a threat, and some of the romantic tension feels forced.
Rating: 3 out of 5
Review book courtesy of Penguin Group
Because of a bargain that Henry Tudor made with the Druids, there must always be a special relationship between the King and the Llewellyns, a vampire-slaying family. Rosalind Llewellyn finds herself at court, attempting to convince King Henry VIII that she is there to protect him from Vampires. The Vampires in turn have families that protect them from those like the Llewellyns, and Sir Christopher Ellis finds himself thrown into Rosalind’s path. But the two of them must learn to work together, because both Druids and Vampires think that an ancient prophecy is about to be fulfilled…
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Tags: Druid, Henry VIII, historical, Kate Pearce, paranormal, romance, Tudor, Tudor Vampire Chronicles, vampires
Posted in Historical, Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | 1 Comment »
Thursday, February 10th, 2011
Pros: Fun plots and characters; plenty of action, humor, and good chemistry
Cons: A few background details on Messengers and Melina that don’t make sense to me; overused snarky first-person female p.o.v.
Rating: 3 out of 5
Review book courtesy of Penguin Group
Also posted on Epinions.com.
Melina is a Messenger, a go-between in the supernatural world. She has just enough amped-up healing, reflexes, and strength to help her navigate between werewolves, vampires, pixies, imps, gnomes, witches, and deities without getting killed (hopefully). When ninjas steal a package she’s delivering to a vampire, she’d much rather try to get it back than face the other vampire who sent her. Her search leads her to a Taoist temple, where priests are forced to control the kiang shi, Chinese vampires found beneath the temple. The creatures are killing violent gang members, but innocents get caught in the middle—and no one but Melina seems to want to make it their business.
Meanwhile, Officer Ted Goodnight is determined to figure out what’s going on as well, and every clue leads him back to (or has him running into) Melina. Melina’s falling for his sweet nature, but how can she build a relationship with a normal person when she can’t tell him about all the weird and wild things going on?
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Tags: Eileen Rendahl, Messenger, paranormal, romance, urban fantasy, vampires, werewolves
Posted in Chick-lit, Horror & Paranormal, Romance & Erotica | Permalink | No Comments »
