Uprising: Vampire Federation

A horrible experience as a youth left Joel Solomon with a unique perspective when it came to claims of vampire ritual killings in the area. As a Detective Inspector, he logically thought that the teen, Declan Maddon was on drugs or alcohol and had imagined the Halloween night death. But, as the boy that watched his own parents attacked by one, Joel had a sense that Dec was telling the truth. As one of the Vampire Intelligence Agency’s (VIA) top field agents, Alex Bishop’s job included policing other vampires and making sure that the humans never suspected vampire existence. Hearing the story that Dec was telling the police brought her face to face with Joel and even though that first encounter didn‘t amount to much, there was show more something about him and she knew they would meet again. Taking different routes, Alex and Joel end up being on the same path … to stop the uprising of the vampire traditionalists.

Book 1 ….. Took an extremely long time to get into the story of the Uprising. Some of it could be attributed to it being the first book of a new series and wanting the back story told. To some point it was predictable, nothing like posting forbidden laws at the beginning of a story to ensure that some if not all will be broken by the main characters by the end of the story. I did struggle to get into it at first, there was so many characters and keeping them straight at first was difficult, and then to find most of the characters that had been introduced ended up dying was a bit frustrating. Near the middle of the book though, I did find myself not wanting to put it down, the main characters had been reoccurring enough that I finally got into the actual story and learned to overlook the introductions of the expendable characters. Turns out that I really liked both Joel and Alex. I liked the way it ended - emotionally, I will probably seek out the next book after it becomes available, if for not other reason than to see the reaction of the characters to the ending action of one of them. show less

I have to point out before reviewing this book that I have a huge love of vampires, the vampire mythology and most (but not all) vampire films/books. I also love the urban fantasy genre, where I find most books seem to be written by women, which seems to lead to a big focus on the romance side of things in the main part.

Uprising by Scott Mariani upon first reading the blurb sounds like it’s going to be the atypical urban fantasy novel but from the first page it becomes obvious it’s not. With Scott’s novel, vampires have rediscovered their bite. They’re not dwelling in forlorn despair over a lost love or a passion that shouldn’t be. They are dangerous, deadly and vicious.
Scott has developed an intricate tale, bringing vampires show more into the 21st century without removing their fangs in the process. Humans are viewed as a foodsource, not as something to be lusted after and the two groups of vampires we are introduced to hold this in common even though they have developed two completely separate ways of continuing their existence.

This story is not a book that lovers of Twilight and vampires that sparkle will enjoy as it makes no bones about the fact that beneath the veneer vampires are not human and do not see things in the same way, although Scott does add an element of romance, but even that comes with an added twist.

If you enjoy a book with bite (excuse the pun) then settle yourself in for an excellent read with characters that jump off the pages and a social system that has been well-developed and thought out with a lot of interesting twists.

Not only has Scott given bite back to the vampire genre, he’s also made an interesting twist on the case of a cross being deadly to vampires. I’m not going to ruin the story by going into detail, but I will say it’s very well done and definitely worth picking up a copy of Uprising to read.

I’m looking forward to reading the second book in the series!

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The Vampire Federation – Uprising by Sean McCabe (writing as Scott Mariani)

The Three Laws of the Vampire Federation:
1. A vampire must never harm a human
2. A vampire must never turn a human
3. A vampire must never love a human

With a system of bylaws like that you just know they’re all going to get broken…

If you are looking for two-hundred year old vampires full of angst pretending to be teenagers or glowing, angelic creatures who want to better mankind, or romantic walkers of the night pining for their human lovers then I suggest you take your reading proclivities elsewhere. You’ll find none of that here. In fact, what you will discover in Uprising are vampires on both sides of the law (those who abide by the three laws and those show more who don’t) who’ll stop at nothing to get what they want. And when they meet you know it’s going to get damn bloody. As a result, a war that could jeopardize the peaceful co-existence between the vampires of the Federation and humans by those who wish to cultivate human-kind as a food supply becomes more and more of a reality.

In my opinion the beginning of The Vampire Federation – Uprising suffers from the introduction of too many characters too quickly in too many too short chapters. (Yes, that’s exactly how I felt [at first].) However, after the swift introductions are over the story develops rather well into a fast paced urban fantasy thriller that just happens to contain vampires. Mr. McCabe manages to deliver an adventure story that reads like a Hollywood blockbuster. As a matter of fact, it took very little imagination to visualize the all-to-vivid scenes being played out on the big screen in my head as I read this. There are a lot of surprises, some unconventional vampire thinking (drugs to walk in daylight, etc.), and lengthy scenes of heartless, plot-provoking violence. Finally, here be vampires with bite (pardon the pun.)

I rather enjoyed the character development, interaction, and dialogue that McCabe created in this story but was absolutely fascinated and captivated by his descriptive, action-packed scenes of violence. (I’m a guy – what can I say! And McCabe certainly knows his audience.) Gabriel Stone, the main antagonist in this story is, to me, quite the evil character and while Joel, the human detective and Alex, the vampire agent, struggle with their own emotional baggage we find that their problems are those many of us struggle with ourselves. There’s plenty of page-turning action here and more then a few thrilling exploits that make up for some of the obvious plot twists and re-cycled devices but there are some surprises thrown in for good measure, as well. One of the more interesting scenarios involves a sleazy politician who more-or-less sells his soul to a vampire and then, realizing the price he’ll have to pay, attempts to redeem himself in an unconventional manner.

Fast-paced and fun.

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I'm a little conflicted about this book. As a Scott Mariani fan, I enjoyed it. As a non-vampire fan, rather less so.

This is typical Mariani fare - great fast-paced action, likeable characters, and plenty of twists.

The vampire theme is not something I'm familiar with, but it did feel a little cliche and there were a couple of distasteful moments - as a non-vampire fan I found it just a little gory sometimes, but I'm sure fans of the genre would disagree.

Fast-paced, exciting thriller. I read this mostly because it was set partly in Oxford and Oxfordshire, which is local to me, and it's fun to check whether people are using the setting correctly or warping the geography for their own convenience. Also, always fun to read about the hero using a mini-JCB to demolish large parts of a mansion in the Oxfordshire countryside.

I got a bit fed up with how the human characters didn't last long - lots and lots of them were brought in as chumps for immediate chomping. A bit tacky I thought - could be more circumspect in the bloodbath. Otherwise, a fun, quick, but compelling read.

I loved the premise of this book: the existence of vampires, a secret federation (of vampires) which ensures that the vamps don't kill humans, a gruesome murder, a dogged detective trying to solve the murder, and the vampire who helps him. I was interested just reading the book jacket! I especially enjoyed the beginning of the book - the opening scenes are atmospheric, spooky, riveting. I really wanted to like the book....but found the characters too formulaic. They seemed like caricatures of characters and thus I could not empathize with them, as much as I tried. Perhaps the second book in the series will flesh them out a bit. I hope so because I greatly enjoyed the world that McCabe has built and would like to learn more.

I just finished reading this today, and I thought it was great. Granted, I wasn't immediately hooked. A few things stand out as less-than-perfect. For example, there's an overly narrated quality to the author's writing style that I didn't always like. At times, it felt like McCabe was trying to write things like a movie instead of a book. Some may enjoy that, but I felt that the narrative flow suffered. A few too many perspective changes, choppy action sequences, scene setups that were a bit forced ... that sort of thing. Overall, none if it stopped me from reading or enjoying this book, so let's move on to talking about the fun stuff.

Uprising scores well with me because I never once lost interest in what I was reading. The story show more unfolded pretty quickly and maintained momentum until the cliffhanger end. Some aspects of the plot were predictable, yes, but that didn't bother me too much since I was happily entertained, nonetheless. There was plenty of good action to be had -- chase scenes, firefights, and dramatic developments in creepy places. Best of all, there was the perfect amount of twisted, violent grit. Readers who fear that the vampire genre has plummeted down a hill of mind-numbing smut and broody Byronic types can happily turn to this book. Here the vampires are dark, dangerous ... and not a one of them glitters.

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