Queen of Kings by Maria Dahvana Headley

What if Cleopatra didn’t die in 30 BC alongside her beloved Mark Antony? What if she couldn’t die? What if she became immortal? Queen of Kings is the first instalment in an epic, epoch-spanning story of one woman’s clash with the Roman Empire and the gods of Egypt in a quest to save everything she holds dear.

As Octavian Caesar (later Augustus) and his legions march into Alexandria, Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt, summons Sekhmet, the goddess of Death and Destruction, in a desperate attempt to resurrect her husband, who has died by his own hand, and save her kingdom. But this deity demands something in return: Cleopatra's soul. Against her will, Egypt's queen becomes a blood-craving, shape-shifting immortal: a not-quite-human manifestation of a goddess who seeks to destroy the world. Battling to preserve something of her humanity, Cleopatra pursues Octavian back to Rome - she desires revenge, she yearns for her children - and she craves blood...

It is a dangerous journey she must make. She will confront witches, mythic monsters, the gods of ancient Greece and Rome, and her own, warring nature. She will kill but she will also find mercy. She will raise an extraordinary army to fight her enemies, and she will see her beloved Antony again. But to save him from the endless torment of Hades, she must make a devastating sacrifice.

Queen of Kings, by Maria Dahvana Headley, should have been a book that I adored. It has a fantastic premise; it involves one of the strongest female characters from history; it has both Egyptian and Roman flavour (some of my favourite periods of history); and it includes a cover quote from Neil Gaiman. I should have been proclaiming my love of this book from the rooftops - and yet...

I liked it, but didn't love it. Headley's prose is dark and elegant, and her imagination is vivid. The tale comes across very much as an historical epic such as The Odyssey or The Iliad. It is fantastical and gripping in many ways, but at times I found myself turning the pages only because I had read so far and ought to at least finish, which is not what I envisaged when I started Queen of Kings.

Despite the fact that Queen of Kings is deemed to be meticulously researched, I found that Headley didn't imbue her writing with a true feeling of the time period. Egypt could be exchanged wholesale for Rome, with no issues. I didn't see any of the colour and attitude of the Egyptian people. Certain historical facts seemed to be thrown in just because Headley had discovered it, not because it fit that particular scene. I especially disliked a couple of situations where characters told other characters myths and legends that were incredibly dry and felt as though they'd been taken from Mythology 101.

Added to this, I completely failed to engage with Cleopatra as a character. Now, this is a Queen who ruled at a time when women were deemed only fit for childbearing. She seduced famous generals of the time. She was romantically associated with two of THE most famous Roman personalities: Mark Antony and Julius Caesar. This is a woman who doesn't need any real dressing up to be fabulous and interesting and someone who should leap from the page. Unfortunately, Cleopatra in Queen of Kings is relatively lifeless (and I don't intend any pun there...) I couldn't understand her motivations at all - at one point she seems entirely focused on Mark Antony, then suddenly her children are what she is concerned about.

Like I say, Headley's writing is very skillful and hence I'm sure there are others who will adore this dark fantasy about Cleopatra - in fact, this review details many of the plus points from another reviewer's point of view. For me, the characterisation of this famous queen was lacklustre and I didn't "feel" the historical aspect. If you have any interest in Ancient Egypt, then do yourself a favour - pick up River God by Wilbur Smith and avoid Queen of Kings.

YouTube Interview with Maria Dahvana Headley - author of Queen of Kings

A little while ago I was contacted by Ben Willis, one of the fabulously hardworking peeps over at Transworld, and he asked if I wanted to submit some questions to Maria Dahvana Headley to be used for an interview. Did I! I am utterly desperate to get to Queen of Kings - it is hovering near the top of my 'must-be-reviewed' pile. I've seen some stunning reviews of this book, including this one, and that only makes me more keen. So I said yes. And today Ben directed my gaze to this here YouTube clip of the questions I asked, beautifully presented within shots from the book trailer that has been favourably looked upon. Maria Dahvana Headley is very beautiful, clearly very talented, and answers my questions with grace and humour. Enjoy!



Queen of Kings by Maria Dahvana Headley is available from all good bookshops right now!

Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

Welcome to Bon Temps. It's just your average sleepy backwater town. You know the kind of place... a dime store, a trailer park, a diner, and a gang of newly 'out of the coffin' undead.

Sookie Stackhouse is a small-time cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana. She's quiet, keeps to herself and doesn't get out much. Not because she's not pretty. She is. It's just that, well, Sookie has this sort of 'disability' - she can read minds. And that doesn't make her too dateable. But then along comes Bill. He's tall, dark, handsome - and Sookie can't hear a word he's thinking. He's exactly the type of guy she's been waiting for all her life.

But Bill has a problem of his own: he's a vampire. With a bad reputation. He hangs with a seriously creepy crowd, all suspected of - big surprise - murder. And then one of Sookie's co-workers is killed, she fears she's next...

I first read Dead Until Dark years before the HBO series (something I've not watched at all). I read it when it had a gloriously kooky cover, and Orbit still published the series as opposed to Gollancz, in the UK. I even imported the new novels from the States to keep up with the series, I was so enamoured. This is the first time I've revisited the series and I confess to being enormously disappointed. I can't quite work out why I devoured these books so voraciously, in all honesty.

I think the best that can be said of Dead Until Dark is that it is lightweight fun. You can whip through it in a single sitting, if you're so inclined. The language is fairly basic, the plot (such as it is) can be followed with ease. There is nothing difficult or particularly meaningful about Dead Until Dark. It is the perfect book for when you want to switch off your brain and be entertained.

Except that, well, there is not a great deal of entertainment to be found here. The pacing of Dead Until Dark mystifies me utterly. There is a slow, slow, slow build-up - where we find out more than we wish to know about Sookie's daily routine, what she does when she's off work, how she cleans her grandma's house - before the "big" finale to the book, which is over in a few short pages.

The characters in Dead Until Dark are, on the whole, paper thin. Sookie provides some interest in terms of how she reacts to her "disability", and the way that people act towards her is also dealt with well. Certainly has echoes of racial prejudice that gives the book some much-needed emotion. I am given no good reason by Ms Harris as to why Sookie is *so* attracted to Bill, except for the fact that he is good looking and she can't hear his thoughts. Their relationship is not remotely believable, as far as I am concerned, and we find out nothing about Bill's character that has me wanting to read more about him.

The secondary characters suffer even more. I am hard-pushed to tell the difference between the various people who inhabit Bon Temps - the Bellefleurs, Rene, Sookie's co-workers. They all wander on-screen, say a few words and then wander off again, without contributing anything particularly meaningful to the plot. Thanks to this, the revelation of the murderer came entirely out of left-field for me, because Harris had not laid down enough clues to guess who it might have been.

The presentation of the deep South is an interesting backdrop to the story. I like the fact that New Orleans is an attraction for the newly 'out' vampires, thanks to the Anne Rice thing. I enjoyed the character of Bubba *very* much. There are a few moments of good quality in Dead Until Dark, which makes it so very sad that the rest is so dull.

From what I've heard, watch True Blood and give the Sookie books a miss.

Guilty Pleasures by Laurell K Hamilton

My name is Anita Blake. Vampires call me the Executioner. What I call them isn't repeatable.

Ever since the Supreme Court granted the undead equal rights, most people think vampires are just ordinary folk with fangs. I know better. I've seen their victims. I carry the scars...

But now a serial killer is murdering vampires - and the most powerful bloodsucker in town wants me to find the killer...

A vampire slayer. Were-creatures. Vampires that allure. We've been here before, right? TV shows. Books. A whole area of the bookshop now dedicated to paranormal romance.

But... Look inside the front cover of Guilty Pleasures and you see copyright Laurell K Hamilton 1993. That is four years before Buffy the Vampire Slayer strode onto our screens (IN THE TV SHOW. I am well aware that the film came out in 1992, a year before, so the concept wasn't exactly brand new - that of vampire slaying by a girl - but I think that Hamilton absolutely put her own spin on matters). That is years before Sookie Stackhouse became a star of page and screen. Ages before Kelley Armstrong and Kim Harrison started producing two of the best paranormal series out there.

Laurell K Hamilton came first. Her inspiration was still Anne Rice and Dracula, and people who wrote "proper" vampires, as opposed to those that sparkle. Nikolaos, the villain of the piece, is a child vampire - evil and chilling. These are proper vampires, that ruffle the hairs on your neck and whose daytime sleeping places have a scent that reminds you vaguely of graves and snakes.

Add into this a truly compelling idea of vampires "coming out" to the general populace of the States, and how that has affected law. Anita Blake might be a vampire slayer, but she needs a document of execution before she can kill them otherwise it counts as murder.

"It had only been two years since Addison v. Clark. The court case gave us a revised version of what life was, and what death wasn't. Vampirism was legal in the good ol' U S of A. [...] All sorts of questions were being fought out in court. Did heirs have to give back their inheritance? Were you widowed if your spouse became undead? Was it murder to slay a vampire?"

Linked to this, Hamilton explores how religion might be affected by the legalization of vampires. She gives us the idea that the Church of Eternal Life is run by vampires, who go door to door to recruit followers (much like Jehovah's Witnesses) but can actually promise eternal life. None of the speculation about what comes after life with this church!

Also, Anita Blake is, first and foremost, an animator - someone who can raise the dead. This voodoo-esque element of the story brings a lot to the table, and will become increasingly important in future books.

There is no overstating the imagination and speculation on show here. Laurell K Hamilton came FIRST - giving us a vampire slayer on retainer with the police, investigating supernatural crimes.

However, the story would be nothing without Anita Blake herself. This is a character with charisma in spades - a short woman who goes to the gym in the knowledge that she has to do *something* to turn over the odds in a fight. A good little Catholic girl with a real mouth on her, that gets her into trouble more times than she can count. She is blisteringly sarcastic and, at times, frighteningly vulnerable. I love her.

She is surrounded by other characters that simply spring from the page. Jean-Claude barely has any page time in Guilty Pleasures, and yet I was so intrigued by this master vampire - achingly beautiful and slightly mischievous in his behaviour towards Anita, and then the switch to something utterly deadly. And Edward - vampire killer, bounty hunter, the aspect of Death. Edward is a mysterious and enormously scary character that the reader will want to hear so much more about.

Guilty Pleasures is an absolute rollercoaster ride - beyond fast-paced. There is not a moment of downtime between killing ghouls, investigating the deaths of vampires and coming face to face with the vampire master of the city. For such a slight book, Laurell K Hamilton absolutely packs in the action.

I would say this is one of the faults. The reader only has time to reflect and take a breath once they reach the end of the novel. Before that, you are compulsively turning pages to find out what happens next. It means that we barely take notice of the clues that we've given about who might be committing the crime of killing vampires. It means that a key character death doesn't have the impact that it absolutely should do.

Another fault is one that Robert Jordan shares - Laurell K Hamilton does love describing clothes: the shorts and sneakers that Anita wears, with the blue piping down the sides; the fishnet shirt worn by Phillip, a vampire groupie; the lace on the shirt of Jean-Claude. Some erroneous details took up way too much page time.

Really, though, Guilty Pleasures is the start of an impressive series that carved the way where so many others have now followed. Laurell K Hamilton gives us the first sassy kick ass heroine in the form of Anita Blake - and I suspect she has never been bettered. Make sure you buy the second at the same time as the first, because you simply won't be able to resist diving into the rest of this series and gulping it down compulsively. Tremendous entertainment - and a little bit of literary history.

Department 19 by Will Hill

Jamie Carpenter is a perfectly normal boy, with a perfectly normal life – until the night his dad dies. Suddenly he doesn’t know what his place is anymore, as his mother moves him from town to town. It seems he cannot take much more when a creature from his nightmares once more turns his life upside down, and forces him into the world of Department 19.

Department 6 is the Army. Department 13 is MI5. Department 19 is the reason you’re alive...

Will Hill’s debut novel Department 19 is a storming read, showing us the world of Jamie Carpenter as he realises that the monsters from the fairytales are alive and living amongst us. It presents a vivid image of a secret governmental department – all James Bond or Spooks - rescuing the civilians from a world they don’t even know exists, with first-class weaponry and insane courage.

Jamie is a very likeable hero – realistically portrayed as he recovers from the death of his father, only to realise that life will never be the same again. His fear, bravery and even the teenage strops are perfectly portrayed, and I think that any teenage boy (or, indeed, girl) will be able to identify with Jamie. The secondary characters are equally well drawn – from Frankenstein (who is brought to life so capably that you never even have a moment where you don’t believe it could be true) to Larissa to the villains of the piece.

And what villains! Did someone say sparkly vampires? With a T-Bone, Hill has wiped them from existence – his vampires are the real deal! No sexy mooning after teenage girls. We have here three dimensional characters, with motivations such as envy, revenge and bitter memories. No two vampires are alike, just as no two people can ever be the same. With villains like Alexandru, you genuinely believe that none of these characters are safe as the blood begins to spill.

I’m not going to lie – blood really is spilled. Daubed. Smeared across most of the pages in Department 19. Vampires and their victims die, alike, in various bloody and imaginative ways. This is a deliciously ghoulish read at times, with moments of horror that might give a child nightmares – but in a Doctor Who manner. They will recall wanting to turn their face away from the page as they read, just as I fondly reminisce now about hiding behind the sofa while watching Doctor Who.

Hill also shows a dab hand at portraying moments from history. Not only do we have the high tech gadgetry of a James Bond film, we also have a London from the 1890s and a 1920s New York – all feel so authentic that I believe Hill could turn in a decent historical novel as well. The historical and military details are all woven into the story subtly, but convey the sheer amount of research that has gone into Department 19.

The prose is smooth and gripping – told so simply and directly that the pages keep on turning. Hill injects a number of moments with real emotional heart, as well as writing action sequences that have the blood pounding.

I am gushing, but with good reason. This book is going to be a phenomenon – you heard it here first. To all those publishers looking for the “next Harry Potter”? Harper Collins have found it in the form of Will Hill’s debut novel Department 19. This is going to be huge. Get in there from the very beginning.

Reclaiming the Monster

For the longest time now vampires have been de-fanged. This is not all due to Twilight and the swathe of books that have been released showing moony vampires brooding over teenage girls. After all, Buffy came a long time before Twilight - and the Vampire Diaries (the original release of such) happened when I was a teenager. Anita Blake was hunting - and having sex - with the monsters years ago. I want to present you with ten novels (not including Dracula, we've all heard of that one - or I would hope we had!) where the vampire is a PROPER bad guy.

1) Salem's Lot - Stephen King

Stephen King recently advised the aspiring young writer of horror tales to keep away from vampires, and the other classical monsters, as they have been done to death, and maybe that's good advice for the novice, but it's worth noting that this, only his second published novel, is one of his very best. The book concerns one Ben Mears, successful writer, who is returning to Jerusalem's Lot, the town where he spent his youth. And of course, it's not exactly as he remembers it. Here King deliberately underplays the human aspect of the vampire, giving us instead the the hideous aspect as first shown in the classic flick Nosferatu.

2) Let the Right One In - John Ajvide Liindqvist

In this novel the emphasis is on the monster being the least monstrous of the characters on show - but that doesn't prevent these vampires from being pretty damn nasty and definitely scary. Blood is spilled and throats torn out by a vampire that has the visage of a young girl - some shocking stuff.

3) Room 13 - Robert Swindells

Room 13 is a childrens novel written by the acclained awardwinning childrens' authour Robert Swindells. Published in 1989, and awarded the Children's Book Award, the novel centres around a group of friends, on a school trip, who stay in a creepy guest house on Whitby's West Cliff. The novel takes advantage of Whitby's sinister and gothic ties and weaves a story of suspense that has earnt its place as a firm favourite of children wanting the thrill of a little horror and suspense. Once again Whitby finds itself inexcribably connected to a vampiric encounter. I read this novel as an eleven-year-old and delighted in the ghoulish horror - the slow unwinding of the tale grips and does not let go.

4) Department 19 - Will Hill

Cheating a *tiny* bit here, since Department 19 isn't officially released yet but one thing I loved about Will's debut is the fact that the vampires are truly horrible. They have fiendish plans, kidnap people and kill in hiedous ways! As I said in my review: And what villains! Did someone say sparkly vampires? With a T-Bone, Hill has wiped them from existence – his vampires are the real deal! No sexy mooning after teenage girls. We have here three dimensional characters, with motivations such as envy, revenge and bitter memories. No two vampires are alike, just as no two people can ever be the same. With villains like Alexandru, you genuinely believe that none of these characters are safe as the blood begins to spill. Chilling.

5) The Children's Hour - Douglas Clegg

This one is rather difficult to track down, but it is well worth it if you are looking for some scary as hell vampires. Author Joe Gardner travels with his family to his childhood hometown of Colony. He has avoided the town and his horrific memories of it for years and now finds himself facing the friends and family members who stir up unpleasant memories. As soon as he hits the town line, he begins to hear the nightmare voices of the past once again calling him. Meanwhile, Colony is being terrorized by something....something evil that steals its children. Joe reunites with figures from his childhood to try to stop the terror only to find his own wife and children in harm's way. Clegg easily takes his place next to King with this strong piece of horror writing. You'll be hard pushed not to put down the book through fright...

6) Der Vampir - Heinrich August Ossenfelder (written: 1748)

This poem is widely accepted to be the first instance of vampires appearing in literature - can you imagine the horror that must have thrilled through people upon reading these words?

My dear young maiden clingeth

Unbending, fast and firm

To all the long-held teaching

Of a mother ever true;

As in vampires unmortal

Folk on the Theyse's portal

Heyduck-like do believe.

But my Christine thou dost dally,

And wilt my loving parry

Till I myself avenging

To a vampire's health a-drinking

Him toast in pale tockay.

And as softly thou art sleeping

To thee shall I come creeping

And thy life's blood drain away.

And so shalt thou be trembling

For thus shall I be kissing

And death's threshold thou' it be crossing

With fear, in my cold arms.

And last shall I thee question

Compared to such instruction

What are a mother's charms?

7) The Giaour - Lord Byron

Another poem, and this one an epic. Once again it is a very early instance of vampires appearing in literature. I don't want to harp on about it, but, honestly, we're so blase these days about the idea of horrific creatures sucking the blood and life from people - can you imagine encountering something like this for the first time? And Bryon does not hold back at all in his vivid imagery:

But first, on earth as vampire sent,

Thy corse shall from its tomb be rent:

Then ghastly haunt thy native place,

And suck the blood of all thy race;

There from thy daughter, sister, wife,

At midnight drain the stream of life;

Yet loathe the banquet which perforce

Must feed thy livid living corse:

Thy victims ere they yet expire

Shall know the demon for their sire,

As cursing thee, thou cursing them,

Thy flowers are withered on the stem.

8) I Am Legend - Richard Matheson

Another influential example of vampire science fiction was I Am Legend by author Richard Matheson in (1954). The novel is set in a future Los Angeles overrun with undead cannibalistic/bloodsucking beings. The protagonist is the sole survivor of a pandemic of a bacterium that causes vampirism. He must fight to survive attacks from the hordes of nocturnal creatures, discover the secrets of their biology, and develop effective countermeasures. "I Am Legend" was one of the first works of fiction to offer a scientific explanation for vampirism; it changed the vampire genre forever. I'm not fond of the novel, but you can't deny both its influence and the terrifying nature of I Am Legend.

9) They Thirst - Robert McCammom

They Thirst details the relentless possession of Los Angeles by vampires, who quickly transform the city into a necropolis. The City of Angels, however, is only the first step of a planned worldwide conquest by the unholy creatures. It is deliberately kept out of print by the author, but, if you can get a hold of this one, it is well worth the hassle. Another horrific example of vampires who aren't going to declare their undying love.

10) The Stress of Her Regard - Tim Powers

Okay, check out this part of the plot: Crawford marries Julia. Julia's stepsister Josephine is present as the maid of honor, but neglects to complete the marriage rite and the newly wed couple leave for their honeymoon. The married couple enjoy their first night together and Crawford is wakened later, being made love to by someone. Although Crawford believes it is his wife, he wakes later to discover her horribly disemboweled body next to him in the bed. How creepy does that sound?

Hopefully, the ten works of literature above should give you something to be going on with if you want to put the fangs back in your vampires and enjoy some proper horror writing.

Do you have any you wish to suggest to me?

Let The Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist

John Ajvide Lindqvist takes us to a dark place, a suburbia where disparate characters are thrown into each other's lives and vices are explored. Oskar is a young boy, bullied constantly, dreaming of killing his persecutors. One night he meets the mysterious Eli, and the two children gradually build up a delicate and tenuous friendship. As a backdrop to this, we watch as murders are committed and the people of Blackeberg come to realise that they are haunted by a vampire.

On the face of this, Let The Right One In is a horror story about a vampire - but it does not take long for the reader to recognise that this is, in fact, a story exploring the monstrousness of human beings. The latent urge in all humans to commit monstrous acts. We have alcoholics, drug takers, paedophiles and bullies. In that company, the vampire turns out to be the most compassionate and reasonable character.

The prose is both visceral and staccato, with a deeply tragic air right from the first word. And yet it still manages to evoke a feeling of hope, and establishes that acceptance and friendship can succeed in saving a young man's life.

Despite the aforementioned staccato rhythm, the story unwinds with a slow deliberate menace. It starts with a searing picture of a victim of extreme bullying: "Let them think someone had been killed here, because someone had been killed here. And for the hundredth time..." Gradually the story presents us with some grisly pictures of a man with his face burned away by acid, blood pouring from every pore of a vampire, cats attacking a woman. And yet it is still those shocking moments of human cruelty that strike the hardest and make you vulnerable to the power of this book's prose.

It is a grey, dark and unremittingly grim novel that has a great deal to say on the true nature of the beast. One line really leapt out for me as an illustration of what this novel is truly about: "All these pathetic lonely people in a world without beauty."

With all of the above said, I should comment on the fact that Let The Right One In also had me quaking as I read it at night in an empty house. It is deeply scary and some scenes will stay with me for long after this last page has been closed.

The characters, as a whole, were not people you would generally root for, but the warm heart of the film is Eli - yes, a vampire, but a character that is confused, overwhelmed, loving, desperate, and with a strong sense of being unnatural. Eli holds the novel together, especially the elusive friendship with Oskar - the gentle growth of trust, the giving of self-confidence, the childish games and puzzles, the laughter. Within this novel, that makes a very warm heart indeed.

In my opinion, this is a hard book to love, but I have a great deal of respect for it. I will remember it for a long, long time. It is well-crafted and beautifully-written. It is dark and grim. But above all it is a memorable treatise on the monsters amongst us. Both riveting and compelling - this is one book you just can't look away from.

Vampirates: Demons of the Ocean by Justin Somper

Grace and Connor Tempest become orphans when their father - the rather eccentric lighthouse keeper who teaches them a shanty about Vampirates - dies. Under threat of being taken in by the local banker, the twins run away from home on their father's boat. When a storm sweeps in the boat is capsized and the twins are separated. Connor joins a pirate ship, and soon begins learning the ropes and making friends with other pirates, while Grace ends up on an altogether stranger ship. Mysteries are uncovered as the twins try desperately to reunite on the high seas...

Vampires! And Pirates! Vampirates! Seriously, what a deeply cool mash-up for a book - I can easily imagine the pitch for this novel and how quickly agents/publishers snapped it up. But is it a concept and nothing else? That's what I wanted to know most...

The good news is that there is definitely more to Demons of the Ocean than just the opening premise of pirates who also happen to be vampires. We have some strong lead characters, a couple of entertaining fight scenes and just all-round swashbuckling fun.

Somper does very well with the pacing of the novel - once Grace and Connor have been separated, we experience virtually alternate chapters from each point of view, often with a climax that makes the reader want to continue turning the pages. This was definitely a wise move, since the simple plot might otherwise appear somewhat slight.

Somper's strength is definitely presenting concepts such as compassion, mercy, loyalty and friendship through the excitement of a rip-roaring adventure story. None of these messages are conveyed overly strongly, but give a good sense of right and wrong.

It is very, very clear that this is an opening volume in a series, apart from the fact it closes on a bit of a cliffhanger. Mostly we have an establishment of the characters, and the "rules" behind piracy and what it means to be a Vampirate - or a donor.

I think the part of the book that disappointed me the most was the fact that Somper declined to expand on the world-building. In the blurb on the back of Demons of the Ocean, we're told that it is the year 2505 and the oceans have risen. A new era of piracy is dawning. But... this novel could honestly have been written as an historical fantasy. There is very little indication that this is some sort of post-apocalyptic future - which just leaves me hoping that Somper plans to use future books in the series to explore this potentially fascinating setting.

I found the book extremely suitable for younger readers - with a couple of scares, a little blood, but altogether very family friendly. The vocabulary used is not unduly challenging, although some words might be unfamiliar. Older children might find the simplicity of the plot detracts a little from the levels of excitement.

Altogether, a very competent opening to a series that has the potential to become great. An entertaining read.

Tracking the Tempest by Nicole Peeler

Tracking the Tempest is the second novel about half-selkie Jane True by Nicole Peeler. In this novel, Jane is visiting her gorgeous boyfriend Ryu in Boston for Valentine's Day when they are attacked by another halfling. A hugely powerful half-ifrit who has left a path of dead bodies in his wake, Conleth looks to be hunting down Jane and won't let anything get in his way. Jane - flaunting her newly-trained supernatural powers - and Ryu are joined by a number of others, including Ryu's big rival, Anyan, to find Conleth before he can kill again.

I've just turned into a fangirl. My one real complaint about the first novel in the Jane True series - Tempest Rising - was that it seemed to be all set-up and not a lot of plot. In Tracking the Tempest, Peeler hits the ground running and gives us a delicious plot with no filler. This is a taut murder mystery, as well as a look at the supernatural politics that dominate the world that Jane has been introduced to.

My very favourite part of Peeler's writing is the snarky, knowing humour that fills every page. Anyone who follows this author via Twitter or Facebook knows that she has a very similar sense of humour to her wonderful main character. We have a girl who creeps through a dark and empty warehouse, thinking on all of the horror movies she's watched where the vulnerable young girl is jumped on and murdered. We have a just wonderful scene late in the book where Jane has been rescued, but all she can contemplate is the fact she drank too much water and needs to pee:

"Jane, I don't even know where to begin. I'm trying to rescue you from a psychotic serial killer who is apparently intent on impregnating you. And you want to take a potty break."

See? Who else d'you know would include the fact that heroines do actually have to pee, especially in moments of high tension? *grins*

The shivering romantic tension between Jane and Anyan is also ramped up in this novel. In Tempest Rising I was intrigued by Anyan, but in Tracking the Tempest he becomes absolutely irresistible.

So, I loved the plot. I loved the characters. I loved the prose. I loved the wicked sense of humour. I loved the fact I COULD NOT put this book down from start to finish. Ms. Peeler, I salute you. You are my new favourite UF author!

Oh, and let's give some cover love to Sharon Tancredi, who has produced another vivid and utterly charming cover to grace the outside of such a brilliant story.

Tempest Rising by Nicole Peeler

Jane True lives in Rockabill, working at the local bookstore, looking after her father and missing the mother who vanished when she was only young. She endures the vicious rumours about the death of her childhood sweetheart - many of Rockabill's inhabitants blame her. She hides the fact that she swims in the sea daily, despite weather and currents. She lives a lonely existence in the most part. Until she discovers the body of a man in the sea and is shown a whole new life. Jane True finds out that she is half selkie, and that she is part of a supernatural culture hidden beneath the life she has always known. However, she also discovers that someone is killing halflings, and her name is next on the list.

You know how some books can be rather po-faced and worthy, while other novels bring the fun and the humour and definitely don't take themselves too seriously? Tempest Rising is most certainly the latter. It bubbles along with fun and frivolity, giving us a wonderful heroine in the form of Jane True.

Peeler uses plenty of myths and fairytales to bring us the various supernaturals that make up her Otherworld, and I am a big fan of this - rather than vampires, we have baobhan sith; no werewolves here, instead there are nahuals and barghests. I absolutely love this, because it shows a care on Peeler's behalf and a genuine love of the fairytales that have imbued our own past.

As I say, Jane True is a wonderful heroine - snarky, and self-doubting, and cute, and quirky. She is strong and lovely, and has a very real sense of humour (i.e. thinking about her designer shoes as her windpipe is being crushed). She is well matched by a cast of mercurial, whimsical, unconventional and downright odd characters. And I'm not just talking about the supes at this point! Some of the humans are a little unorthodox as well. All the characters have effective personalities and help to drive the plot along - I particularly loved Anyan, and want to see WAY more of him!

Truly, the only downside to this novel is the fact that it is an "Origins" story, in that Jane True is being introduced to her new world. It means there is a great deal of explanation going on and not masses of plot. The tale of the halflings being killed is a little thin, but I find this acceptable because Peeler is establishing her world. I fully expect a much more immersive tale in the next volume of the series.

I would say that if you want a fluffy, fast and very fun read you should look no further than Tempest Rising! I already have the second novel in the series and am excited about getting started!

The Chainsaw Gang

What is The Chainsaw Gang?

A chainsaw-wielding, gore-loving gang of brand new YA horror writers who've had enough of vegan vampires, cute'n cuddly werewolves and romantic zombies. New wave writers, old school horror. Ladies and gentlemen, start your chainsaws...

Who is involved in The Chainsaw Gang?

(as snitched from Alex Bell's website)

First up, Sarwat Chadda (unofficial leader of the gang – and the one with the Templar warrior heroine):



Stephen Deas (the dragon man of Gollancz):



Sam Enthoven (writer of fantastical action thrillers):



David Gatward (lots and lots of DEMONS!):



Steve Feasey (writer of ferocious werewolves):



William Hussey (who writes about ancient horrors):



Jon Mayhew (demons plus fog-drenched Victorian London = a double win in my book):



Alex Milway (he writes about yetis! And I agree with Sarwat on this – there just aren’t enough yeti books out there):



Sarah Pinborough (aka Sarah Silverwood – writer of murder, madness and the Knights of Nowhere):



Alexander Gordon Smith (yes, there are three Alex’s in the gang. At a future date I may stage a mutiny and attempt to rename the group The Alex Gang . . .) He writes about an underground prison run by demons! What more do you need to know? :



And Alex herself, as introduced by Sarwat: an escaped law student, and a collector of big dogs, neurotic cats, and crazy hats. She dislikes the heroic, selfless, goody-two-shoes heroes of recent YA fiction, and far prefers anti-heroes who lie, cheat, swindle and steal all the way to the top. Her young adult Lex Trent books are about a teenage thief, conman and adventurer; battling monsters, chasing treasure, breaking all the rules – and getting away with it.



Where can you get more information on The Chainsaw Gang?

Each of the members is web-savvy and has a website, where they are currently posting reviews on each other's novels and detailing where you can go and see them in real life. Check it out. The Chainsaw Gang is also on Facebook.

These are some incredibly talented authors, writing excellent old-school horror and adventure - go and make friends!

By Midnight - Mia James

April is deeply upset when her father takes a job at a small paper in London, and moves his wife and daughter from Edinburgh to do so. At first she is just miserable because she misses her friends and has to start a new school, Ravenwood, where many of the students are either stunningly beautiful or frighteningly clever. But then the deaths start, and April realises that she might be in danger as well. Suddenly there is no one she can trust — not even the beautiful and mysterious Gabriel, who April is drawn towards. Set against the backdrop of Highgate in London, By Midnight tells a tale of love, loss and quiet horror.

There are a lot of vampire stories around now, mostly thanks to the massive success of Twilight, and I have read a number of them. Some are definitely better than others. I regret to say that this is one of the worst that I have read, for various reasons which I will deal with at length shortly.

Firstly, I wanted to mention the few parts of By Midnight that I did enjoy. One of these was the ‘Clueless’ style of the school, involving cliques and bitchiness and makeovers. Tasmina Perry (one half of the writing team) draws on her particular expertise from the bonkbuster-style novels she usually writes to make this aspect exciting and fresh.

I also enjoyed the relationship between April and her father, William, which is heartfelt, warm and realistic. However, these facets of the novel are not enough to make it a compelling read.

One of the reasons for this is the pacing, which seemed snail-like for the most part. If I was feeling charitable, I would term it a slow burn mystery, as the different parts of the story reveal their secrets — but, really, I just found it incredibly boring. It takes forever for the meat of the tale to begin, and then it is just very dull. I ended up skipping passages to get to ‘the good bit,’ but it never materialised. The climax of By Midnight begins incredibly close to the end of the book and whips past with little tension.

Mia James (a nom de plume for a husband/wife writing team of John and Tasmina Perry) uses lengthy exposition in a clumsy manner to convey much of the back story: the use of dry textbooks to explain away the Highgate mystery; the long conversations between Gabriel and April, where he talks without any passion about vampires; a final discussion involving Miss Holden towards the end of the novel where an entirely new concept is dropped into the story in a dull paragraph of discourse. I appreciate that it can be difficult to convey history to the reader without long sections of explanation, but other authors have managed to do this successfully.

In addition to this, Mia James employed another clumsy method of passing across information to the reader: that of two people being familiar with something discussing it for the benefit of the person reading By Midnight. In this case, April and her grandfather Thomas discuss a picture hanging in his house — a picture she has seen many, many times before, showing a portrait of one of her ancestors. Thomas reveals it is Alexander Hamilton, something April would have known. I find this unloading of information very frustrating and amateur.

The dialogue does not read smoothly, often jarring the reader out of his or her immersion in By Midnight. Sometimes there doesn’t seem to be any obvious reason for a character to say what they do. For instance:

“I think you might be right,” she said. “No one laughs when you say Stonehenge has a certain feel to it, or even that a wedding ring does.”

Umm, what now? What is the connection between Stonehenge and wedding rings? Who says that a wedding ring has a certain feel to it?

I also felt extremely uncomfortable at Mia James’ fairly obvious ‘lifting’ of ideas from other, more popular, vampire stories. As an example, we have a section of dialogue in By Midnight that felt like blatant stealing from Twilight:

“You’re a honey trap for vampires. Everything about you is designed to draw them in: the way you look, the sound of your voice, even your smell.”

Edward says something extremely similar to Bella. In addition to this, the concept of Furies — girls born to hunt vampires, three a generation, destined to have super strength to combat vampires — sounds remarkably like another vampire slayer we all know and love. I don’t know whether Mia James was popping these in as an homage to the source material, but it made the novel feel like a rushed mish-mash of other vampire stories.

The last point I want to make concerns the nature of the relationship between Gabriel and April. I found myself unable to accept it, because there seems to be no basis for their mutual attraction. I mean, I know teenagers do sometimes involve themselves with people purely based on looks (as do grown men and women) but I want to see more from my literary relationships! I want to see the characters connect with each other and talk, learn about each other and find things in common. Instead we have April mooning over Gabriel and saying things to herself like:

"No, if she was honest, she was hoping that Gabriel Swift would decide he wanted to marry her, sweep her off to the Bahamas for a beautiful beach ceremony, and then, after a bout of amazing lovemaking, reveal that he was stupendously rich and personal friends with Justin Timberlake."

At this point she has had a brief conversation with him, hasn’t even kissed him, and yet is thinking about marriage!

In conclusion, I found this novel dull and unimaginative, with very few redeeming features. At my most cynical, I would say it is a blatant cash-in on the success of the Twilight novels, and that it fails on every level. There is plenty of very good YA fiction out there, some of which includes vampires. Please try something else rather than spend any time on By Midnight.

This review has already been posted to FanLit

If you would like a positive review of this book as a comparison, check out My Favourite Books

The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall by L J Smith

Elena Gilbert has returned from the Other Side, and has to relearn how to live amongst humans. She is helped by the love of her life — Stefan Salvatore, a vampire — and her three closest friends. However, evil forces are gathering around Fell’s Church, drawn by the beacon of a returned soul, and Stefan is snatched away from Elena when she needs him most. She has to turn to his dark brother, Damon, for help — never knowing for certain what motivates Damon or whether he has been possessed by the dark forces that want to steal Elena for themselves.

Unfortunately, The Return: Nightfall is a horrific mess of a story. It is a long rambling book — almost 500 pages, which is a great deal longer than any of L.J. Smith’s previous novels — and seems to leap from event to event without any obvious connection. Some of the writing is terrible, and disappointed me greatly because usually Smith’s prose is so very good. I just didn’t understand some of the descriptions Smith used, such as in the following passage:

"Tears pooled in Bonnie’s brown eyes. “I didn’t mean-”
But she didn’t get to finish. Meredith and Elena drew in protectively around her in the solid phalanx of what they called ‘velociraptor sisterhood.’ It meant that anybody messing with one of them was messing with them all."

I honestly didn’t get this reference, and it was mentioned a couple of times through the book — why would anybody refer to themselves as a velociraptor sisterhood? What does that even mean?

There is also a quote from the book which seemed to indicate the way in which L J Smith wrote this novel:

"The knowledge seemed to come moment by moment as she needed it."

It felt as though Smith was never in control of this story — that she was throwing ideas at the pages and hoping they would stick to create a coherent whole. None of her characters are consistent with how they are written in the four previous novels. Sure, on the surface Bonnie is still impetuous and fiery, Meredith cool and collected; but at times they would do something so wildly out of character that it jarred me from the story horrendously.

What made this so disappointing is the fact that during brief periods, the prose still soared in the way I have come to expect from L.J. Smith. When she is on form, I genuinely believe that there is no other YA author who can touch her, but sadly there is very little of that in Nightfall, the below excerpt being a rare exception:

"She had seen him when she was a human girl, and she had defied him and desired him in equal measure, and he had seemed to love her best when she was defying him.

She had seen him when she was a vampire and had been drawn to him with all her being, and he had cared for her as if she were a child.

He was a womaniser, he could be callous, he drifted through his victims’ lives like a chimera, like a catalyst, changing other people while he himself remained unchanging and unchanged..."

In all honesty, I was never sure why Smith revisited The Vampire Diaries after the first three books, which presented an excellent tale with a very natural and moving ending. I could sort of accept book 4, since there was clearly a decent story in place. Book 5 is a step too far, and ensures that I shall not be picking up any further novels in the world of Elena and Stefan. Some authors need to learn to quit while they’re ahead. I recommend pretending that this book doesn’t exist.

The Vampire Diaries: The Fury & The Reunion by L J Smith

This is the second bind-up for THE VAMPIRE DIARIES. The Fury and The Reunion were originally published as two separate books; in fact, The Reunion was published some time after The Fury, which effectively closes the trilogy begun with The Awakening and The Struggle). In The Fury Elena, alongside her friends Bonnie and Meredith, struggles to control her nature and discover the source of the evil Power that is haunting Fell’s Church. She knows that the only way it can be defeated is if the two vampire brothers Stefan and Damon can put alongside their lifelong enmity and work together. In The Reunion Fell’s Church is once again being terrorised by an ancient evil. Damon and Stefan are summoned by Bonnie, Meredith and Matt to face down a powerful villain, who is determined to have Elena for his own.

I enjoyed Volume 1 of THE VAMPIRE DIARIES well enough, my biggest complaint being that the heroine Elena was very hard to take to. I had little sympathy for her plight, feeling that she brought a great deal of her troubles on herself. In The Fury and The Reunion, Elena is a far more well-rounded character — someone I delighted in spending time with. Her remorse for her previous actions is genuine and made me warm to her greatly, especially a very sweet and necessary scene with Matt:

“OK, so you’re here. You’re alive,” he said roughly. “So what do you want?”
Elena was dumbfounded.
“Come on, there must be something. What is it?”
New tears welled up, but Elena gulped them back. “I guess I deserve that. I know I do. But for once, Matt, I want absolutely nothing. I came to apologise, to say that I’m sorry for using you — not just that one night, but always...”

In fact, all of the characters are stronger and more developed in these two novels, particularly Damon, who changed from more of a pantomime villain who did evil because he is evil to a man who is conflicted over his relationship with Stefan and seems to want to do the right thing.

L.J. Smith evokes chilling situations with her flowing and very readable prose. We learn along with the characters the nature of the threat, and fear of the unknown creates plenty of spine-tingling moments.

In these two novels, my only complaint was that at times Smith employed deus ex machina to solve her characters’ problems or ensure that they understood what was going on. It smacked as slightly lazy, but could be forgiven when the actual story was so gripping.

Elena and Stefan remain an extremely likable couple in the world of YA vampire fiction. I think anyone who has tried and enjoyed Twilight will gain a great measure of satisfaction from the writing of L.J. Smith and her version of the vampire with the tortured soul. Readable.

Infinity by Sherrilyn Kenyon

Teenager Nick Gautier thinks he knows everything. Streetwise, tough and savvy, his quick sarcasm is renowned. But his whole world is suddenly turned upside down on the night his best friends try to kill him. Saved by a mysterious warrior, Nick is sucked into the realm of the Dark-Hunters - immortal vampire-slayers who risk everything to save humanity - and he quickly learns that the human world is only a veil for a much larger and more dangerous one that's filled with all kinds of evil. However, before he can even learn the rules of this new world, his fellow students start turning into flesh-eating members of the undead. Nick knows he's in real danger and he soon has a lot more to deal with than starting high school: he's under pressure to hide his new friends from his mother and his chainsaw from the principal while trying to impress the girl he has a crush on - all without getting grounded, suspended...or killed.

I didn't like Infinity. There were parts of it that I quite enjoyed, but the majority I found tedious and vaguely confusing.

By far the strongest part of the book is the character of Nick. His dialogue, both internal and towards other characters, is sarcastic and funny. He cares deeply about his mother; and shows the usual inclination of teenage boys of wanting to date girls, but doesn't know where to start. He's pretty realistic in the way he's written, and I enjoyed how Kenyon represented him.

"His mother hesitated before she continued grilling him. 'Is he a good boy?'

'No, Mom, he's Satan incarnate. In face, once it's over, we're going to get liquored up and tattooed, then find some cheap hos and have a good time with his trust fund.' "

However, I found Nick's attitude towards his situation baffling. He accepts Acharon without batting an eye, and yet thinks Bubba and Mark are freaks for believing in werewolves and zombies despite the evidence of his own eyes.

Speaking of zombies, the whole plot involving the zombies being created from a videogame might have been intriguing if that had been the central plot in a YA tale about zombies. Here it became a complete mess that went on for far too long around which Kenyon tried to shoehorn in hints about Nick's future.

I was of the belief that this YA series about Nick would lead handily into the Dark Hunter adult series written by Kenyon, and that you didn't need to have read any of the Dark Hunter novels to pick up what was going on here. Either I was wrong or I am pretty dense, because I had no real idea what kind of demon Caleb was and whether he was good or bad. I didn't know what the hell was going on with Simi, and that deal with the BBQ sauce was humour that went very awry for me. Maybe it makes more sense having read some of the Dark Hunter novels, but here Simi was just an unexplained oddity that came out of left-field.

I also don't understand if Nick is going to be a Dark Hunter or if he is a whole other type of mystical being. The way the gods interact with the immortals was never handily explained. In fact, I spent half of the novel going 'huh?' which I don't believe is the desired effect.

I found some of the curse words used: 'Oh Dusseldorf' very quaint and unrealistic. As though teenagers would say something like that as a curse! Certainly the teenagers I know have real potty mouths...

I just want to make mention of a small extract towards the end of the novel:

" 'To infinity then.'

Nick frowned at Bubba's words. 'What's that mean?'

'It's something my dad used to say when I was a kid. To infinity, meaning you'd see something through to the end.' "

Seriously, is it just me who now has Buzz Lightyear in their head? *grin*

So, ultimately, I found this book a disappointing mess of different themes and subplots that required a stronger hand to sort it into a book that would have been fun to read. I doubt I'll be following any more of Nick's adventures. What is sadder is that I probably won't try the Dark Hunter series either, thanks to this poorly-written novel.

Grave Peril by Jim Butcher

Harry Dresden's faced some pretty terrifying foes during his career. Giant scorpions. Oversexed vampires. Psychotic werewolves. It comes with the territory when you're the only professional wizard in the Chicago area phone book. But in all Harry's years of supernatural sleuthing, he's never faced anything like this: the spirit world's gone loco. All over Chicago, ghosts are causing trouble - and not just of the door-slamming, boo-shouting variety. These ghosts are tormented, violent, and deadly. Someone - or something - is purposely stirring them up to wreak unearthly havoc. But why? And why do so many of the victims have ties to Harry? If Harry doesn't figure it out soon, he could wind up a ghost himself...

I was rather partial to the second book (Fool Moon) in the Dresden series, and started Grave Peril with great eagerness, but found myself somewhat underwhelmed. I think this was for a number of reasons, which I shall endeavour to explain below.

The first reason is no doubt the hype and expectation. Everyone I know universally loves this series (in fact, I genuinely don't know a single person who has found it boring or insipid - a danger with a lot of urban fantasy) and states categorically that each book improves on the last. Because I loved Fool Moon, I was expecting Grave Peril to blow me away - but it didn't.

The second reason is no real fault of the book or the author, but I feel it bears mentioning. When you join a long-running series so late, and there are so many books ahead of you, there is no real tension about whether the hero will live or die. Sure, the peripheral figures might be in some danger (depending on the author - some never kill of any people, despite an ever-expanding cast; LKH, I'm looking at you!) but your main dude isn't going to die, no matter what gets thrown at him. So, despite ever-escalating levels of danger in this novel, I felt comfortable that Harry would survive.

My third reason is a matter of writing: after three books, I can confidently state that I don't like the pacing that Jim Butcher employs. For the first hundred and fifty pages of each book, I've found it very easy to put them aside. The last hundred pages is usually barn-storming, tension-filled and extremely gripping - so I guess they all finish with a bang! - but I wouldn't mind a more evenly-spread level of excitement.

Reason the fourth: bloody vampire politics. I am so sick of vampire courts, with back-stabbing and covenants and home advantage and things like that. They pop up all over the place in urban fantasy, and seem so generic. Although Butcher's vampires present a couple of surprises (in appearance, mostly), in other areas they are tiresomely generic. Which is quite unlike the werewolves from the previous book, which felt quite refreshing to me.

Lastly, I didn't like Dresden's faerie godmother. I think the fae in the Dresden series have the potential to be chilling and unique, but I don't feel they're well represented by Lea. The reason I didn't like her is the way she popped up in a "plot device" moment usually. She felt tacked onto the main thrust of the storyline.

This is all making it sound as though I have nothing but gripes - but I did enjoy the book! Just not as much as the previous book!

The main reason for enjoying this book and loving the series as a whole is Harry Dresden. In Grave Peril Harry gains a lot more emotional depth and throws around some bad ass magic. His sense of honour and inability to leave a woman in peril is a facet of his character that I adore, no matter how chauvinistic it may appear. It sort of reminds me of Marty McFly in Back to the Future who is unable to be called 'chicken' without taking a person up on a stupid challenge!

" 'For the sake of one soul. For one loved one. For one life.' I called power into my blasting rod, and its tip glowed incandescent white. 'The way I see it, there's nothing else worth fighting a war for.' "

His resigned sense of humour when it comes to landing himself in dangerous situations is alive and well in Grave Peril as well, and some of his dialogue with both friends and enemies fairly snaps along:

" 'Hell's bells, Kravos,' I muttered, sitting up again. 'Do they produce a Cliched Lines Textbook for Villains or something? Go for broke. Tell me that since you're going to kill me anyway, you might as well reveal your secret plan.' "

Since we're talking about characters, Butcher introduced some really vibrant new cast members this time around. Michael, in particular, is a very powerful character - providing morality and an abiding faith to Harry over the course of Grave Peril. His quiet gravity and admonitions towards Harry for his swearing lend a calm centre to this novel that I felt was missing in prior instalments. I also *loved* Ferrovax - I demand to see more of this Dragon. His brief appearance in Grave Peril lit up the pages.

Another part of the novel I really liked were the references to the fact that life continued in between the end of Fool Moon and the start of Grave Peril - in other long running series you feel as though the characters are frozen in time until you return to their universe. Here we are aware that Harry has taken a number of jobs and his relationship with Susan has deepened - and it all happened off-screen, as it were.

In conclusion, this was not the strongest novel in the Dresden series for me and I am hoping for better from the next. Harry Dresden is still entertaining and I adore the little details of the world that Butcher is weaving into the tales; even though I was slightly disappointed with Grave Peril, I would still be happy to recommend the Dresden series.

Storm Front by Jim Butcher

Storm Front is the first book in the long-running Dresden Files by Jim Butcher, introducing us to Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden, the only wizard with an entry in the phone book in Chicago. The plot is a fast-paced magical murder mystery, which lends itself well to showing some of the no-doubt recurring characters and the "magic system" that Dresden wields. We also learn a little about the White Council, the ruling body behind practising wizards.

What interested me most about Storm Front was not so much the book itself, but the manner in which it should be read. For the first 120 pages or so, I kept picking it up and putting it down for various reasons (short public transport journeys, around making food, on brief lunch breaks) and never really settled to an extended stint. And I ended up wondering a little bit what all the fuss was about this series!

And then I sat down with a couple of hours on my hands and ended up sweeping through it, thinking 'Just one more chapter, just one more' which, as far as I am concerned, is how you should respond when reading something as action-packed and punchy as this. I equate Storm Front with an action movie - you wouldn't watch ten minutes of an action movie and then turn it off while making a cup of tea or heading out to see friends, and then watch another ten minutes a few hours later. An action movie would suffer from watching it in that way, and I think the Dresden books too. You definitely need to dedicate a couple of hours and then will find it incredibly good fun.

I thought the prose was incredibly effective - Jim Butcher presents Dresden in a first person perspective, which gives immediacy to the story. We know everything Dresden is thinking, and his uniquely sarcastic rejoinders to the events occurring in the book really added to my empathy for his character. I mean, when faced by a weird scorpion talisman that is becoming a little life threatening, I think a number of us would have something snarky to say!

The writing was also descriptive and atmospheric at key moments, rather than just business-like, which I expected it to be. I enjoyed the potion making scene between Harry and Bob, in particular.

The secondary characters were incredibly well-rounded, considering we didn't spend a great deal of time with them in this first tale (although I'm pretty sure they'll feature in future books). I particularly liked Murphy and her uneasy relationship with Dresden - I feel sure that this will develop in an interesting manner in the future. I also don't think I'm alone in liking Bob best!

One factor I found almost irritating, though, is the way that Butcher faithfully documented all the facial features and hair colour of each new character as they were introduced. It is something that I enjoy knowing about my characters, but I prefer it to be presented more naturally, rather than as a ticklist.

Certainly, this was very minor and might be a matter of taste, rather than an issue that other readers will experience as well.

To conclude, Storm Front was incredibly entertaining, with some great action set pieces and genuine tension. I think the highest praise I can offer is that I'll definitely be embarking further on this series!

The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening & The Struggle by L J Smith

I am reviewing the bind-up version of The Vampire Diaries, published by Hodder, which contains the first two books in the series: The Awakening and The Struggle. I will review them jointly rather than providing two separate reviews.

Elena is the ice-blonde queen of the school, admired by girls and boys alike. With her friends, Bonnie and Meredith, she enjoys her status and uses it to snag the most eligible boys. However, Elena always feels as though something is missing. When new boy Stefan starts at the school, she suspects she has found what she is looking for, but Stefan manages to resist her charms. Elena makes a vow with Bonnie and Meredith that she will have Stefan no matter what - little suspecting that he hides a deadly secret. When Stefan's brother Damon arrives on the scene, Elena may be in more trouble than she realises.

(I am actually finding it hard to write a summary of the two books jointly, avoiding spoilers - but that paragraph will have to do!)

I am a big fan of L J Smith's writing, and have enjoyed a number of her books. I did enjoy both The Awakening and The Struggle, but felt that they suffered from a central main character that I actually didn't like too much.

It is my belief that Smith is deliberately writing Elena in this fashion, since the heroines of her other series have been characters I could relate to and found myself admiring them for their integrity, honour and humour. Elena is a hard character to like, at least in these first two books of the series.

She thinks way too much about boys (although this is forgiveable compared to her other faults, especially considering how much I used to think about boys while at school!)

"After all, what was more important than boys? They were the mark of how popular you were, of how beautiful you were. And they could be useful for all sorts of things. Sometimes they were exciting, but usually that didn't last long."

She is completely manipulative when she wants to get her own way.

"Throughout Tanner's lecture on Europe, Elena repeated to herself, 'Hello. I'm Elena Gilbert. I'm on the Senior Welcoming Committee, and I've been assigned to show you around the school. Now, you wouldn't want to get me in trouble, would you, by not letting me do my job?' That last with wide, wistful eyes - but only if he looked like he might try to get out of it."

I disliked her to the point that when one of her friends says the following, I almost cheered and completely agreed!

" 'You only want everybody and everything revolving around Elena Gilbert,' he said bitterly. 'You only want everything you don't have.' "

With this in mind, at the start of the book, I wasn't sure I would like it. And yet the story sucked me in. This is mainly because of the brothers - Stefan and Damon. On the one hand, we have the tortured soul and on the other, the brother who has embraced the darkness. It is a mark of L J Smith's superlative characterisation that I genuinely didn't know which of the brothers I wanted to end up with Elena.

Some of the plot devices are less than realistic (which teacher invites his student over for a evening to get to know them?) and some of the subplots become extremely tired (Elena's lost diary), but at the heart of this book is a love story and the quality of this shines through. Of all the teen writers, I believe that L J Smith captures best how utterly and sweetly in thrall you can be when falling in love for the first time. The burgeoning relationship between Elena and Stefan is impossibly fairytale and yet very realistic (if you disregard the vampire side of things!)

I also like the diary entry method of writing part of the story - it helps to convey the way Elena's feeling, and gets inside her head properly. I enjoyed the switch in point of view over to Stefan - the way he saw Elena was beautifully done, and the flashbacks to his history were entertaining.

In summary, this book has some major faults but I couldn't help but love the central romance. Elena and Stefan are Romeo and Juliet for the MTV generation!

Blue Bloods by Melissa De La Cruz

Blue Bloods is the first book in a series by Melissa De La Cruz about the upper-class students at a prestigious school in New York who enjoy fashion and gossip, and just happen to be turning into vampires. We follow Schuyler Van Alen, a 15 year old girl who has never fit in with the other students at Duchesne — preferring to wear charity shop vintage clothes and hanging out with Oliver Hazard-Perry. Little does she realise that her life is about to change forever, as she is initiated into the exclusive Blue Bloods society and finds out that she is one of the ‘Fallen Angels’ — immortals striving to regain the grace of God.

For some reason, I found myself compulsively turning the pages and read Blue Bloods in two brief sittings, but it was rather akin to reading a trashy gossip magazine or eating a meal from MacDonald’s rather than a three course meal. I enjoyed it well enough as a piece of disposable entertainment and would likely read the sequels as well, but I certainly won’t be rushing out to pick them up.

I think the reason it felt so quick and disposable is because I didn’t manage to really identify with any of the characters or to start rooting for them. Schuyler is rather the best of a poor bunch, but even her character does not follow consistent behaviour — oh, and what gives with the name? Upper-class children are sometimes given rather unusual names, but I was jarred out of the prose every single time I encountered her name because I was unsure how to pronounce it.

Schuyler is an outcast with little interest in fashion or of being popular, yet she still ends up falling for the most popular guy in school and taking on a modeling contract! The other characters were barely two-dimensional, let alone three, and I struggled to remember who was who at times. Their motivations seemed slight, to say the least.

I’m no prude, and I understand that kids these days are going further in relationships at an earlier age, but I felt deeply uncomfortable at some of the scenes where the girls, in particular, seemed to think nothing of jumping into bed with the guys they liked. The underage smoking and drinking, to a lesser extent, also left me cold. I didn’t like the idea that these cool and popular kids in the story were presented as being able to do what they liked; impressionable young eyes will be reading Blue Bloods — it’s being marketed to teens.

Despite these things, there were parts of Blue Bloods that I enjoyed thoroughly. The history of the vampires was different and, consequently, exciting (even though it was given to us in a massive infodump disguised as a meeting between new and old members of the Blue Bloods). The idea of these fallen angels is one I’ve encountered in other books, but never combined with the vampire myth, and it ended up being very effective.

In conclusion, Blue Bloods is entertaining enough — but distinctly forgettable.

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