Undead and Unworthy [Paperback]

This comedy vampire thriller is number seven in a series which combines chick lit romantic comedy and vampire thriller - from the viewpoint of the new and particularly incongruous Queen of the Vampires.

Imagine a cross between "Sex and the City" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and you've roughly got the idea.

The plotlines of the first six books were more or less resolved in number six, "Undead and Uneasy" so this book, "Undead and Unworthy," kicks off what Mary Janice Davidson calls a new "story arc" which was originally supposed to be a trilogy but is still far from finished after four more books. The full list of Queen Betsy stories to date is

1) "Undead and Unwed"
2) "Undead and Unemployed"
3) "Undead and Unappreciated"
4) "Undead and Unreturnable (Undead 4)"
5) "Undead and Unpopular (Undead 5)"
6) "Undead and Uneasy"
7) This book, "Undead and Unworthy"
8) "Undead and Unwelcome (Undead 8)"
9) "Undead and Unfinished: Undead series: Book 9 (Undead 9)"
10) "Undead and Undermined."

There is also a "Queen Betsy" novella set at about the same time as book six, in Davidson's anthology "Dead over Heels" which is a collection of three paranormal romance stories. In my opinion you will get most out of these books if you read them in order: I would start with "Undead and Unwed" and work on from there.

The "Queen Betsy" books are told in the first person by Elizabeth Sinclair, nee Taylor, who prefers to be called Betsy. The first words of the series are "The day I died started out bad and got worse in a hurry."

Betsy is a former model and is still a fashion fanatic: at the start of the series, on the morning of her disastrous 30th birthday, she is working as a secretary. Her main interests are designer shoes, designer clothes, and her cat. In quick succession she gets fired, loses her cat, and is killed in a car accident. It is a great surprise to her when she rises again as a most unusual vampire. It is even more of a surprise when, through a sequence of bizarre events, she becomes queen of the vampires.

At the start of this seventh book, the initial chaos which results from Betsy's accession to the Vampire Throne appears to have died down. But then, in quick succession,

* Betsy's ghastly and recently-deceased stepmother Antonia (who she thinks of as "the Ant") starts haunting her

* Local detective Nick Berry, who is also the boyfriend of Betsy's best friend Jessica, asks Betsy for some discreet help in solving the horrible murders of a number of gangsters. He suspects that a rogue element of the police force has found a way to get rid of local criminals without the tedious business of gathering evidence or attending court by paying a vampire or fiend to murder them.

* Betsy and her friends are attacked by a pack of ungrateful fiends.

There will be a lot of confusing and amusing shenanagans before all this is sorted out ...

Mary Davidson has great fun by mixing up the vampire genre as in "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" or Laurell Hamilton's "Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter" series and Chick-Lit romantic comedy as in "Sex and the City." This series is way over the top, fairly sexy, and usually very funny.

An interesting comparison with other authors who have written entertaining comedies by combining incongruous genres would be with Marianne Mancusi and Robert Frezza.

In the same way that this book gets plenty of laughs by combining chick lit with Vampires, Frezza write two very funny books which combined Vampires and Science Fiction ("McLendon's Syndrome" and "The VMR Theory") and Mancusi combined chick lit with time travel in "A Connecticut Fashionista at King Arthur's Court" and "A Hoboken Hipster in Sherwood Forest." Anyone who likes this book is likely to enjoy all four of those, and vice versa, if you have read and enjoyed any of those books you will probably like this one.

OK, this is never going to win the Booker Prize or any other great award for classic literature, and it is fairly raunchy, so not suitable for children. However, if you have the right sort of sense of humour, it is good fun. I can recommend "Undead and Unworthy" and also enjoyed reading the rest of the series.

I really like the undead series, despite the fact that they are often much too short to be a called a book. They are irreverant, funny and enjoyable to read. I love the characters of Betsy and Sinclair in particular. None of that has changed, but this installment of the story just doesn't match up to the rest.

It centres on Betsy's decision as to what she must do about the Fiends but I found that I just couldn't really get interested in the plot of that particular storyline. The side issues were far more interesting- Nick's animosity towards Betsy, Jessica being torn between Betsy and Nick, Sinclair and Tina disagreeing with Betsy's decisions, Garret's guilt and self-doubt. The ending was something of a shock but it was hashed out quickly across two pages so it didn't have the impact that it could have. One thing that has totally disappeared from the plot is Betsy and Sinclair's ability to read each others' minds. I used to really like that. It was the only time that you had any insight into Sinclair's feelings but it's gone suddenly. It doesn't happen, isn't mentioned at all and I think it's a bit of a loss.

Davidson states in the foreword that this book is the beginning of a trilogy within the series. I can't help but think that I would have been happier to wait longer for a new book if she would put the three stories into one proper length book. I'm sure that would have been a more satisfying read, because it often feels as though she abitrarily ends the story after 200 pages just so that she can put it in a separate book.

It's still worth a look if you want to keep up with the story but it's not as much fun as the others. I'm going to keep on with them because I like the characters so much, but my patience is starting to wear a little bit!

betsy is adjusting to married life and being a parent to her baby bro. so when life becomes quiet some disaster occurs to shake her world. his time her dead stepmother "the ant" appears to her as a ghost. also the fiends from the basement get free and try to kill betsy and her friends. back on form davidson has written a great story which has the original humour of the first novel, many of the following on novels were less than stellar in my opinion. welcome back!!!!!