Dark Destiny, Christine Feehan

Another really good one!

We have Nicolae and Destiny. What makes this one good is Destiny's story.

She was kidnapped, converted, and abused by a vampire. When she's a child she connects with Nicolae, but he can't find her to save her. So, eventually he trains her as a hunter so she can kill the vampire that took her and escape.

But still he can't find her.

This kills my theory that the reason the women before Raven (Dark Prince) were deranged when they turned was at least in part because of the vampire blood. Destiny is in physical agony due to the blood, but she's not deranged. And of course there's the psychological trauma - no conversion is going to change that.

So, there's of course a lot of trust issues. Destiny can't see the difference between vampires and Carpathians. Plus, Nicolae has always been her salvation, so she's afraid that by letting him close she'll lose him. As with many victims, there's a lot of guilt and self loathing.

Nicolae tries to heal her, but it's beyond his abilities. He calls in Gregori, who's still in the area after helping with Corinne in Dark Melody.

Destiny struggles here too. The vampire they're fighting even preys on her self loathing by telling her the Carpathians will never accept her, will insist she's killed. She already half believes that, so the vamp scores a hit with that one.

Nicolae calls in Gregori, despite Destiny's concerns, and takes her blood - the tainted blood - so that her fate is his fate - to show solidarity with her. Gregori is of course completely accepting and heals them both completely.

Meanwhile, there's a guy using hypnosis to ruin peoples lives. Not a vampire though. Destiny and Nicolae take care of him.

There was one really important scene that didn't really have much to do with the plot, but adds more understanding of the world Feehan is creating. There are two old ladies in the neighborhood Destiny has claimed as her own. They're pretty outrageous in all ways - syntax, content...fashion. They're pretty hilarious. Not to mention psyhcic. So, the vampire tries to draw Destiny and Nicolae out by attacking the neighborhood. The vamp is about to kill Destiny, when one of the old ladies puts herself in front of him with a stake. She tells him that she waited for him, asks why he never came. The vamp kinda stares at her, a look of sorrow briefly on his face, before he attacks again. The old lady kills him, with Destiny's help, and immediately falls apart. She was obviously his intended lifemate. Only he chose evil first.

This scene answers a couple questions for me and raises others. The idea of redeeming a vampire has been repeatedly shot down. The vamps choose evil, it's not an accident or something they were coerced into, it was a choice. They knew it was wrong and they did it anyway. However, I wondered about what happened when/if a vampire met his lifemate after the fact. Now we know. Now, I've thought that perhaps reincarnation might be something the Carpathians would believe in. Perhaps the vampires and lifemates return to the world to try to find each other again, to try to make better choices.

For a while I even wondered if maybe there weren't always lifemates for vampires. I mean, so, look. Most of the characters we've seen have been very close to turning. I've been wondering if the vamps are a Darwin thing. The Carpathians have a lot of power and only those with a strong will to use it responsibly can reproduce. If you don't have the will to resist evil, then you're not strong enough for the species. It seems, especially with this scene, everyone has a lifemate, it's just a matter of finding him/her. And can you hold out till you do? And do you get only one shot at your lifemate? If your lifemate is human, which most seem to be for the moment, then he/she may die before you find her. Does the human's soul get reincarnated as long as the Carpathian holds out, giving him/her more than one chance at finding their lifemate? Fate seems to put them together, but this scene with the old lady shows that they don't always find each other in time.

Maybe we'll find out more in other books...

Anyway, it's not an overly complicated, but I really did enjoy this. We learn a bit more about how the race works and Destiny is a really good character.

I do think I know what's next though. Nicholae has a brother, Vikirnoff. A vampire is looking for a woman who can touch objects and see their history. Now, that sounds a lot like Sara, from Dark Dream, but the way Vikirnoff reacts, I don't think it's supposed to be her. So, that's my prediction...

Dark Destiny, Christine Feehan

Dark Fire, Christine Feehan

Right again! :)

Darius and Tempest, the mechanic.

She's human, but can talk to animals. So, we're more back to human/Carpathian storyline. However, I do finally get something I want: a woman who chooses to convert! She's not even dying! Well, the situation is still life and death, but....Beggars and Choosers, people!

I'm getting ahead of myself again.

Ok, so Tempest is hired on as the mechanic and of course as soon as Darius sees her, he knows. He comes on strong, too. :) It seems Carpathian males don't know any other way.

He drinks her blood and erases her memory, only because her brain is a bit different, it doesn't work. So, of course she freaks, thinking him a vampire and runs. Unfortunately, she gets in a car with a bad man who tries to rape her. Darius saves her before he gets to far, but we find out this wasn't her first incident. It happened once before when she was barely an adult.

This allows her and Syndil to talk about their experiences, which is a really nice moment. Darius learns a bit, too. Syndil seems to be healing, though she and Barack are still not together in the beginning. It seems having someone who understands is helpful.

Something I really found entertaining about this story was Tempest's ability to get into trouble. Every time she's alone, something happens. And it doesn't seem like a new development in her life. It made me smile.

And my favorite part is her conversion.

Love You More, Lisa Gardner

So much for happy endings.

At the end of Live to Tell, DD and Alex were getting together. As had Danielle and her man. The baddies had gotten what they deserved. And for once, it didn't seem like anyone got away with murder. Sounds like a happy ending for me.

And now it's all ruined.

Sorta.

We start with a State Trooper accused of killing her husband - an abuser. Only then they realize the kid is gone.

Troopers responded to the death at the house, but fucked up the crime scene before they realized there was a missing kid.

So, Ms. DD gets called in.

And everything is wonky from the get-go.

The Trooper, Tessa, is weird. The timeline is weird. The story itself is weird. Everything adds up at face value, but not when you scrape the surface. It's like.....2+2=4, right? But then if you look at decimals, you find out, actually, it's 5.

See what I'm saying. And Tessa is definitely a 5.

So DD starts investigating. Now, the case is this weird mob conspiracy. Basically here's what you need to know.

The Neighbor, Lisa Gardner

Ok, we're improving.

For one, this was the first one that really felt like a happy ending. Sure, Bobby and Annabelle got together at the end of Hide - to my disappointment, the beginning of this one talks about their wedding - but it still didn't give that...satisfied feeling happy endings usually produce.

Maybe because I was still hoping for DD and Bobby...

Anyway, this one did.

Of course, we have another woman getting away with murder, though. Two actually.

I can't get everything I want, I guess.

Also, DD is finally the main character. Though, I'm still not a huge fan of her.

So, we start with a missing wife/mother. Only, DD is instantly suspicious of the household. It's not too messy, not to clean, not too anything. Staged. And the husband is...withdrawn. Back in my hospital days we would say he had a flat affect. Which, could be shock, or, to DD's mind, a guilty conscience. Of course, I kinda think if he was guilty he would play up the grieving husband. Then again, maybe it's both, shock and guilt that he did it. But that goes back to DD trying to fit information into her theory regardless.

Of course, we're in his head, so we know he didn't do it.

Hide, Lisa Gardner

Argh!!

Ok, so this was a weird one for me. Mainly because it was just so damn familiar! And I honestly do not know why. As you can see from the cover photo, it was a TNT movie. So...maybe I saw that?

No idea, really.

I will say this was ever so slightly better than Alone.

At least I think it was. Maybe it was just because it was familiar.

I don't know. The deja vu really threw me off.

Again, DD takes a back seat to Bobby. So, that weirded me out again. And a lot of the same issues I had with Alone are back.

Sigh.

So, anyway, Bobby gets a call in the middle of the night before his first day as a detective - after the questions about the shooting in Alone, he needed a change. He gets this call from DD to come to a crime scene.

A crime scene that bears a remarkable similarity to where Catherine was kept when she was kidnapped as a child.

Alone, Lisa Gardner

So, this is actually a book I gave my mom as a gift a while back. I had found it on a list of for "the best" mystery and crime books. I was trying to find some new authors. *shrug*

When I asked my mom, she said it had been good, but frankly, I really didn't like this book.

It was wired.

First, this is the first book of the DD Warren series...except that DD is barely in it. It's all about this guy, Bobby.

Who does that?

Second, the other main character is Catherine, and I do not like her. I don't think we're supposed to, but still...

Third, I don't really like DD!! How can I not like the title character?

*sigh*

OK, lets get into this...

Grant County and Will Trent In Review

 (<--- awesome picture of Karin, right?)

So, Grant County and Will Trent have come to a close for now. Well, Grant County is over for good I think. They'll all be Will Trent crossovers under the Will Trent name. 

That's what it looks like, at least.

I love them for the most part. 

I think my feelings about Lena are clear, so I'm not going to go belabor that. 

But lets not get too far ahead of ourselves. 

So, a lot happens over the course of these series. I think Slaughter's choices make for a really...surprising and interesting series. 

That doesn't mean I'm happy with all her choices. 

Snatched, Karin Slaughter

So, this is a review for a short story (quickie) in the Will Trent series, taking place between Fallen and Criminal.

Snatched is a....well, I want to say a sweet story and it is at the end, but it feels wrong to say a story about a child abduction is sweet.

So, in Criminal, we learn that Will has been placed on "airport duty" as punishment for having his hair too long (yeah, I read these a bit out of order, sorry). Sara likes his hair longer, so Will's not willing to cut it.

We also learn in Criminal that's not really the reason. Turns out, Amanda, in typical Amanda fashion, is doing it so Faith can have some time with her mom after her mom's kidnapping ordeal. His hair is just an excuse. Or a torture device...

I Love Amanda. :)

So, Snatched is a story about Will's time in the airport. Airport duty is when he sits in a bathroom stall waiting for some guy to proposition him.

While in the bathroom, Will sees little girl feet in the stall next to him. He gets a hinky feeling about her and the guy she's with.

Sadly, he's right to be concerned.

He saves her, returns her to her mom, gets the baddies, and once again, all is right with the world.

Until all breaks loose in Criminal.

Snatched, Karin Slaughter

Criminal, Karin Slaughter

O. M. G!!

This was fantastic!

We finally get to learn more about Will's past.

So, Will and Sara are still going strong. Unfortunately, he spirals into despair when he finds out his father was released from prison.

We know is father killed his mother, but not much else.

Actually, there's another reason this is an awesome book: not only do we learn more about Will's past, we learn more about Amanda's.

Now, in Fallen, Faith's mom tells Will that Amanda is more like his mom that he thinks. As soon as she said that, I figured Amanda had found him when he was a baby. Still, now we get to see the whole story play out.

So, as much as I love that we learn about Will's origins, I love that we get to see young an naive Amanda.

Yes, Amanda was naive. Sheltered even.

Fallen, Karin Slaughter

I love this one! This series just gets better and better.

So, we learn a lot about Faith, her mom, and her mom's past. Remember I mentioned Will investigated Faith's mom? Well, now we get some answers.

So, Faith had her baby. I don't think I mentioned she was preggers, but she was. Like her first child, this was an oops baby. The father doesn't even know about the baby until this book. Kinda a shocker for him since they'd broken up before Faith even knew she was pregnant. She also found out she had diabetes at the same time.

So, Faith's life has been pretty all over lately.

Now, she's just had her baby and is returning home from mandated work training when she realizes something is wrong: her mom isn't answering any of her phone calls.

She finally makes it home in time to find one dead, one hostage, one with a gun, but no mom. Her mom managed to get the baby into the locked shed where her weapons are kept, but other than that, there's no sign of her mother.

Faith calls 911, but storms the house herself and kills the remaining two baddies. And despite one being a hostage, they are both baddies.

So, we start with some harcore Rambo shit from Faith.

After that it gets a bit more complicated.

Undone, Karin Slaughter

So, this is the first crossover with Grant County. It's 3 years since the events in Beyond Reach.

A woman is hit by a car. She's been raped and tortured. Blinded. She walks out into the road, and...

...ends up in the ER with Sara.

That's where we begin.

Will and Faith are working well together, though there's still some...kinks to work out.

Where in Triptych, I felt that Will and Angie were just 2 damaged people who loved each other, but didn't know how to have a relationship, in this one...

I feel like Angie stopped being a victim and started being an abuser.

Stay with me, here.

We weren't in her head, like we were in Triptych, I admit that could be part of the switch, but I think it's more than that. In this book, Angie was cruel. She hurt Will on purpose. She wanted him to know that he wasn't worthy of anyone but her. He tries to stand up for himself. He tries to make a break, and she makes it clear that he's stuck with her. That he's not good enough to be with anyone else.

She calls him stupid.

She's...alluded to that before. Mocked him for his disability, thought subtly, but this was something different. This was "I can control you, and don't you forget it."

Like I said, she switched roles for me in this one.

Fractured, Karin Slaughter

Will Trent is back - and Angie is living with him.

She left the force after getting hurt in Triptych, and they're engaged.

Gave me false hope, damn it. They're still a disaster. An engaged disaster, but a disaster never-the-less.

We also meet Faith.

I'm a fan of Faith.

Faith is not a fan of Will.

See, Will's last assignment was to root out corruption and he came across Faith's mother in the process, who was then forced to resign.

So, yeah. Faith + Will = Tension!

And they're working a missing persons case. She's the partner of Leo, the guy who was the partner of the cop from Triptych. When Will realizes they're not at a murder scene, but a kidnapping scene, Leo gets kicked off the case and in trouble for missing the clues, and Faith gets partnered with Will.

Blindsighted, Karin Slaughter

It's series time again! This is actually a recommendation from a friend, and boy! was she right on.

I've been feeling like a binge read for a while now, and when the new Karin Slaughter came out, my friend was obsessed. So, when it was time to pick a new read, I thought I'd give the Grant County series a shot so I can catch up.

I completely understand her obsession now!

So, this is obviously book one. It's a mystery/thriller series taking place in Grant County, GA (Hey, that's the name of the series, too!!) where coroner and pediatrician, Sara, and her ex-husband and police chief, Jeffery, live and fight crime (couldn't help myself). Now, there is a...reconciliation brewing, but don't let that trick you into thinking this was a romance. It's all mystery/thriller. (Though I did call the killer right from his first appearance. :D booyah!)

So, the shit hits the fan when Sara comes across the body of a local woman in the bathroom. She's been stabbed and raped, and despite Sara's best efforts, she dies. To make things more difficult, the victims sister, Lena, is on the force. Jeffery's partner actually.

Now, as I said: Not a romance. But I do have to go over that part of the plot because it feeds into the murders (yup, the woman in the bathroom was just the beginning).

Kiss the Dead, Laurell K. Hamilton

So, it's still Read a Romance month, so next up is some hot and steamy Anita Blake.

However....it wasn't one of my favorites. The plot was just kind of...lacking. Wah wah. Basically, a group of vampires want to be" free." Unfortunately, their methods for doing that are to kidnap a minor and then martyr themselves (aka suicide by cop - or executioner, in this case). The have a leader, a master, but they haven't blood oathed. Somehow the master misses the part where he can influence lesser vamps without a blood oath.

So, when they're around him, he can keep them on board with his plan for peaceful dissent. Unfortunately, when he's not around, his mojo wears off and they decide being martyrs and killing cops is the better plan.

Sigh.

Antia ends up setting them straight. That's basically the entire book plot wise.

Now, relationship wise, there was much more.