Dead in the Family (edition 2010)

Every time I look at that cover I think for a brief moment that Eric is bald. Something is just off in that painting. Now, on to the book.

Even though I read it almost three years ago (seriously, holy shit), I still clearly remember really enjoying the ninth book of the series. It was action-packed with lots of development of both plot and character. It reinvigorated the series for me so much so that even this much later, I was excited to pick up the next book. I should have known it would fizzle some after the action of the last book. It’s not easy to keep that much tension and action going, and it’s not like there weren’t any lulls earlier in the series. What I can mostly say about this book is that nothing much happens. Seriously. It’s longer than some of the books but less happens. I suppose technically things do happen. Eric’s maker shows up with a new vampire-brother for Eric, the hemophiliac Romanov brother, who is just not quite right in the head. This leads to some interesting development of Eric’s background, but not a ton. And it just isn’t all that intriguing. Similarly, even though logically it should be very interesting that Claude shows up at Sookie’s and the weres sniff out two fairies around, but it just isn’t. They sound interesting on the surface, but when you’re reading the book it mostly feels like you’re hanging out at Sookie’s house eating a cookie and wondering if the calories are worth it to listen to her yammer on.

I think the crux of the problem might be that neither Sookie nor Harris is comfortable with Sookie being with Eric, in spite of the reader liking Sookie being with Eric. If it’s not within the character for her to be with Eric, then a break-up needs to happen, regardless of what the readers like seeing. It’s important to keep characters acting within character. Interestingly, Sookie has started to notice that she is aging and thinking about what it will be like to slowly grow old and die. She seems to be seriously considering her vampire options. But we all know Sookie doesn’t want to be a vampire. Sookie wants children. If she gives that up to be a vampire, it will make the series take an incredibly dark turn. The next book will be an important one. It’s basically a shit or get off the pot moment for character development, and in spite of the ho hum nature of this entry in the series, I am interested to see if things pick up in the next book in this regard. They tend not to slump for long in Sookie Stackhouse-land.

There’s not too terribly much else to say about the book. Weaknesses that are there earlier in the series are still there. Sookie isn’t very smart and is kind of annoying. The sex scenes continue to be cringe-inducing. But the world is complex and fun to visit, even when not much is happening there. Sookie does need to start taking some agency soon though, or being stuck with her first person narration may become a bit too much to handle. Readers of the series will be disappointed by this dull entry, although it won’t come as a surprise since lulls happen earlier in the series. Enough happens to keep some interest up to keep going with it though.

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Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: It's all about family ...

Sookie Stackhouse is dealing with a whole host of family problems, ranging from her own kin (a non-human fairy and a telepathic second cousin) demanding a place in her life, to her lover Eric's vampire sire, an ancient being who arrives with Eric's "brother" in tow at a most inopportune moment. And Sookie's tracking down a distant relation of her ailing neighbor (and ex), Vampire Bill Compton.

In addition to the multitude of family issues complicating her life, the werewolf pack of Shreveport has asked Sookie for a special favor, and since Sookie is an obliging young woman, she agrees. But this favor for the wolves has dire results for Sookie, who is still recovering from the trauma of her abduction during the Fairy War.

My Review: This is book ten in the thirteen-book series, and somehow I never got around to reviewing it before. I've unearthed it for a re-read preparatory to reading the series finale soon.

Sookie's world, that is the one created for her by Miss Charlaine, is a very rich and varied one. It's amazing to me the depth of the population's weirdness and otherness, and the reason I've kept reading is at least partly that depth. There are so many rules when world-building, and each of them must make sense in the context of the story being told, and form a part of the overall trend of the story or series if it is to be believable. Well, that's a specialty of these tales!

Another big part of my pleasure in the books is the realness of the fantasy. Harris has created slang for her supes, "deader" being the rude term "twoeys" (the two-natured, or weres) use for "vamps" (human slang for vampires); "oneys" then are civilian humans to the weres, though the vamps call us "breathers." It's all very organic for a series of books about a character who is the nexus for a lot of contact among these parties that otherwise wouldn't take place. Of course any group comes up with names for the other, different, competing groups! Naturally. And so Miss Charlaine provides.

This entry in the series does several things that needed doing, snips off some very unprofitable lines of story and blooms open others, and makes a few of the unpalatable fae characters come more alive. Eric, played on TV by the gorgeous Alexander Skarsgard, and Sookie are deeply enmeshed in a relationship that makes Sookie do some very, very against-the-grain things in this book. They're totally understandable, and they add to the sense of the books as lived-life stories as improbable as that sounds.

I liked the ending of this book about the best of them all that I've read. Very satisfying. Very.


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Harris always does well by the reader. It's a world with much darker fringes than the sometimes lighthearted tone of the books would lead you to expect.

Sookie is changing and what she deals with changes her. (And Jason may be actually maturing a little!) ( )

I understand why some people are a little disappointed with the latest Sookie Stackhouse novel from [a:Charlaine Harris|17061|Charlaine Harris|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1275527715p2/17061.jpg]: it's a change of pace for Sookie and the first two-thirds of the book are full of information rather than action-packed. But give the girl a break - how many wars between supernatural factions has she been at the centre of now? So one book without vampires, weres or fairies trying to kill her is only fair. Wait... They still are trying to kill her?
While Sookie and the vamps are recovering from the devastating Fairy War in '[b:Dead and Gone|5161066|Dead and Gone (Sookie Stackhouse, #9)|Charlaine Harris|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255574625s/5161066.jpg|5228078]' (with Bill suffering from silver poisoning), the world of the supes is still moving on. Now that the the weres and shifters have 'come out', resistance from people is leading to government plans to force them onto a register. Closer to home, Sookie learns that there are two bodies buried behind her house (one of which she can immediately identify) and that, while most fairies have left, there are still some fae in the area. When Eric's maker arrives with his new 'protégé', Sookie feels the effect of them both through the blood bond. As if they didn't already have enough to worry about with the possibility of a takeover attempt by Victor.
It's true that there is a lot of explaining rather than action and telling rather than showing in this book, but we learn a lot about vampire politics and human government reaction to the revelation of the weres and shifters. To be fair it would be difficult to reveal anything about politics in any form without explanation as it is possibly the least action-packed part of any society. While it does make this entry in the series rather information-heavy, I like this knowledge and it's important to know this background to the societies involved. The problem is not that we learn these things, it's that 'Dead in the Family' seems a bit like an information-dump, explaining what's gone before and providing the motivations behind what may happen next in the series.
That's not to say that I didn't enjoy the book - I've loved every Sookie Stackhouse novel so far including this one. The series provides great characters to follow, making it easy to just slip into the next volume. So it's comfort-reading. Y'know, with death and monsters... ( )

I love it so far!! ( )