Dark Destiny

It probably won't be often that I give a book at 10/10 rating, but I decided this one deserved it for reasons I'll go into below.

Yet again, the fact I read Christine Feehan (in fact, pretty much everything she publishes) is because I got suckered in my Barbara the Bookseller. That's okay. I discovered a good author and she gets a lot of my business. In fact, she was so sure she could convert both me and the friend I was shopping with on the day in question, she gave us a second hand copy of the first Carpathian book, Dark Prince. She gave away one book and between us we've probably bought about forty or so Feehans since then. I'm not sure who won.

Dark Destiny is the thirteenth Carpathian book. I wasn't as impressed as usual with the show more last one (Dark Melody) although I admit I'm still not sure why. It just didn't gel as well with me as some of the others have. So I started this one wondering if this was a general trend or a one-off that just hadn't quite worked for me. It was soon clear that it was the latter. In my opinion, Dark Destiny is possibly the best of the series.

Destiny (I don't think we ever learn her last name) was beguiled by a vampire when she was six. She unwittingly led him to her family and he murdered them in front of her, before abducting her and forcing her to take his blood. In her desperation to survive years of torture and abuse, Destiny reached out and touched another mind. I was a man, one she believed to be another vampire, who taught her all the skills and talents she needed to become a hunter. At fourteen she killed the vampire who had taken her and since then has been hunting the evil creatures.

Destiny made one error. She had not made contact with another vampire, but with Nicolae Von Shrieder, an ancient Carpathian. He has been trying to find Destiny for years, and as the book begins, he finally does so. When he finds her, his grey world explodes into colour and he realises Destiny is his lifemate.

Nicolae has a hard task ahead of him. Not only does he has to convince Destiny of what she is to him, he also first has to prove to her that he is not a vampire and that she, despite having been converted by one, is not either. Destiny, because of her terribly abusive childhood, is a scarred and damaged survivor, who does not know how to trust; she believes herself to be fundamentally evil (and while her actions quickly prove this untrue to the reader, she is unable to see it herself) and she has closed herself off from the possibility of friends, let alone the binding love of lifemates.

The reason I have chosen to rate this so highly is because of the way Feehan has handled the sensitive issues of an abuse survivor. Nothing drives me crazy more that a book where the heroine is shown to have been terribly abused, but once she meets the hero she is swept away by his amazing virility and suddenly everything is all right. Feehan has avoided this with care, sensitivity and style.

Destiny learns slowly. Even as her instincts involve her with people and draw her to Nicolae, she's fighting it. She comes to trust slowly with false starts. Sex is a frightening experience, no matter how right it feels and - hooray - it is a development, not a cure. Even by the last chapter of the book, when Destiny has grown and learned so much, when she's discovering it is safe to laugh and be happy, "the scars remained in her heart and mind".

I am blessed and lucky. The horrors of abuse of any kind have passed me by and I can only be grateful for that. So I cannot say if this is truly an honest and appropriate treatment of the subject, shifted into Feehan's fantasy world. But it does look to me that it is, and that is a large part of what impressed me so much. She tells a great story, introduces another set of wonderful characters you want to know more about, depicts again a wonderful tale of love, and yet, amongst it all, maintains a sense of great truth.

The book also introduces a sparkling set of minor characters and I look forward to having a chance to catch up with at least some of them again. I hope Vikirnoff finds his lifemate (like others, I have my suspicions about who it will be) and I hope we get to see Mary Ann again (I think it should be in the Carpathian mountains - it's time we had another story there). Velda and Inez were a delight; Velda's tragedy such a touching sadness - and an explanation of something I hadn't even thought about before.

The whole Carpathian series is great, this one especially so. show less

And it's not just "a" book review - it's my LAST book review of the year! Luckily, Dark Destiny was a really good book to end 2008 with. This is book 13 in Christine Feehan's Dark Carpathian series.

Dark Destiny is the story of Destiny (duh), a female Carpathian hunter - something unheard of in the previous 12 books of this series. Destiny was not born a Carpathian though. She was just an innocent child of 5 or 6 with strong psychic abilities, when a vampire found her. He killed her family and converted her, then spent years abusing her in every way you can possibly fathom. That's when she cried out to her savior.

Nicolae, ancient Carpathian hunter and protector of his people, heard the suffering of a child in his mind. He spent years show more trying to shield her from her pain. He taught her how to survive her captor, and eventually, how to destroy him and escape.

From that day on, Destiny traveled the world, hunting and destroying the undead. She hated herself for what she had become, and so she hid from Nicolae, afraid that he was a vampire, afraid that she would have to one day destroy the only thing that kept her alive.

Nicolae was patient, he knew his salvation depended upon finding her, and he finally tracked her down in the mountains not far from Seattle. He and his brother Vikirnoff arrived just in time to help her escape a brutal attack from a group of vampires.

After much persuading and explanation from Nicolae, Destiny decides that he is not a vampire, even though she can see the beast within him "roaring for release". She doesn't think she can be his lifemate however. Because her blood was tainted with the poison of the vampire that made her, she believes she is evil as well.

Nicolae and Vikirnoff believe that if they can get Destiny to their homeland in the Carpathian mountains, the healers among their people will be able to rid her of the toxins in the vampire's blood.

Nicolae endures as she tries to work through her trauma so that they can be together, and is delighted when she eventually reaches out to him for help with a neighborhood mystery.

Something is terribly wrong in Destiny's neighborhood, with the people she has chosen to protect. They are acting out in violence, completely of character, harming their loved ones. Afterwards, they have not memory of what happened. Destiny and Nicolae cannot detect the vampire's touch in them, but something is amiss.

Together, as they struggle to be what each other needs, they try to unravel the mystery of what is happening to the city.

Dark Destiny is one of the best Dark books I've read so far. Destiny was a strong female character - she had to be, and Nicolae was by far the most patient male yet! The "supporting cast" was good as well: the little old ladies Velda and Inez - practically the eyes and ears of the neighborhood; the social worker Mary Ann - risking her life to protect and save battered women in need; Father Mulligan, the local priest who knows about the Carpathian race and the good they do to defend humans and immortals alike from vampires.

Dark Destiny was well written, with an original storyline and fantastic, fully-formed characters. show less

In the eleventh book of the Dark/Carpathian series, Destiny is hunting vampires and doing her best to survive. When she was six years old, a vampire kidnapped her, killed her family, and horribly abused her for years. He also converted her into a Carpathian and left burning parasites in her blood. The only thing that kept her sane was the mysterious voice in her head. Since she believed the man telepathically speaking to her was a vampire, she never responded to him, but she listened when he instructed her in how to kill the monster that was hurting her. She eventually escaped and has lived on the run ever since.
Nicolae Von Shrieder never really understood why the child Destiny mentally connected with him, but finding her has become his show more sole reason for living. For years, he and his brother Vikirnoff have been searching for her, and then she finally speaks to him. To his surprise, he can suddenly see in color and feel emotions.
I really enjoyed this story. Thank God Nicolae hadn’t known Destiny was his lifemate when she was a child. He would’ve gone crazy and likely turned into a vampire himself since he was never able to find her. Once they’re finally together, he was patient, understanding, and willing to let her take the lead in their relationship. Most heroes in this series are demanding and controlling, but Nicolae was better than that.
Destiny, likewise, was also tougher than most of the heroines. Even though she’s a damaged woman, she’s not entirely broken. She’s strong but insecure, desperate for friendship and companionship, but too scared to try. She keeps to herself, but helps others from afar, always looking in from the outside of life.
I love the secondary characters, especially Mary Ann and the flamboyant sisters Velda and Inez. I feel so bad for Velda, but it was interesting to learn what happened when a woman’s lifemate was a vampire.
The only reason why I’m giving this book 4 stars and not 5 is two-fold: the passive voice and head hopping; and Destiny took way too long to fully accept Nicolae as a permanent part of her life (though, of course, her reasons were understandable). This book is one of my favorites in the series, and I cry every time I read it, which has been about three times now. Always grab some tissues before you start this story!
4 Stars show less

This is actually one of my favorite books in the series. Destiny is a very damaged person, but she's incredibly strong - a vampire hunter who was turned by a vampire. She's led her lifemate on a merry chase for over a decade, and he doesn't really have a clue what to do with her, now that he's caught her. Fortunately, both Destiny and Nicholae are fairly deep, well-fleshed characters, and there's some great mystery plot stuff going on, in addition to some important series story arc stuff.

We get introduced to Mary Anne Delaney, who is important, and we also get introduced to Vikirnoff VonShrieder, who is very robotic - understandably, as it turns out later in the series.

This is Nicholae VonShrieder and Destiny's story. Not one to skip.

Really enjoyable. Not as cohesive as some of the other 'Dark' books, but I still really enjoyed it and am hooked on the series - the stories seem to be getting better, with more depth, and a little less repetition. (Or is that my imagination? - perhaps I no longer feel bad when I skim some of the emo/lurve paragraphs?)

As a cost cutting measure for CF I think I could save her a couple of pages of printing by removing 'of' from some of the sentences. Eg. "He took the shirt off of her body." Rather than "He took the shirt off her body." (This is not a quote as I don't have a book in front of me.) The word is inserted superfluously into so many sentences it drives me crazy. I am working on conditioning my mind to skip this word wherever show more possible. (I know there are plenty of other grammatic errors throughout the writing, but for some reason, this one REALLY bugs me. But I keep coming back for more!! :)) show less

The pain of conversion to Carpathians is difficult enough for the women, but a child being converted by a vampire leaves tainted blood and horrible scars, inside and outside. At the a young age, Destiny knew horrors most humans can’t even imagine, the only way she survived was her mental connection to Nicolae Von Shrieder. He taught her how to survive, how to hunt and how to live again even though he could not find her. Being connected allowed him to help, but Nicolae couldn’t protect her they way he wanted and he couldn’t convince her that he was different from the monster that had terrorized her for so long. When he finally tracked her down, Destiny was afraid she would have to destroy him like she did all the other vampires she show more hunted. When Nicolae first heard her voice, he knew she was his lifemate and he was going to have a difficult life, no one had ever heard of a women hunter, or one of the light having vampire blood making her feel like the dark one.

Book 13 ….. Strong, courageous and funny, Destiny is a very competent women and hunter. The more ancient these men get, the more compassionate they seem to be. Nicolae has such great control of himself and Destiny is such a well developed character, I really enjoyed watching the change (almost like another conversion) from the vampire world to the life of a Carpathian. This book is packed full of great characters. The addition of Gregori, Savannah, brother Vikirnoff, Father Mulligan, MaryAnn Delaney, Velda, Inez, and even the vampire Pater to help tell this story was great, they are wonderful characters and I hope to have a few more stories that include some of them (Vikirnoff and MaryAnn especially). show less

Two Minute review for “Dark Destiny” by Christine Feehan

To say Destiny had bad childhood would be like saying the Grand Canyon is a bit of a dip. Lucky for the reader, there are not a lot of details. But through it all Nicolae was in her head, keeping her sane, teaching her how to kill the Vampire that was torturing her and trying to find her . Nicolae and Destiny are Carpathians. Good Vampires that hunt rogue vampire killers but Destiny does not know this. She thinks she is an evil killer and so is Nicolae. This is not my favorite series, that said, I loved this book. Strong characters, wonderful detailed writing, and lots of action.