![Prey for The Dead: Book Two of The Dead Game Series by [Leist, Susanne]](https://images-eu.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51NvGuNwhhL._SY346_.jpg)
I was offered a free copy of Prey for the Dead by Susanne Leist in return for an honest review. I have not been a reader of vampire stories since I read Dracula by Bram Stoker some forty years ago, so I was ill-prepared for the changes to the genre that seem to have taken place since then. Vampires, to me, are evil demons who inhabit the dead bodies of human beings. They have an insatiable lust for blood, are utterly without conscience or empathy, live in environments oozing decay and death, and cannot move around during the day.
The vampires I encountered in this book are so far removed from Stoker’s original that I have great difficulty in accepting them as vampires. These vampires, including a new breed called ‘hybrids’ (half-vampire, half-human), are glowing, healthy, full of life and vigour and every one of them is an Adonis with smoldering good looks and physiques to match ... as, indeed, are all of the women, human and vampire. (Credulity stretched already, I’m afraid.) They eat enormous amounts of regular food (one loves ‘duck a l’orange’!!), indulge in copious bouts a alcohol consumption and live generally human lives. One was even surprised when a female lead didn’t know they prayed for their dead. (!!?)
Prey for the Dead does have a story. A group of evil vampires are about to rise from their dead zone under the ground and threaten the town of Oasis. Good vampires and hybrids engage in a battle to defeat them. This results in mayhem, blood and some levels of tension.
But it seems to me that this is a story written by a woman for women readers. There are numerous descriptions of fashion, hairstyles, and make-up. The dialogue is largely relationship-based (more often than not angst-ridden and argumentative). The lead male vampires are riddled with jealousy as they compete aggressively and angrily for the love of one of the human women. The tale is generally romantic (or, I should suggest, given the constant conflicts) aggromantic. For me, a male reader, I found this element of the story distracting.
However, much of the above is about my own predilections. How do I judge this book objectively without allowing my own prejudices to intrude unfairly?
All writers have an idea and an intention when they set out to produce a novel. They will please some readers; they will not please others. The question is, how well did the writer succeed in doing what she set out to do? In this book, Leist has created an entirely new vampire lore, peopled her story with lively characters, and pitted dark against light in a tense and exciting way. I have no doubt that many readers of this kind of story, familiar with the modern evolution of the vampire myth, will love this book.
Even suspending disbelief however, and accepting the author’s fantasy milieu, I did have a problem with the dialogue between Linda and her two vampire suitors. For me there were too many sudden switches of emotion, too may pointless and sharp rejections, too many bouts of uncertainty and mistrust. I regret to say that this element of the story was, for me, mostly unnatural and didn’t ring true.
All of that said, this is a story for people with specific tastes. There are many fans of this genre as is evident from other highly complimentary reviews, so the author is to be respected for her success in delivering the story as she intended. No writer can do more than that. Were it not for the problems with the dialogue, I would probably have awarded the book the full five stars.
- Format: Kindle Edition
- File Size: 1919 KB
- Print Length: 330 pages
- Sold by: Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
- Language: English
- ASIN: B07PB9KG4P
- Text-to-Speech:
Enabled
- Word Wise: Enabled
- Customer Reviews: 2 customer reviews
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
#743,970 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #16350 in Urban Fantasy
- #22966 in Urban
- #3458 in Teen & Young Adult Paranormal & Urban Fantasy
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