Laurell K. Hamilton

In this installment of the Anita Blake's saga, there are international vampire problems afoot. It seems that Edward is already in Ireland trying to sort out a recent spate of vampire related killings that have thrown the area in and around Dublin into chaos. The human inhabitants of Ireland have always believed that vampires cannot rise on their soil - something to do possibly with the magic of Fairy which protects them. It's also for this reason that they have not called in Anita. There is show more a stigma against necromancers and the local authorities are also put off by her bloodthirsty reputation.

However, things are heating up enough, and Edward has been talking her up so it's just possible that they could extend an invitation to The Executioner shortly if they cannot solve the problem on their own. If that happens, Anita is hoping to take Damien, who was made a vampire in Ireland and knows something of the vampire scene which has been thriving there for centuries. There is a concern that Moroven, the evil vampire who created Damien and rules Ireland is acting out because she is no longer living in fear of the Mother of All Darkness and her Harlequin. It's also possible that she's completely lost her mind and is now slaughtering wantonly. Alternatively, something else entirely could be going on and the only way to find out is go to the Emerald Isle for a visit.

Will Anita be able to keep her people safe or will Moroven target those she loves most in an attempt to gain power in the new world post-MoAD?

To begin, I'd like to say that this book is really really tedious and honestly a cringey slog from beginning to end. The edition I read was 710 pages long. We learn in the first chapter that there is a vampire problem in Ireland and so know that Anita will be going to Ireland. However, she doesn't make it to Ireland until page 375. So if you want to read this book, begin by tearing it in half and tossing the first half in the garbage. You will have missed nothing. I would also recommend you throw the second half in the trash, because the plotting of this book is deranged and the "mystery" is extremely underdeveloped and takes a back seat to time-wasting conversations.

Now - to the numbered list of complaints:

1. Damien is back again. It's probably been a half dozen books since Damien has been mentioned in more than just passing. It's like LKH woke up and remembered that before all these fucking tigers, Anita had a triumvirate. It turns out that Damien has been having non-stop nightmares where he wakes up sweating blood. He thinks this is happening because he's been isolated from Anita and Nathaniel because he's been going steady with his girlfriend Cardinale. Anita was more than happy to take him off her sex rotation and was glad that he found a girl to be monogamous with, but now, against her will, she has to sleep with Damien. At least, sleep in the same bed. Damien thinks that if he can fall asleep next to his triumvirate, he'll be able to sleep soundly. His girlfriend, Cardinale, is a hellacious bitch who told him she would rather see him dead then even just platonically sleeping in bed with anyone else. I cannot be mad at Cardinale because she is such a ridiculous caricature designed to demonize femininity that it's clear she's not intended to be a real person, but just to be a comically bad partner for Damien so there is no complexity when their relationship suddenly ends and he rejoins Anita's harem. Cardinale has insisted that she move into Damien's room in The Circus of the Damned, even though that's a pretty bizarre decision considering they basically each have a dorm room, and now they've cut their living space in half. She's also committed the unforgiveable offense of decorating his room "all girly" which is a crime on par with infanticide in Anita Blake land. She's covered the walls in pictures of flowers. She's put pink sheets on their shared bed. She's selected a flowered bed spread and a flowered rug for the floor. And her huge wardrobe has taken over the closet so Damien has to get dressed somewhere else because there's no room for his clothes. He admits that he didn't ever speak to her about any of this but secretly hates it. But it's fine, because Cardinale has broken up with him for daring to try to not die. Their entire relationship has been conducted off screen so there are literally no stakes. The only purpose the extended discussion of this relationship serves is to remind the reader that Anita is awesome because she's basically a man and men are way better that women who suck.

2. So when Anita, Damien, and Nathaniel agree to sleep together to see if it helps with his nightmares it takes way too much awkward and boring conversation for them to actually get into bed. Here's the thing, Damien is very very straight. He's like, totally not gay at all, and it sorta freaks him out that he'll be in bed with Nathaniel. But they eventually shoehorn him into bed. However, the triumvirate find themselves drawn into Damien's nightmare which appears to be possibly happening in real life, possibly in Ireland.

They all wake up covered in blood because Damien sweats blood when he has nightmares. They therefore decide any more awkward, cringey conversations must wait until they shower. I counted. It's 6 chapters before they actually make it into a shower. Instead, the reader is assaulted by tedious, pointless, gross and insulting conversations with just random people they meet in the hallways. Which brings me to point 3:

3. I've discussed my deep moral objection to the existence of unisex bathrooms in The Circus of the Damned basement. The 24 hour bodyguard army is apparently constantly running around the place, working out, and showering all naked together. The first time the unisex bathroom makes an appearance in these books, one of the female guards feels so uncomfortable using them that she asks Anita to go in with her. Anita herself is then so violently harassed that she is forced to physically overpower her own employee. Apparently, this proven dangerous asshole is not only still on the pay role, but makes another appearance to again threaten Anita. This motherfucker, known as Ricky, points a gun at Anita which apparently makes her realize that by defending herself earlier she's emasculated him which has made him dangerous. She's hoping that she can let him beat her up in training later so that he can save face. WTAF??? There is so much wrong with this. First of all, Ricky should be fired and blackballed because he's a menace. Second of all, the Circus should review their shower policies because something is off if employees are justifiably nervous about using it. Seriously, imagine that the boss herself is assaulted while trying to shower and the dude who did it remains on staff. How could anyone feel safe at that point? Third of all, it's so poisonously bad that Anita is blaming herself for Ricky's criminal behavior. It is her fault for not firing him for misconduct, but Ricky started off a dangerous asshole and her only fault is enabling him.

4. Nathaniel doesn't respect safewords. I've wanted to bring this up before, but for a guy who supposedly scenes a lot in the bdsm community, he regularly violates the rules of said community. He has an established history of trying to put Anita in situations where she cannot use her safewords to stop things she's uncomfortable with. In this book, Anita says "yellow" and is ignored. When she later says "red" Nathaniel treats this as yellow and just backs off. This is a huge violation of trust but is presented by the book as him just being some sort of harmless scamp. I don't like it. It's dangerous representation and it makes me not like Nathaniel. Which bring me to ... sigh ... point 5:

5. Nathaniel rapes everyone and the book just treats it as fine and not a big deal. Okay, I'll grant that at this point, losing consciousness and waking up to find out that you've been having sex with people unknowingly for a really long time is like, a theme. It's gross and repetitive, but if you've come this far in the series, you know that rape is essentially a leitmotif. However, in this book, Nathaniel now has vampire powers, rolls both Anita and Damien and continues to use their bodies to fulfill his wildest sexual fantasies for several hours. He says he didn't know he was doing it, but prior to this, Damien was so skittish around same-sex relations that he didn't even want to sleep in the same bed as Nathaniel. Now he has penetrative sex with Nathaniel several times with no problem and Nathaniel didn't think to question it.

Anita is fine with it almost immediately, but that's expected because this has happened to her several times by now. However, not only is Damien fine with it, now he's into Nathaniel. Both Anita and Nathaniel realize this is out of character and conclude that Nathaniel has used vampire powers to make Damien bisexual. At least bisexual when it comes to Nathaniel. And they are just ... fine with that. They barely discuss it. This rape scene is very bizarre and seems to be just there to handwave Damien joining Anita's harem again and being okay with being in bed naked with other dudes. It's weird. It's offensive. I don't like it at all.

6. No one in this book talks like a people talk. I have, at this point, a physical reaction to the phrase, "What does that mean?" Everyone says it in Anita Blake Land all the time, even when it's painfully clear what someone means. It's a thinly veiled excuse to explain things over and over again which serves the purpose of padding this already bloated book even more. Furthermore, everyone in this book feels perfectly comfortable demanding that Anita have sex even if she doesn't want to. I practically screamed when one of her body guards, an employee currently on the job, jumped into a conversation that did not concern him to pressure Anita to stop being such a prude and just have sex with someone already. First of all, how about we let women make their own sexual choices without feeling the need to force them to justify those choices? It's gross. And offensive. But to have an employee feel comfortable enough to prescribe sexual choices for their boss is just BEYOND.

You can open this book to any page at random and find a tedious and cringe-worthy conversation taking place. Dialogue in these books predominates, as the author has obviously figured out that it chews up pages like nothing else. Despite writing so much of it, she's singularly bad at it.

7. The Setting. I was actually hesitantly excited to see that this book would be taking place in Ireland. Obviously, this was before I realized it would be nearly 400 pages before we actually GOT to Ireland. However, I thought we would at least get some interesting local color. Alas, I think I learned more about jet lag than I learned about Ireland. Ireland was decidedly not another character in this book. It barely appears. For all that we are promised fairies, they barely appear. The portion of the book that takes place in Ireland is almost completely consumed by the local authorities stomping around being pissy because they don't like Anita. There's the typical dick measuring contests that we've come to expect in these books. There is the unreasoning and wildly unprofessional displays of hatred and prejudice. There are the never-ending descriptions of new characters' physiques that more and more trend towards objectification. Especially when a woman is being introduced, we are treated to judgements about their persons that inevitably compare them, typically unfavorably, to Anita.

Once in Ireland, Anita spends eleven pages at a crime scene before it's back to proving points to the local cops who treat her with an irrational disrespect for someone whose help they've specifically requested. From there she just bounces from one pointless meeting to another. They go to two or three pubs for various meetings with contacts who can provide no information at all. This whole time, by the way, they are carting their comatose vampires around in duffle bags. Just let that sink in for a minute. They're having drinks in a bar and Damien is under the table in a duffle bag. Along with the other vampire, whose name I literally can't remember. This is such a bizarre choice that is presented as normal. Even though the thin material of the duffel bag is the only thing protecting these vampires from a sudden, fiery death, and even though they will only be useful after nightfall, we are to believe that this is not a truly ridiculous thing to do.

Obviously, this telegraphs that at some point, Damien will wake up before nightfall and be useful because that's something he can do. Which happens. He's not really useful, but he's there. Just. The number of times they are out in the world walking around and the author chooses to remind us that one of their party is toting a literal human body in a bag on their back. And I'm supposed to not snicker at the ludicrous picture that makes.

8. Anita is crazy unprofessional. She's invited to travel internationally to a country where she is not welcomed. Not only does she bring a hugely outsized entourage, but she absolutely refuses to not make out with them constantly. I don't even work with her, and I got nauseated by the daisy chain of men she has to kiss one after another whenever she's leaving a room or just feeling emotionally vulnerable. It's weird. It's inappropriate. It's also usually very tonally dissonant.

9. The pacing of this book is unforgivably bad. At this point, I'm used to a majority of these books being completely pointless and then the author remembering that she's supposed to have a plot in the last 50 pages, but this is just a really glaring example of this. The final 20 pages of this book are a WILD FUCKING RIDE. In that time Anita is kidnapped from her hotel room, is taken to Moroven's secret castle, finds out that Nathaniel and Damien have also been abducted, escapes, realizes that she's accidentally taken 3 brides at once, tries to raise a graveyard of zombies - fails, uses her necromancy powers to make ghosts able to fight vampires, witnesses Moroven's demise by primarily offscreen action and also finds out who has been killing people in Ireland. OH! She also finds out that the weird prophecy about how she needs to marry a tiger was misinterpreted and somehow has been fulfilled by accident when Domino was killed and she was forced to drink his blood.

The funniest part of this is when Damien shows up and just points at a random vampire we've never seen before and says, "It was him! He's the one who's been killing everyone in Dublin." And then, I guess he died in the fight? I reread the ending but couldn't find out whether he ever actually died. It was that frigging chaotic. As for Moroven, she died off screen. I guess Damien killed her animal to call (off screen) and then her human servant literally pointed a gun at Anita and said, "I'm going to kill you now," but one of her new brides jumped in front of the bullet and shot him to death. So I guess Moroven died from the dual trauma of both her human servant and her animal dying at the same time. Later, in the epilogue, we learn that she was a fairy or something. Which explains why she was able to make vampires in Ireland. THE END.

Sheesh. This book has to be read to be believed. But honestly, don't read it. It's so bad. And boring. And long for no reason. show less

Reading this book felt like reconnecting with an old friend. I grew up, but she’s still as wild and dramatic as ever. This series has been my guilty pleasure for over 20 years, and book eight didn’t disappoint. It’s over-the-top and ridiculously sexy in a very 90s way—definitely tamer than today’s steamy romance—but that’s part of the charm. It’s also super gory, so if blood and guts aren’t your thing, you might want to steer clear. For me, though, this is all part of the show more fun.

One of the best things about this series is how unapologetically layered it is. There’s the drama of the love triangle, the fast-paced action, the ever-complicated supernatural world, and this book piles it on without feeling overwhelming. This entire series is part mystery, part romance and part horror, with a nuanced blend of all of the above I absolutely love.

The world-building in this series has always been one of its strongest points, and Blue Moon doubles down on that. We’ve got vampires, werewolves, necromancers, witches, magic—everything you’d want in a supernatural drama and then some. It’s intense, sometimes ridiculous, and I loved every second of it. I think what makes it work is that it doesn’t take itself too seriously. It’s bold, it’s extravagant, and it’s just plain fun.

Now, I have to admit, my love for this series is tied up in a lot of nostalgia. I started reading these books in my 20s, and they’ve been with me ever since. If I were to pick up the first book now, I’m not sure I’d feel the same way about it. But having followed Anita through her journey for so long, I can’t help but feel invested. These books are like comfort food for my brain.

I read this book on the balcony of a massive cruise ship, and it was the perfect vacation read. Fast-paced, emotional, and over-the-top. Pure escapism into the supernatural world I’ve come to adore. It’s gory, it’s sexy, it’s dramatic, and it’s everything I love about this series. While it might not be for everyone, for me, it’s an absolute joy to dive back into Anita Blake’s world, and I can’t wait to see what trouble she gets into next. show less

I saw this book described as a “novella” and thought “this is just going to be a sex scene”. Then I opened it and saw that it was 150 pages long so took it back and assumed there was going to be a plot. I was right the first time, it’s just a very very long sex scene with a pointless pre-amble. This just goes to show that even cynical me has some stubborn, foolish hope that refuses to die despite repeatedly being stabbed in the head.

But let’s begin with that pre-amble. First of show more all, in classic Anita Blake style, every character who appears, no matter how briefly or how irrelevantly, is described in ludicrously unnecessary detail. That includes characters who are referred to but never actually have any role in the book. If the post man had visited while they were talking, I’m sure we’d have three paragraphs describing him as well.

We also have a huge chunk of completely irrelevant and unnecessary recap. It makes me wonder if this is a breakfast ritual at Anita’s house, along with pulling out the relationship flowchart. They discuss Richard’s issues with Nathaniel and Jason because they’re not dominant/powerful/big hulking manly enough for Anita and then a big tour of the whole “who is ruthless and why that is a good thing”. None of this is relevant. The characters they talk about aren’t even in this book – and all of this has been shown before, so why does it need to be told? It’s just a random insert.

That done we have a visit from a weretiger (called Envy. No, really). She’s had sex with Richard and left because he keeps hurting her, hammering away with his super-strength and enormous endowment despite her repeatedly telling him that she’s not having fun and he’s hurting her. There are many ways this could have been handled sensitively and kindly, but since Envy is a blonde woman she is Clearly Evil and instead we have a recounting of how Anita can totally take it with her Vagina Of Steel followed by Envy being envious (ha!) of the wonderful life and wonderful lovers Anita has because she’s just so damn awesome. Because this is Anita and all other women are inferior – even when meeting J.J. a woman Anita actually likes, one of the very first things she does is describe how amazingly, wonderfully curvy Anita is and how much she isn’t.

Then to the endless sex scenes and the pre-amble to it – and the problems here. First of all, this series whole approach to sex and consent is broken. One element that was really strong in this book is the idea that saying no = prudery. If you are not comfortable with a type of sex or a sex act then this isn’t your taste or preference or even sexual orientation – it’s some kind of flaw you need to overcome. If someone comes to you and says you should have sex wearing a wet suite, riding a llama while singing Wagner, then you better get a snorkel, put on your horned helmet and check ebay for an alpaca. This is really pushed in this book – Anita doesn’t get off on voyeurism? Get over it. Anita doesn’t want to share a bed with someone? Get over it. Jade doesn’t want to have sex with men? Get over it. Everyone must want to have sex in all ways at all times with all people or they are evil prudes of prudery who need de-pruding.

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I LOVED this book!!!!

I must admit that the sharp left the series took into the realm of erotica was disappointing when it put the character development second to the erotica. This book balances the two, and ties together themes from the last several books beautifully!

The issue of Marmee Noir's easy death by explosion is addressed. Really guys, can the mother of all vampires be killed off by bombs as an after thought in one of the books. Turns out not so much, heh.

What I love most about show more Hamilton's work is that she explores contemporary cultural issues of racism, sexuality, LGBT and feminism through her metaphysical symbols. Haven, in particular represents old school patriarchy in his need to be Anita's one and only, and caring more for possessing her rather than for her love, or heaven forbid, her happiness. There is a beautiful scene where Anita tells him that she is her own prince, and not a princess in distress for him to rescue, that she needs a partner, not a hero and he needs to be ok with that. It is a piece of beauty that gave me chills to read it. THIS is what feminism has been fighting for through the last 40 years. The right to be a damsel, or a prince, to be ourselves. The series actively opens up myriads of identity options for men, and negotiates power dynamics through metaphor. Haven's fate results from the inability to change, or to see a human being for what she is: an individual with her own needs and desires, not a box of gender performativity to be possessed.

Richard cleans up his act, really he is the other side of Haven's coin. He wanted the life fed to him by contemporary gender construction (read: white picket fence), and has spent most of the series trying to foist that expectation onto Anita and being pissy and pouty when it doesn't work. Haven is what happens when the patriarchy cuts off its nose to spite its face, and serves as a warning about contemporary social dynamics.

I adore the gender queering of the series, and this book in particular is the icing on my motif cake. I am surprised by all the negative reviews on it, it seems that people have their favorite characters and are disappointed about not getting enough of them here, or in their various fates. But really, what did they think was going to happen if Haven couldn't learn to bend?

Anita's reaction to Haven's fate is realistic, and demonstrates that however much she fears she is becoming a monster, that the rules have changed. Monsters aren't the things that go bump in the night, monsters are the things that don't protect the weak, that abuse their power over others. The changing definition of monstrosity is what makes Urban Fantasy such a fascinating genre. Richard deals with some of the same, I am glad to see him growing as a person and dealing with the terms of the world he lives in rather than the one he wishes he lived in (read: Leave it to Beaver). Illusions and a refusal to cope with reality is incredibly damaging, and as much as I have enjoyed seeing that mind set played out to its very damaging conclusion, I am also glad to see that eyes can be opened, ways can be mended, and at the end of the day we all fight for the hope of a better world. show less