Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Two vampires walk into a bar, see a fat old woman crying over the death of her husband, and proceed to make a bet as to how long it will take for the woman to be changed into a vampire. It's an interesting and gritty beginning to a book with a whole lot of promise. Unfortunately, things go down hill from there and as much as we like Lissa, the plot holes are big enough to drive Buicks through, the writing is choppy, and the characters are strangers. First of all the writing style is very disjointed. The main character speaks in the first person, narrating the majority of the book but snippets are randomly thrown-in from secondary characters which are written in the third person. These side scenes are rushed and skeletal in details, often only a paragraph long. Just enough to distract you and then throw you back into first person writing again. In most cases these outtakes could be cut out all together or condensed into longer more solid scenes, maybe longer scenes outside Lissa's pov would help develop these secondary players. As is, most secondary characters are cardboard cutouts. And then there are the plot holes. OMG! The holes! I guess I should put a ***SPOILER*** alert here, though nothing I'm going to mention is from too deep into the novel. 1) the initial bet makes no sense since we've been told no female vampires have been successfully made in 700 years 2) Lissa immediately acknowledges she's a vampire and knows exactly what she has to do. Not even a half a page is devoted to the obvious "I have fangs!!" 3) The vampire council is omnipotent, immediately knows about her, and wants to destroy her as a rogue vampire even though she is A) a super rare female and B) not killing anyone, not exposing their race, and not acting out of control. 4) Lissa finds a bodyguard position that conveniently involves night work only and the interview consists of getting tackled and defending herself. That's it! No firearms use, knowledge of crowd control, or references. 5) All activities and movements conveniently take place at night. Lissa's employer never seems to want to go anywhere during daylight hours. 6) Lissa's super paranoid employer is conned into ditching his protection detail because he got a call that his sister was being held hostage. Super paranoid employer doesn't actually hear his sister's voice or wait to confirm she's missing before abandoning his super paranoia to rush off alone. 7) Um, she's shot 3 times in the back and no one thinks this is much of an injury. Also Lissa doesn't seemed surprised no one thinks much of her injury even though she still believes no one knows she's a vampire. 8) Lissa wants to leave her job after getting shot but is coerced not to. She's told if she tries to leave her employer will blackmail her- he knows she's not who she says. Wait.... huh? Blackmail only works when you KNOW a secret that someone is trying to hide. Firstly, there is nothing to indicate at the time that the employer knows who or what Lissa is, only that she isn't who she says. Secondly, Lissa has no identity that she's trying to maintain or past that she is trying to protect. She has no kids, her husband is dead, and she's facing eternity as a kick-butt undead. She could just disappear again. So why exactly is this a motivator? This is where my brain short circuited. I couldn't keep reading. I know some might find it unfair to review a book I haven't finished, but isn't it a review in and of itself that I couldn't finish it? If the author ever sought mainstream publication for this, my first advice would be to patch up the holes. Then flesh out these characters, clean up the points of view, and do some world building. This first novel alone could easily be 3 quality novels if the writer was patient enough to do the story justice. For readers considering this novel? Well I have pretty high standards when it comes to writing; I admit it. If you are just looking for a paranormal story then your 99 cents might find a good home here, but if you can't stand poorly written novels no matter the price, look elsewhere.