Love is Darkness (A Valerie Dearborn Novel) [Kindle Edition]

I read a lot of paranormal and urban fantasy and there comes a point where you've seen them all-- necromancers, vampires, dragons, werewolves, shapeshifting animals, witches, etc. But now we have... the Empath! And the empath is a welcome addition to the genre.

In this book, all the other supernatural types (werewolves, fey, witches)are extinct-- except vampires.

There are some humans who kill them called Hunters but otherwise they only keep the killings down when their king forces them to.

Enter Lucas, the king whose been pretty bored for several centuries and was even considering suicide. Then one of his vampires shows up drunk and happy (having killed a woman and drunk her blood) and Lucas knows the vampire found an empath-- a human whose blood can give emotions if a vampire drinks it. And if the human drinks from the vampire, the human will get memories, know the vampires feelings etc.

Well, the dead woman had a daughter so Lucas decides to wait until she grows up and then he's going to...well, he's not sure what he's going to do. There is lots of sexual tension and then well, release of said tension, because the two are drawn to each other, but Valerie's deepest desire is to have a normal life and Lucas is anything but normal.

She also still has feelings for Jack, her father's apprentice and a hunter who swans in at inopportune moments and messes with her emotions.

The baddie-- if Lucas can be considered a goodie, which I don't think he ca--, is Marion, a 600 year old vampire whose nuts and gets lots of good jokes. She's a crack up. From joking that Lucas is so old his kama sutra is made out of woodcuts to talking about how a switch for a light is now more than something you whip someone with, she made me lol.

The book is the first in a series, the continuing plot being to find the Fey and see if there are any witches or werewolves still lurking around.

I thought the heroine was as likable as sookie, Lucas as hot as Jean Claude, the sex as outrageous as Emma Holly and the writing as funny as Kresley Cole.

I feel like I've read it all. I picked this up cause it looked cool and it's great because it's funny, sassy, hot and slightly unusual. Similar to the historian, we get a few different time periods and locations (ca/prague/london) which gives some nice atmosphere. Highly recommend.

Honestly, I thought I was pretty much "over" vampires, having read all the big series and watched all the big shows. Sure, I loved a lot of them, but like many people, I figured I'd pretty much seen it all and nothing would surprise me. But I have to say, this one (the first in what I hope is a long series) gave me everything I loved from my favorites and added in a new twist--the Empath.

The writing is often of the hysterical-laugh-out-loud variety, the prose melodic, and the characters are incredibly engaging. Valerie, our heroine, is a "normal" girl brought up in a family of vampire hunters. That makes for a rough childhood. She's been in love with the same boy forever, but he seems too busy doing the hero-thing to return her love. So she's prime-pickings for a hot, unfeeling vampire with ulterior motives.

It was honestly frustrating to read so far into the book without knowing which love interest I preferred. That never happens to me. Until I got to the one line that landed me firmly in the Lucas-camp. I won't spoil it for you, but it was absolutely hysterical. And ridiculously charming.

All of the characters, including the villain, were wonderful. It's so nice to have a villain who is just as amusing as the main character and who doesn't see herself as "evil". And the boys are through-the-roof sexy.

This book is very hot, very real (in as much as any vampire story can be), and very well-written. I loved it. When's the next one coming out?

The description pretty well sums up the book. Valerie Dearborn wants a simple human life, but she keeps getting sucked into the dark underworld of the Others...well, the vampires anyway.

Overall, this was a good book, but not a great one. The characters were reasonably believable, the plot was fast enough to keep me entertained, but there were also quite a few problems that were distracting during the read, including grammar and spelling errors, and problematic point of view switches (one paragraph from one character followed immediately by another paragraph from a different character, and back again). At $.99, it's a fun distraction and a quick romp in urban fantasy, but don't expect anything extraordinary.

Characters: *** 3 Stars
Nearly every character in this novel was a contradiction of themselves. Valerie wants to have a "normal" life, but she loves men who can't give her that normalcy. In fact, the only man that could, Ian, is a non-character that was present for a couple of chapters and unnecessary for the plot. I actually would have preferred her just focusing on her grad school studies rather than getting involved with a stand-in. Meanwhile, Jack is the bad boy from her past that simultaneously wants to protect her by keeping her away from the action, but gets jealous when she actually tries to have a life outside of his world. Lucas is the vampire king that has been emotionless for centuries, but on finding out that Valerie is an empath, wants to take her as his own while using her as a tool to find more of the Others (empaths, werewolves, and fae). None of the characters really grew through the story or resolved their issues, although at least Valerie realized she was probably never going to have her white picket dream.

Plot: *** 3 Stars
Beyond the basic spelling and grammar issues (which automatically subtract a star), the story concept was strong but the execution of the plot was forgettable. The intro flashback chapters could have been incorporated into the rest of the story better, providing integrated background and adding some suspense instead of being front-loaded on the novel. Once we finally get into the meat of the story, Valerie does a lot of complaining while being whooshed around by Lucas or ordered around by Jack. Some of the action sequences toward the end were good, and the verbal repartee was fun, but there were huge plot holes that needed to be filled. For example, a whole section of the story is devoted to Valerie doing research on the Others. Lucas whisks her off to the British Library, sneaking her into the stacks using his ability to dematerialize. However, in subsequent chapters, Valerie is going to the library on her own. How does she get to the books she needs without Lucas? Similarly, she finally discovers some information, but never has a chance to report it to Lucas, yet somehow he magically knows about it. It left me with a lot of unanswered questions.

The ending also left me hanging. It was too open-ended and too abrupt, like a cliff-hanger at the end of your favorite TV series before they go on break for the holidays. LOVE IS DARKNESS clearly wasn't intended to be a stand-alone novel, but I shouldn't have turned the last virtual page thinking there were still several chapters to go.

Setting: **** 4 Stars
I love London, so the setting worked for me, but probably because I've been there. The description was somewhat limited, and I never fully felt sucked into the world, but I was still able to enjoy it.

Romance: *** 3 Stars
The love triangle was set up nicely, but failed due to an overabundance of jealousy, lack of willpower, and inability to make a decision. I loved the tension between Valerie and her two interests, but I never felt emotionally involved in either relationship. I wanted to her to have some kind of epiphany, even a small one, that would start her down the path toward one of the men.

Genre - Urban Fantasy: **** 4 Stars
LOVE IS DARKNESS fit right in to the urban fantasy genre. It's dark enough to please, with a couple of kinky twists and lots of vampire action. That being said, I didn't feel the story offered anything new to the genre, so I can't give it a full 5 stars.