Blood Noir (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter Book 16) by Laurell K Hamilton
SPOILER ALERT!!! Ok so I finished the book. I thought it was too short, but I guess I just cant get enough of this series and will always want more. Out of the entire series this installment was my least favorite, however I still could not put it down. In my opinion, the flaw with this book was that there was not an actual villain, but it looks like Jason will be moving to the list of main characters.
Here is the blurb from the back of the book. Now the Old Bastard's Dying and I Won't Have Time to Forgive Him Before He Goes......Jason Schuyler is a werewolf. He's also one of Anita Blake's best friends, and sometimes her lover. And right now he needs her--not to be a vampire hunter, or a federal marshal, or a necromancer, or even for her rank in the werewolf pack, but because his father is dying. He needs Anita because she's a pretty woman who loves him, who can make him look like an everyday guy, who agrees to go home with him and help him say good-bye to the abusive father he never loved. The fact that Jason is about as much an everyday guy as Anita is a pretty woman is something they figure they can keep under wraps for a couple of days in small town. How hard can it be? Marmee Noir, ancient mother of all vampires, picks this weekend to make a move. Somehow she has cut the connection that binds Anita and Jean-Claude unable to sense what is happening. Dangerous even as she sleeps, buried in darkness for a thousand years somewhere beneath the old country of Europe, Marmee Noir reaches out toward power. She has attacked Anita before, but never like this. In Anita she senses what she needs to make her enemies tremble.
Here is the breakdown of what happened. Nathaniel talks Anita into going with Jason to see his terminally ill father in North Carolina, and to convince him that Anita is his girlfriend and Jason is not gay. It starts out with the usual Anita hang-ups about her relationships with the men in her life and now finding herself alone with Jason. She discovered that she is having more feelings for Jason than their normal friends with benefits relationship, even without the ardur into play.
Jason is mistaken for a distant cousin Keith, who happened to be the governors troublemaking son, who is back in town to get married. This causes a little conflict because Keith has run off with the master of the city's wife, and there are vampires out to kill him, and of course they think Jason is him.
In the meantime Marmee Noir decides to try and make Anita her human servant and raises the ardur to a level that it has never been before. This causes Anita to almost change into a tiger, Marmee Noir's animal to call. She also managed to put out a call to all of the waretigers across the country. She then wakes up in the hotel room two days later with Jason and two strange waretigers and doesn't remember much. As it turns out Anita rolled Crispin one of the tigers from Vegas and he becomes addicted to the ardur.
Jean Claude sends Richard to check on Anita when he could not feel her through the marks because their connection was temporarily cut by Marmee Noir's attempts to mark Anita. Apparently Anita broke Marmee Noir's hold on her by making Jason her Wolf to call and Marmee's cat was scared away. Anita doesn't realize that she did it until Richard comes and can tell because Jason's smell changed, and they are now aware of each others thoughts and feelings. Somehow the ardur is transfered to Richard and he tries to use it on Anita but is stopped by Jason. As always he gets angry with Anita because she will not solely commit to him and he leaves. Anita and Jason return to St Louis where I'm sure the next book will try and sort out all of the new drama with the addition of Jason as Anita's animal to call. Also Jean Claude said that per vampire etiquette Anita has to meet with all of the tigers that will respond to her call.
I only touched on the parts of the book that I think are essential to the Anita Blake story line.
Book 1 of 50 in 365 Challenge!
Comments
First of all, this is my first experience with vox (I tend to read blogs that interest, but not respond often). I want to say that I love the world of Anita Blake. Love it! That said, I want to share my opinion about the direction the series has been headed. While I wouldn't necessarily agree that this is the worst of the books, it continues the downward path of less involved plot, more relationship angst. I am not a prude (ok, maybe an understatement); I am not going to throw stones at the number of men in her life. I am however, going to throw them at the number of men who are in a love relationship with her. She (Anita) has collected to many "permanantly" attached men for this to work anymore. She says much of that herself if you've been reading along. I hope the author has a plan in mind to start to break some (most) of them away. I like them all (except maybe Richard, who I could have liked if he hadn't spent the last half of the series being a pain in the ass). The next book, Skin Trade, was mostly an improvement. Much more of the plot involved the "old" Anita character dynamic of hunting monsters/vampires. It still throws in, near the end, some new men on her plate. It is not possible to be the answer to the love/life prayers of 8-10 different men. So now I'm going to pitch my vote for the series love resolution (I know that it doesn't mean anything to the author). Here's hoping that the guys that have become attached to Anita through her "beasts" can drift away from her enough to be more traditional "animals to call" without having to be king/queen of that particular were group. Also, the men she has gained through the ardeur need to find love elsewhere (since without that, they look to her). Richard needs to grow up and choose between trying to lead a "human" life, and accepting his place as Ulfric. Either way, no girl for him. He's sort of the guy that didn't come back from war (in this case the one in his own head), gone for so long that the girl moves on and has a different life now. You don't leave someone you truly love, and have loved for years, to go back to someone you loved in spite of their destructive qualities. Anita needs to take the 4th mark, and remain with Jean-Claude and Asher. I could go into detail about my why's on this, but since I've been long winded enough already, I will just end with that. Anyone else that has read the series and has thoughts about it also, I am curious to hear them. I would also like to know if anyone has recommendations of other authors that write similarly (to the first half of the series, the last half I am still reading because I am hooked and want to know where LKH ends the series).
Thats it, finally!