Blue Moon

 

Level: Explicit

Genre: Fantasy> Urban Fantasy > Vampire

Obtained: Purchased at Border's

Reviewed by: Nic Echo

Cover:

I've never been sure how I have felt about this cover. I certainly never found it awful, and the artwork and placement is nice. I even love the colour blue. However, I think what turns me off about it is that it is uninspired. As cliche as it is, I do understand choosing the colour blue for this. It turns people off if you have a colour in your title and your cover doesn't match it. Still the fact that they added a wolf and a moon in the cover just ... really? There was nothing else you could do? On the other hand, it does let the reader know that this is going to be a book that focuses a lot on the werewolves so that is the good. The unoriginality just makes it fall flat for me though.

About the Book:

Anita ends up getting a call that Richard is in jail. The problem is that he is a werewolf and a full moon is coming up. Of course, once there other problems arise. The Tennessee werewolf pack has its politics to dance around, and then there is Colin, the Master of the City, who believes that Jean-Claude is now trying to take over his territory. Add a few mutilated bodies and well... no one said Anita didn't have unusual problems.

Rating: 7/10

So many pointless politics. Okay, before I start, let me say that I usually enjoy reading about political manipulation. However, politics are not Hamilton's forte so when we do get them, they often feel trite. In fact, we get a lot of sexual situations and blood. Now, I will say that it makes sense to a point, bit when most of your book is little more than that, it starts to drag. Blue Moon ends up having a lot of scenes so that Anita can appear tough, sexy, and cool. I won't say it is as bad as the later books, but it is still pretty apparent.

"Well, Nic, you seemed to really dislike this book." Actually, no. Will it ever be a favourite? Will I ever highly recommend it? Not likely. Yet the story itself was quite entertaining. Yes, the "sexy", "dark", and "edgy" scenes dragged, but when Hamilton focused more on the story, I really wanted to keep reading. Sadly, most of this was in the last quarter of the book, but it was entertaining enough to warrant another point. Colin's attack and fear of Anita helped to created some tense situations also (I say some since after a while, they also started to drag). However, I would say the thing that upped the rating score the most was the demon. I'm sorry, but it was pretty cool. I really enjoyed how it started out half formed, and even when it had become fully formed, it had an otherworldlyness about it. Personally, I would have liked to have seen the demon do even more damage, but it was still fun.

Sadly, there was still a lot I disliked about Blue Moon. Like I mentioned, there were too many "politics" and look how tough Anita is scenes. Luckily, the tones of the book made it much easier to swallow except the rape/chase/sex scene. So there is a scene where Raina, the last werewolf queen, takes over Anita and sets something off so that all the male wolves want to sleep with her. Anita manages to make it back to her cabin, and soon after Richard gets there. Although Richard does ask and Anita does say yes, it is still very sketchy as she is very on edge with "hormones," and well, the only way to end the chase is to sleep with someone. Yeah... Okay so that may not bother everyone as Anita and Richard are both in love and in lust with each other, but the sex scene itself was just laughable. Seriously, I was giggling aloud at some of the phrases used, especially from "edgy" author Laurell K. Hamilton, who goes on and on about how daring she is with sex. So what sort of phrases came up during this "arousing" scene? "He kissed me there like he kissed my mouth, all tongue and exploring," or my favourite orgasm ever: "He pulled me into his mouth until the warmth spread from my groin upward in a golden rush that left the world hazy and edged with white guaze like I was seeing through a mist." Now, I am not one of those people who like excessive use of the word penis, dick, cunt, and pussy, but Hamilton can't even bring herself to use the word member. She used there for the vagina/clit for god's sake.  What's more is we don't even get a great mood for the scene like we did with Jean-Claude. Well, I guess all the sexual tension between Anita and Richard helped some, but Hamilton's writing certainly did not.

Okay, okay, maybe I am getting into it too much, especially since the sex scene is only a small part of the overall novel. Still, Blue Moon was definitely not without its faults, causing it to drag in many places. However, the tones and the ending certainly saved it and made it fairly enjoyable. It is middle of the road but still fun. Again, if you liked the other Anita Blake books, I would still suggest checking this one out.

What I'm Reading Next:

        

Burnt Offerings

 

Level: Explicit

Genre: Fantasy> Urban Fantasy > Vampire

Obtained: Purchased at Border's

Reviewed by: Nic Echo

Cover:

I actually like this cover and think it works well for the book. Not only does this draw your eye, but it has a sort of poster feel. There is also an obvious sexuality to it, which again works really well with the book's content. The one major issue with this cover is the woman's stomach is so hidden in shadow that it looks as if it isn't there most of the time so you are left with an illusion of a pair of chopped off legs in the flames. I mean, look at the German cover below. It is basically the same cover except the colours are brighter, not as close of a crop, and the torso isn't so shadowed. While I do like the colours of the US paperback more, the shadows in the German one work much better since it looks more like a body than just random legs.

  

About the Book:

Anita has always led something of a dangerous life, but now the danger has hit a new level when The Vampire Council comes to call. They are accusing Jean-Claude of trying to start a new council in America, but even if Jean-Claude convinces them otherwise, The Council will be wanting their payment of blood and sex.

Rating: 6/10

 Burnt Offerings has many of the same downfalls that The Killing Dance had, mainly the repetition. The enjoyment of the plot is able to make it more bearable, but the repetitiveness is still pretty in your face. The good news is that there is a lot less focus on the metaphysical abilities (though this may be a downfall to those new to the series). However, the sex, rape, and torture are at an all time high. Now, when I first read this, I hadn't minded, but I was also in high school then and although the Anita Blake books did feature a lot of rape and torture, they weren't in the spotlight as often as the later books where it seems every person is obsessed with sex and violence. Now, that isn't to say that there aren't some terrifying and gruesome things that The Council does, such as skinning the back off of someone or breaking bones through the skin of the legs. Still, the sex and pain went on much too long.

Honestly, there were two things that made this book slightly better in my mind: Asher and Warrick. Warrick has been one of those characters that have stayed in my mind for years even though he was only featured in one book. Part of it is his love for God, but we have seen that plenty of times before. No, the thing that made me remember him is when we see his animal to call, and he is so thrilled even though his animal to call is butterflies. Yes, precious, beautiful, delicate butterflies. I adore this touch that Hamilton brought. It is such a simple thing but managed to bring so much to a character, and speaking of characters, let us talk about Asher. This was the Asher that I had fallen in love with. He was snarky, emotional, and dramatic without being whiny just so we could have some "tension." Here I could feel his anger and loss, feel the weight of being mistreated for centuries. Sadly, there was still one major issue I had involving Asher. At the end of the book, Jean-Claude and the others have to pay prices to The Council. For Anita, she is required to let Asher take blood. She ends up "seducing" Asher out of it by touching and caressing his scars, and he ends up so moved that he cannot bear to harm her, even though he had been planning on killing her for a long while now. Anita is just that awesome. Can I get some more eye rolls, please? Yeah... Oh, and JC and co. manage to get out of every one of The Council's demands as well. The really nefarious ones I am okay with (such as Yvette wanting to rot on Jason), but every single one? Ugh.

Anyway, Burnt Offerings had a lot of issues yet it was still fairly enjoyable. It had a lot of the sarcastic feel the earlier books had, but the issues mentioned really bring this down and are likely to put many off. Still, several of the characters managed to up it a bit more, and it still remained fast paced and gruesome. It is no where near as a bad as the later books, but it still fails to hold that certain darkness the early books did. I would still recommend it if you liked the Anita Blake books so far, but it may also be a stopping point for many.

What I'm Reading Next:

     

 

Dancing

Level: Explicit
Genre: Fantasy> Urban Fantasy > Vampire
Obtained: Amazon Kindle
Reviewed by: Maggie W.

Cover:

The person on this cover seems to be peeking out from where they've been buried alive. Fitting since this book is an attempt by the author to climb out of the hole she dug herself into with the previous crappy books her series has turned into. The first thing I noticed about this cover art when it was released was, that it the ugliest color of orange for the author and title, and it doesn't look any better next to the purple and blue. Based on only the cover this gets a D if only because it wasn't one of the random objects we found in a box covers.

About the Book:

I would have let Nic continue with his on going reviews of the books in the Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series but this book was literally so terrible that I felt I had to post the review I wrote on Amazon here. Never in my life have I read a book so terrible that my ability to spell and make complete sentences afterwards left me for over an hour. Even now 2 hours later as I write this, I have to rewrite words repeatedly. 

Rating: 2/10

This book only earned a point for each of the following reasons: 
1) There were no horribly written boring sex scenes.
2) It was only novella length and I wasn't forced to suffer through the usual 500 pages of this swill. 

I don't even know where to start on how terrible this novella was. Once I got going I didn't know when to stop.

First were the endless paragraphs describing what characters looked like that were nearly identical to every other description of them we've gotten since they were introduced in the series. We get it, Nathaniel has long, long hair and lavender eyes, Micah is short with curly hair and a triangle face. Make a character list with a 1-2 sentence description of each one to put at the end of each book, problem solved in case people haven't read any other books in the series.

Then is the fact that because Monica is out of town for a week at a conference, she's left Matthew with Jean-Claude, Anita and company. Why would you leave your child in the care of someone that can't even remember to eat so as not to have ardeur problems while investigating murders? Not to mention, why is it appropriate to talk about the fact that you(Nathaniel) met Anita after nearly being killed by a trick and that you spent years trying to get in her pants in front of a 4 year old?
"we'd started doing less of the tonsil-cleaning kisses in front of Matthew--not just between the men, but between me and the men, or anyone and anyone. Why? Because Matthew liked to imitate"
So it never occurred to them about what is appropriate in front of children until Matthew started to imitate them? O.o Really? They didn't get that maybe 4 year olds shouldn't see you shove your tongue down multiple someone's throats until he tried the same? I think that's one of those things on the list with, don't swear in front of them, or expose them to violence until they're mentally equipped to handle it. Then again, if you're leaving a child with Anita they'd probably see all 3 and more within the first 15 minutes.

I noticed something while reading this, Zerbrowski has been a character since Guilty Pleasures. He was a character I enjoyed reading. When Anita and sundry get to the house, even his wife Katie is calling him Zerbrowski. I thought, hey, they've been married for 20 years, that's a little strange. So I googled and realized, we've never heard his first name. We've got nicknames for characters that get killed off a book or 2 after their introduction(sometimes in the same book) but a character that's been there since book one doesn't have a full name. Or maybe he's just Zerbrowski, like Cher or Madonna.

"It took us almost thirty minutes of conversation to try and explain that Matthew wasn't ours, but he spent a lot of time with us." Why would that take 30 minutes? All that needs to be said is, that's Matthew, our friend's son, we're watching him while she's out of town. Even if you're the slowest speaker in the world it would take maybe 1 minute tops to explain. Of course it's the wives that can't understand this quickly, because what's an Anita Blake story without some sexism thrown in for flavor. And of course we can add a bit of Anita getting angry over other women finding Nathaniel attractive and they only back off when they find out Nathaniel is taken because boring vanilla cardboard cutout wives can't resist him.

If working as a stripper gives Nathaniel so much angst about not being seen as a person then why continue to do the job? I mean as much as he and Anita both go on about him being the wife, why not be the stay at home partner full-time? He could just teach dance part-time.

"In that cold, wicked witch of the north sort of way," Nit-picking but the witch of the north was Glinda, the good witch.

The last 1/3 of the book I just rolled my eyes through. More meanies being mean about Anita and Co.'s lifestyle, even bringing Matthew into it by having another child start a fight about it and at one point a little boy kicks a girl in the head, because fuck her, that's why. Apparently dance is only for gay boys. Que Nathaniel getting everyone to dance ballet, even the mean little boys that only play baseball or do martial arts. Everything ends with pages of Nathaniel dancing with all the children, then children dancing with children, then adults dancing while talking about dancing. I wanted it to end and have no desire to dance for a while.

Someone please get me a drink, I need it.

What I'm reading next:

Literally whatever will erase this terrible, terrible book from my brain. 

The Killing Dance

 

Level: Explicit

Genre: Fantasy> Urban Fantasy > Vampire

Obtained: Purchased at Border's

Reviewed by: Nic Echo

Cover:

What to say about this cover? Busy and confusing sums it up nicely. While confusing kind of works as this books focuses a lot on Anita's love life. The Killing Dance also features the first sex scene, and sex certainly can be confusing at times. However, just because it shows the confusion in the book does not make it visually appealing. Every time I look at this cover, my eyes don't know where to look as there is no focal point. Also, maybe it's just me, but the place where the model's breast is against her arm looks like a butt to me at a glance because of the shadow placement. Now, the pink is eye catching, but overall, this cover is just a mess.

About the Book:

Anita has always been used to having enemies, but for the first time, she has a professional hit on her. Then, if that wasn't bad enough, she is also having to deal with her two boyfriends, Richard and Jean-Claude. On one hand, she is starting to see Jean-Claude as less and less of a monster while Richard, on the other hand, seems to becoming less and less perfect, and Anita isn't quite sure if he can fit into her life.

Rating: 7/10

Originally when I read this back in high school, this was one of my favourite Anita Blake books. I'll admit that I loved the sexual tension and romantic drama mingling with Anita's adventures. Now? Well, it's definitely lost its pleasure. That's not to say I hate it, but with how the current books are, anything focusing mainly on Anita's love life bores me. Still, that's not to say everything was a complete drag. I found the werewolves to be a lot of fun. LKH did a wonderful job at mixing humanity with the monstrous. It was especially nice to see LKH not blaming the animal for all the killing and blood lust. I will say that The Killing Dance made me mourn on how LKH used to write her wereanimals. They used to be frightening, and powerful creatures used to be a rarity. In here, Richard seems to be the only alpha (except Raina) that can share his power. In the recent books, it seems that every lycan and their uncle are able to. Speaking of powers that used to be rare, this is the book that introduces the triumvirate. I won't go into it too much for those who haven't read the book, but this ends up being only the third one Jean-Claude knows about. The later books seem to introduce a new one every other book. As far as this particular book, originally when I read it, I had found the triumvirate to be really interesting. It was new, fresh, and I wondered where it would lead to. Upon the reread, I couldn't wait for it to end.

However, whether it is a reread or a first time read, the exploring of the triumvirate went on much too long, I do understand that it is something new, but it felt as if chapters went by just TALKING about the power and the zombies. Yes, just talking. It's like get on with it already! This is definitely the book where the talking and repetition really come into play (though still not as bad as the more recent books). Hamilton starts referencing blue, blue eyes, and I lost count of how many times I was told Richard had brown eyes. This is also where Hamilton starts focusing on clothing more. Personally, I did not find it excessive, but those who could care less about clothing may.

So I have talked about some major issues that I had with The Killing Dance, but there is still plenty to enjoy. I already mentioned the werewolves but in particular, I love Richard. I really enjoyed the way Hamilton showed the shades of grey of morality. I love getting to see Richard try to use other means than death to become Ulfric (main alpha) and the cost upon him when he makes the decision to do otherwise. Granted, I did feel that Richard started threatening death too often after that, but my head cannon has him not fully realising his decisions so it's all words really. Even so, it was great to see Richard and Anita arguing about what is right in such a grey tinted world. Another thing I liked was more Edward! We get more action, more mystery, and even humour! The Killing Dance also had a fairly fast moving plot as assassins try to off Anita, and there was also lots of steamy scenes for those interested in the romance. All in all, The Killing Dance was an enjoyable book (even if it had more negative aspects than the prior Anita Blake novels). It had action. It had sexual tension. It was definitely better as a first time read, but it is still rereadable. Not as good as the first five, but still plenty of fun.

What I'm Reading Next: