Remember how I said I grabbed a copy of Thirst (No. 1) by Christopher Pike because I thought I wouldn’t have to contend with any sparkly vampires? I believe I may have spoken a bit too soon.

“As I climb in my stolen vehicle, I notice that my arms and hands are glowing with a faint white light. The effect stuns me. My face is also glowing! In fact, all my exposed skin shines with the same iridescence as the full moon, which hangs low in the sky in the direction of Las Vegas.” Thirst No. 1 – pg. 450

While it’s not sparkling in the daylight a la Twilight, it’s still an iridescent vampire. A sparkly glowing rainbow vampire. I mean really? REALLY?!?

Not to give out any major spoilers, but it gets even more bizarre than that (hint: levitation). I can almost hear that gossamer thread suspending my disbelief crying out in pain.

The first book, The Last Vampire, was a breeze to read and I rather enjoyed it. The second book, Black Blood, took a bit of a nosedive compared to the first book (the voice changed completely), but pulled itself together and my hope was salvaged. The third book, Red Dice, is the one that happens to be tugging on my nerves in the worst way, but I’m hoping it will go the way of the second book and salvage itself. I don’t have much hope after the whole iridescent levitating vampire thing, though.

One problem, however, that I see throughout the books is the random romances. I can almost understand love at first sight and I understand why they’re necessary (they actually drive Sita’s personal story of self discovery forward), but they don’t properly fit and they are a major weakness to the entire story.

I started out loving this book, now I only like it. *sigh*

Sunday Sketch

There were three characters that I thought about drawing—Sita, Yaksha, or Krishna—but settled on Sita because it is her story after all.

This was a super quick sketch and I added hints of color to the eyes and lips because those were the two areas she usually focused on in the book—her powerful eyes and how she could seduce people by altering her voice.

Welcome to another (late) edition of The Sunday Salon…

It’s been a fair while since my last Sunday Salon post and I’m writing this one late at night rather than in the morning, but I say it’s better late than never.

Raaaawwwwr! Scary Psychologically Abnormal Monsters Abound

My current reading pleasure is The Night Monster by James Swain. I’m rounding the last fifty or so pages and will most likely finish it up tonight.

The story so far is about an ex-cop (detective) turned private investigator Jack Carpenter who’s on the hunt for a missing college basketball star, who also happens to be one of his daughter’s friends and teammates.

The case is personal to Jack because he discovers it’s connected to a case that he’d been investigating for sixteen years—a case involving an abduction that he hadn’t been able to stop.

So far, the book is great reading, though I’ll admit the first three-quarters of the book was fast-paced and even left me a little breathless and now that I’m nearing the end, and the action should be picking up, it seems to be trundling along at almost half-speed. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s not necessarily a good thing either.

Even if the book’s pacing never picks up again, I still think it’s a great read. I hope to have my full review up some time this week.

And speaking of reviews I hope to have up this week…

It’s Twilight, with Zombies and Better Writing (and Only Marginally Better Editing)

I’ve finished reading Generation Dead by Daniel Waters and absolutely loved it. There were some laugh out loud funny moments and the characters are all highly well developed. The writing is tight and flows well.

What I found highly interesting is that it’s Twilight, with zombies. The pacing of the book is similar to Twilight in that it meanders for the first three-quarters of the book and then for the last quarter, the action suddenly picks up. The difference with this book and Twilight is that the action is built from the beginning. We see the villain and watch him ramp up his campaign of evil.

Tommy Williams is described as having pale skin, and despite being dead, it’s not decaying or foul-smelling—he smells rather earthy actually. He’s also good-looking, strong, and feels stone-hard and cold when he’s touched. Sound familiar? Yes, it’s a zombified version of Edward Cullen.

Phoebe Kendall is described as being very pale, doesn’t realize her own physical beauty, can’t seem to sort out her romantic feelings and is inexplicably drawn to the new zombie in town despite knowing next to nothing about him. Bella Swan anyone?

Finally there is Adam Layman who is a living, breathing, hot-blooded teenage boy who happens to be one of Phoebe’s best friends. Despite his feelings for Phoebe, which he chews down and swallows, he helps her get closer to Tommy simply so he can be near her. Sounds vaguely familiar…oh that’s right, Jacob Black.

I also spotted similarities to Alice and Rosalie Cullen, and a few other characters from Twilight sprinkled throughout. There were even a couple references to vampires that made me do a double-take and giggle.

At the end of the day, I could probably dissect both books and write an essay, but I’ll save that for some other time. Instead, I’ll share my Sunday sketch (yay! I finally did one…and on a Sunday) of the Generation Dead love triangle.

It originally had a bit of color to it (Phoebe’s eyes and lips), but since I didn’t scan it—took a picture with my digital camera because I’m lazy—I decided it looked better in black and white. Also, it shouldn’t be too difficult to see who I hope Phoebe ends up with—*cough*Adam*cough*

Smokin’ Hot Angel, Oh My!

I’ve started reading Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick, but had to put the title aside and read a few other things. Why? I’m entirely too excited to read it. I’m worried that I’ll breeze through it and I would like to savor it.

When I finish the Night Monster, I believe I’ll take a few days to write reviews of all the books awaiting reviews (sad to say, quite a few) and then I’ll be picking up Hush, Hush again.

And…I may have a surprise in store for Today, I Read… newsletter subscribers coming up. That’s the only hint I’ll give.

I’m about halfway through Dear Zoe by Philip Beard. It’s been on my TBR pile for a few years, ever since I read The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold.

Yes, there’s a connection between the two. It’s the blurb on the front cover which prompted me to pick up the title in the first place:

“Like The Lovely Bones, it is a piercing look at how a family recovers from a devastating loss. Everything about this moving, powerful debut rings true.” –Booklist

There was something haunting about The Lovely Bones. It was a powerful and gripping book, and one I’ve not been able to read twice. Each time I see the cover, I get a chill and a memory of what’s within its covers drifts through me and I have to put it back down.

Like The Lovely Bones, Dear Zoe is an emotionally gripping book. It’s told as a series of letters to Zoe written by Tess, Zoe’s older half-sister. Through these letters we can see how Tess is dealing with the loss of Zoe, along with how her shattered family (mother, step father, and other half-sister) are dealing as well.

I’m not ashamed to admit that I’ve shed more than a few tears as I read a few striking passages. For instance:

Even though it’s been almost a year, sometimes I still miss you so much it feels like someone is pushing their finger into the base of my throat and I cry like it just happened yesterday. But now when I cry like that it kind of feels like it cleans me out, and each time it happens it feels like I’m going to have a little longer until it happens again and usually I do. It’s not that I’m missing you less. It’s more like I’m finding a place to keep you.

Anyone who’s experienced loss on a profound level can certainly relate to the emotions painted on these pages.

Unlike The Lovely Bones, however, Dear Zoe doesn’t seem too disturbing. Without giving out any spoilers for TLB, there was an aspect to that novel that just made me want to vomit as it unfolded. I don’t get that same feeling with Dear Zoe, though there is a twist to the day Zoe died and it’s a day that is certain to incite or touch a nerve with many people. Up to this point, the day has been downplayed, which I believe works well for the story; it doesn’t gouge at any old wounds.

I should be finished within the next couple of days so I’ll be able to give the book a proper review.

I finished reading Gena Showalter’s Blacklisted on Tuesday, and I wanted to publish a few book notes. Think of this like a flash review until I can publish the extended edition.

When I was about 9/10ths of the way through this book, I realized that it was a sequel to Red Handed, which was sitting on my bookshelf—unread. That was definitely a *facepalm* moment if I do say so myself. So, if you already have Red Handed, read that one first.

Aside from reading the book out of order, I enjoyed my little detour.

• The action never stopped. It seemed that Camille and Erik were always being chased, shot at, and when they weren’t Camille was getting a little action of her own. (There were a couple scenes which would definitely place this book on the 16+ list.)
• The characters were well-drawn, if not a little stereotypical. I would have preferred, however, if Camille’s cowardice and goodie-two-shoes-ness was shown more clearly in her actions before we got to see the brave, strong Camille that she never realized she could be. But it was no big. I also wish the bad guys had been a little badder. (Eh hem, I’m looking at some of those A.I.R. agents.)
• Reading it made me reminisce about old Alien Nation episodes that I used to watch as a kid. Yes, folks, I just admitted that I watched Alien Nation. The concept of aliens inhabiting the earth alongside humans has always been intriguing to me and the thing that I loved about both the series and this book was that it didn’t sugarcoat it. It showed some of the tribulations that different species might encounter as a result of simply being different.
• There were more editing mistakes than I’d expected. The book started off strong, with an easy flow, then all of a sudden, errors started cropping up. The errors seemed random and gave the book the feel that it was a rush to complete and get to print. While it didn’t detract entirely from the story, there were more than a few moments when I had to stop and re-read a sentence because I thought my mind was playing a trick on me.

Put plainly, I had no idea what to expect with this book, but was pleasantly surprised. It’s a great lazy day read when you just want to kill a few hours.

And since I won’t be reading this title for my Sunday Salon post, I won’t be able to use this sketch for my Sunday Sketch. Rather than let it languish, I’ve decided to include it here.

This is my interpretation of Kitten, one of the A.I.R. agents that took on Camille and Erik.

I have no idea why I chose to draw Kitten—in fact, I didn’t even know I was drawing her until I was done. I really wanted to draw Cara or Erik, but never quite got around to it…maybe while I’m reading Red Handed.

(Sorry about the image bleed-through. I sketch in my Moleskine notebook and these particular pages are thin.)

Happy Tuesday! It’s time again for another edition of Teaser Tuesdays…

Remember how I said that I was reading The Great Perhaps last week? Well, yeah, I’ve set that aside for a minute.

Gena Showalter’s Blacklisted is my current detour. It’s an easy read. In fact, I’m nearly finished—so close to finished that I will be in the next fifteen minutes. It hardly seems fair to use it for my Teaser Tuesday piece, but it is the book I’m currently reading. So, here goes…

Here are the rules:

• Grab your current read
• Let the book fall open to a random page
• Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12
• You also need to share the title of the book where you get your teaser from…that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given
• Please avoid spoilers

“They pounded toward us, guns raised. But there was surprise in their eyes, as if they hadn’t expected to see us.” pg. 129 Blacklisted by Gena Showalter

So far, I’ve enjoyed reading this book. It’s light and fluffy and, in some cases, stereotypical, but entertaining. I don’t feel as though I’ve wasted my time with this detour. (I needed one of those “shut your brain off and jump into the story” reads and this definitely fits the bill.)