Dead to the World

In preparation for Season 4 of True Blood and to take some of the waiting sucks edge off myself it was time to dust off my copy of Dead to the World, book 4 in the Southern Vampire series. This book is perhaps one of the funniest I have read in a while. It does deal with some serious subject matter and that stays serious, but the idea of watching Eric Northman act like a lost little boy? Oh it makes the whole thing ripe for a great deal of humor. I am the first to admit that the first few books were a bit of a slog for me; I enjoyed them but not as much as the show. I can honestly say this book I will enjoy as much if not more than the show this season. The book is well written and the story weaves together seamlessly this time. Perhaps show more it is the lack of the I love you I hate you with Bill? Hard to say, but it is the best book so far by far. Any book that says, “If there was an international butt completion Eric would win hands down – or cheeks up.” Gets my vote. show less

Oh. My. God. This series keeps getting better and better! I knew I loved Eric before, but WOW!

First off, I was highly disappointed to see that Alcide and Sookie didn't develop into a relationship. I'd make babies with that wolf guy, even if I had wolf babies in the process. The guy is walking perfection...minus his love for Debbie. But he abjured her, so he wins massive points in my book.

Debbie Pelt got EXACTLY WHAT SHE DESERVED! A shotgun is putting it mildly, and I get the sense that she won't disappear forever, or at least not in name. She's too evil to just die off....

And Eric....oh the hot Viking has a soft side. I pray that he remembers his love for Sookie eventually and she lets him back in, he'll treat her WAY better than Bill show more would. I appreciate that Bill cares for her and that Sookie loves him as anyone would love their first, but he doesn't deserve her.

I also loved that the books finally became more than just supes/vamps with this edition. The introduction of witches and fairies, as well as the implication that there is more than just the vampires to contend with, helps make the world that Charlaine Harris more plausible. If one thing that goes bump in the night exists, why wouldn't all the others?

Applause all around, these books are killer! show less

Rating: 3.9* of five

The Publisher Says: In Sookie Stackhouse—a Southern cocktail waitress with a supernatural gift—Harris has a created a heroine like few others, and a series that puts the bite back in vampire fiction. Now the hit series launches into hardcover for Sookie's biggest twist-filled adventure yet.

When cocktail waitress Sookie Stackhouse sees a naked man on the side of the road, she doesn't just drive on by. Turns out the poor thing hasn't a clue who he is, but Sookie does. It's Eric the vampire—but now he's a kinder, gentler Eric. And a scared Eric, because whoever took his memory now wants his life.

My Review: Sookie's life isn't dull, is it? I'd hate to be a character written by Harris, because one thing would be show more sure and certain. I'd never get a single uncomplicated moment's peace.

Bill's the ex, Eric's the new boy, and Jason (Sookie's playa of a brother) has vanished. That right there, in a person's real life, would be enough for a Jamaican escape cruise and a year of therapy to be necessary. Sookie, she gets no rest. She's got a powerful ancient vampire living in her basement, bereft of his memories and therefore stripped to his essential nature. That he also happens to be a gigantic, gorgeous blond Viking with a millennium's-worth of sex secrets to share (the mind might forget but the body doesn't) makes Sookie's rebound from her breakup with Bill one heckuva lot of fun, in the sack at least.

It's that pesky out-of-bed world.

Eric's memory was taken from him for a reason. There's a new group in Shreveport with domination of the supernatural community on their minds, the witches. Some bad, bad witches. With some really nasty plans for Shreveport, and getting rid of Eric is step one. He's the supernatural law, after all.

Sookie struggles with the fear and grief of losing her brother, her one surviving blood relative, throughout the book. It just can't be good that Jason's vanished after starting a relationship with a werepanther girl. Calvin Norris, the leader of the bizarre werepanther community of Hot Shot (out at the ancient native trails crossroads near Bon Temps), adds to the complexity of the situation by getting a little bit of a Thing for blonde, busty bimbo-lookin' Sookie-with-the-special-powers.

Sookie's world, once devoid of companionship, now teems with people of both genders, all imaginable persuasions, and every conceivable level of bizarreness, all wanting a piece of the woman, and her special mind-reading powers. She was isolated, and now being left alone sounds awful good. She battles the dark witches, she finds her brother, she sacrifices the simplicity of loving for the honorable and dutiful complexity of restoring balance to as much of the world as she can reach.

It's a pretty darn spiffy, if jam-packed, episode in the Stackhouse Files.


This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. show less

Summary: Dealing with (and dating) the supernatural community of northern Louisiana has brought Sookie Stackhouse nothing but problems, so she's made a New Year's resolution: this year, she's going to stay out of trouble... and stay out of the business of vampires, werewolves, and shapeshifters. However, that resolution becomes somewhat harder to keep when she's driving home and sees the viking vampire Eric Northman, mostly naked, along the side of the road, fleeing for his life. He has no memory of who he is, who Sookie is, or what happened to him, and Sookie agrees to hide him while his vampire compatriots work to figure it out, and stop those responsible. But having Eric in the house puts Sookie right back in danger, and when her show more brother Jason disappears without a trace, it becomes clear that her resolution isn't working... but staying away from vampires is hard when you've got a sweet, gentle, and extremely hot (albeit amnesiac) one following you around like a devoted puppy.

Review: Oh, this one was really, really good. It's the same fun mixture of romance and fantasy and mystery and chick-lit as the rest of the series, but it comes together much more smoothly here. I liked that Harris continues to expand the borders of her supernatural world; we get our first glimpse of witches and fairies, as well as more information on how weres and shifters work. I liked that Jason got more screen time, as well as some stuff to do, and promise of a more prominent role in future books. I liked that Bill, who in recent books had kind of started seriously sucking (and not in the fun sexy vampiric way), was absent for most of the book, and when he was around, I enjoyed watching him get some small measure of comeuppance. I liked that Alcide was back, although there are definitely some lingering emotional threads with him that could have been better developed. I liked all of that... but I loved amnesiac Eric. While the whole book was good, I found myself getting antsy during the daylight scenes, just because it meant that there was no chance of funny, sweet, and sexy-as-hell Eric turning up. But, really, the book ticked along at a fast pace, the plotting was much smoother than it has been previously, there were lots of individually great scenes, and plenty of interesting set up for future books... so I'm very excited to see what happens next. 4.5 out of 5 stars.

Recommendation: Best one in the series so far. show less

With every book in this romance-mystery-vampire series, Harris ups the ratio of supernaturals to humans, and yet, it doesn’t feel over the top. And in this book, in which we encounter both “good” and “evil” witches, the author uses her trademark humor tinged with pathos to emphasize the necessity for judging group members as individuals, rather than by resorting to stereotypes.

Dead to the World continues the adventures of Sookie Stackhouse, a 26-year-old hottie waitress/barmaid in Bon Temps, Louisiana. She has just broken up with her vampire boyfriend Bill, and she runs into Bill’s powerful boss Eric, who is disoriented and has lost his memory. It turns out that area witches put a hex on him. Moreoever, they want to drain show more his blood, since a vial of blood from a vampire as old as Eric can fetch up to $500 on the black market. (Drinkers of vampire blood gain strength, attractiveness, and healthiness, but the effects are temporary, so the practice quickly becomes addictive. Vampires victimized by “drainers” run the risk of being weakened and left to die when the sun comes up.) It takes a boatload of vampires, werewolves, witches, and even a fairy - plus Sookie, of course - to put the situation to rights.

Eric, whom we previously knew as “sinister and sexy” is now vulnerable and sexy, and he’s staying with Sookie who is protecting him. But she needs protection herself from her awakened sexuality, now lying dormant since her breakup with Bill.

Meanwhile, Sookie’s brother Jason has gone missing. Is he, too, a victim of the witches? One flips through the book with addicted bated breath! Will Sookie succumb to Eric? Will the hex be broken? Will Bill try to get Sookie back?

Favorite Anecdote: Sookie is being comforted by Alcide Herveaux, a big manly guy who is also a werewolf. Sookie reports:

"Since his shirt wasn’t buttoned, I found my face pressed against his warm chest, and I was glad to be there. The curly black hair did smell faintly of dog, true, but otherwise I was comforted at being hugged and cherished.”

Evaluation: Come on! You know you want to read these books! show less

Dead to the World
4.5 Stars

When small town waitress and closet telepath, Sookie Stackhouse stumbles across an amnesiac vampire wandering around in the woods, she immediately recognizes him as Eric Northman, the arrogant and domineering Sheriff of Area 5. After taking him home and cleaning him up, Sookie discovers that an Eric with no memory is sweet, vulnerable and oh so sexy. Unfortunately, the witches who cursed him are hot on his trail, and Sookie will have to pull out all the stops to keep him and those she cares about safe.

The Sookie Stackhouse series is not to be mistaken for serious literature in any shape or form. Nevertheless, the characters are engaging (aside from Bill the jerk) and the stories are fast-paced, action-packed show more and highly entertaining.

Dead to the World is the best book so far, and this is mainly due to the wonderful dynamics between Eric and Sookie. While Eric's charm and humor have been apparent from the start, and his deeper feelings for Sookie have been hinted at, these traits come to the fore in this installment as his amnesia allows Sookie to lower her guard and get to know the softer Eric beneath the smarmy façade.

In addition to Eric, Sookie's supernatural harem gains another member, Calvin Norris who joins Sam, Bill and Alcide in their affection for her. However, at this point, it remains unclear which of the "bachelors" will go home with the prize as each is problematic in their own way.

In terms of the story, there are two apparently connected threads - the witch coven's plot to usurp the Shreveport vamps and weres, and the disappearance of Sookie's incorrigible brother, Jason. Although rather predictable, both are well-developed with one or two compelling twists and turns that will have intriguing consequences going forward.

All in all, these books are light, fluffy and fun. However, readers expecting a written version of the TV show are going to be disappointed as any resemblance between the characters and the plot developments is superficial at best. Can't wait to see what is next for Sookie and her cohorts. show less

#4 in the Sookie Stackhouse series, but my first.

I'd highly recommend this for fans of Laurell Hamilton's earlier installments of her Anita Blake series, or of Robin McKinley's 'Sunshine.' The set-up is very similar - modern world, but vampires have 'gone public.' And our protagonist has relationships with them.

In this installment, Sookie, a human but telepathic waitress, has recently broken up with her vampire beau. Then, her brother goes missing. To top it all off, she finds a powerful vampire club owner acquaintance of hers running down the street, half-naked, and a victim of amnesia. Sookie takes him into her home for protection so that the powerful evil witches who are out to take over his financial empire don't find him... and show more things soon get rather complicated.

Definitely light reading, but charming and fun... show less