So this is the October book from fairyloot. My edition has some beautiful red sprayed edges and some exclusive art work on the inside of the dust jacket. In addition to being signed by the author (in red, which is a nice touch). Now the other two books I have recieved and read from fairyloot I have more than enjoyed. In fact both have been solid 5* reviews from me. So I will be going into this book hopeful for the same.
However, the general theme (vampires) is not one of my common go to read now. Saying that I throughly enjoyed Twilight back in the day, as well as The House of Night Series and the Sookie Stackhouse Series. I was big into vampires as a teen, Buffy and Angel were staples of my youth. But I have found as I got older I dont tend to drift towards vampire novels.
I intended to give this book a good go and I was hopeful that the added murder mystery element would add something new to what can, in my opinion be quite an overdone genre.
Set in New Orleans French quarter at the back end of the 1800's we are introduced to Celine who has sailed to New orleans to escape something we as of yet do not know. I must say that has me intrigued already, I love hidden secrets in the main characters. It makes it really seem like we are finding out about characters this way and not just being privy to all their thoughts and history straight up.
Early on we read the point of view our first murder victim a young girl who has ventured out after dark, in the dead of night to meet a mystery man. Unfortunately for her she is then killed and I guess the mystery begins. Who is the murderer and why are they killing?
Now as of half way through the book I must say I was generally underwhelmed. With just about everything. The characters don't seemed well fleshed out. They feel like they just, kind of, appear. The main character has no idea what she wants to be, and not in a good way. She seems to flit from disdain to camaraderie so fast I often have to check who is interacting with.
Also as any seasoned reader will know, it's never good when you start skim reading. And boy am I skim reading this now. It's so annoying as the synopsis screams interesting engaging story. But unfortunately that doesn't seem to be what I am getting with this book. From taking a brief look at other reviews it is felt by alot of people and they have stated a lot of this authors books feel like this. If so I probably will not be picking up a book by this author again.
Update: I did indeed finish this book. The main point I want to make is this; if only thr last 30-40 pages were the quality of the whole book. These last chapters were brilliant. The story and pace picked up immensely. It went from being 2 star book to 4 stars because of those last pages. I do still feel that the characters were in general really flat and none of them made me feel attached to them at all. I am a few months post reading this now and I am unsure if I will read the follow on books. If just wasnt really for me.
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