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Let me start by saying that this isn't the typical sort of book you'd find me reading. In a literary sense, I've come a long way since my days of trawling through every Star Wars book I could find.
However, I was drawn in by the witty opening line on the back cover, and decided that maybe Anita Blake's adventures would be a worthy read. So I purchased the omnibus edition of the first three novels in the series.
The premise is this. Vampirism has been legalised in a single US state, making an otherwise ordinary area a haven for vampires. Other things have since crawled out of the closet, including the ability of some people to re-animate the dead. Anita Blake is one such person. She is also a vampire hunter, and is called in whenever a vampire goes rogue. There is only one sentence for vampire criminalism - execution.
So the scene is set quite nicely. The thing is with these books is that they are exceptionally easy to read. Pick up and put down anytime sort of stuff. It's not high-brow in any sense, and will not at any point have you reaching for the thesaurus, or leave you at any point wondering what the author is not telling you.
It becomes clear very early on that Laura Hamilton likes guns, and let's you know anytime someone fires, points, picks up, or re-adjusts in its holster, a gun of any kind. And she'll also let you know which kind it is, as though it would have any meaning to the casual reader.
That small obsession aside, the pace of the books is quite admirable. You really are tossed through the plot at some speed. That said, there is also always plenty of slack in the plot of all three books to accumulate a significant amount of sexual tension. Tension which does not find release in these three books but which, I am told, gets quite solid and graphic release quite frequently through the later episodes.
Other than it's obvious efforts to pull in an audience that really doesn't discriminate too much in what it chooses to read, the books are good fun, but don't really cme up with anything revolutionary. My only real gripe with the whole three novels I've read so far is that, very early on in the first book, Anita is awarded special powers over vampires. The author seems to realise that this is a mistake, and goes about the entire third volume in an effort to rid her of these powers. Just seems a bit daft to me.
All in all, I'd recommend a read, and may well come back to the series myself after I've indulged in some serious, high brow sci-fi...
However, I was drawn in by the witty opening line on the back cover, and decided that maybe Anita Blake's adventures would be a worthy read. So I purchased the omnibus edition of the first three novels in the series.
The premise is this. Vampirism has been legalised in a single US state, making an otherwise ordinary area a haven for vampires. Other things have since crawled out of the closet, including the ability of some people to re-animate the dead. Anita Blake is one such person. She is also a vampire hunter, and is called in whenever a vampire goes rogue. There is only one sentence for vampire criminalism - execution.
So the scene is set quite nicely. The thing is with these books is that they are exceptionally easy to read. Pick up and put down anytime sort of stuff. It's not high-brow in any sense, and will not at any point have you reaching for the thesaurus, or leave you at any point wondering what the author is not telling you.
It becomes clear very early on that Laura Hamilton likes guns, and let's you know anytime someone fires, points, picks up, or re-adjusts in its holster, a gun of any kind. And she'll also let you know which kind it is, as though it would have any meaning to the casual reader.
That small obsession aside, the pace of the books is quite admirable. You really are tossed through the plot at some speed. That said, there is also always plenty of slack in the plot of all three books to accumulate a significant amount of sexual tension. Tension which does not find release in these three books but which, I am told, gets quite solid and graphic release quite frequently through the later episodes.
Other than it's obvious efforts to pull in an audience that really doesn't discriminate too much in what it chooses to read, the books are good fun, but don't really cme up with anything revolutionary. My only real gripe with the whole three novels I've read so far is that, very early on in the first book, Anita is awarded special powers over vampires. The author seems to realise that this is a mistake, and goes about the entire third volume in an effort to rid her of these powers. Just seems a bit daft to me.
All in all, I'd recommend a read, and may well come back to the series myself after I've indulged in some serious, high brow sci-fi...
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Let me start by saying that this isn't the typical sort of book you'd find me reading. In a literary sense, I've come a long way since my days of trawling through every Star Wars book I could find.
However, I was drawn in by the witty opening line on the back cover, and decided that maybe Anita Blake's adventures would be a worthy read. So I purchased the omnibus edition of the first three novels in the series.
The premise is this. Vampirism has been legalised in a single US state, making an otherwise ordinary area a haven for vampires. Other things have since crawled out of the closet, including the ability of some people to re-animate the dead. Anita Blake is one such person. She is also a vampire hunter, and is called in whenever a vampire goes rogue. There is only one sentence for vampire criminalism - execution.
So the scene is set quite nicely. The thing is with these books is that they are exceptionally easy to read. Pick up and put down anytime sort of stuff. It's not high-brow in any sense, and will not at any point have you reaching for the thesaurus, or leave you at any point wondering what the author is not telling you.
It becomes clear very early on that Laura Hamilton likes guns, and let's you know anytime someone fires, points, picks up, or re-adjusts in its holster, a gun of any kind. And she'll also let you know which kind it is, as though it would have any meaning to the casual reader.
That small obsession aside, the pace of the books is quite admirable. You really are tossed through the plot at some speed. That said, there is also always plenty of slack in the plot of all three books to accumulate a significant amount of sexual tension. Tension which does not find release in these three books but which, I am told, gets quite solid and graphic release quite frequently through the later episodes.
Other than it's obvious efforts to pull in an audience that really doesn't discriminate too much in what it chooses to read, the books are good fun, but don't really cme up with anything revolutionary. My only real gripe with the whole three novels I've read so far is that, very early on in the first book, Anita is awarded special powers over vampires. The author seems to realise that this is a mistake, and goes about the entire third volume in an effort to rid her of these powers. Just seems a bit daft to me.
All in all, I'd recommend a read, and may well come back to the series myself after I've indulged in some serious, high brow sci-fi...
However, I was drawn in by the witty opening line on the back cover, and decided that maybe Anita Blake's adventures would be a worthy read. So I purchased the omnibus edition of the first three novels in the series.
The premise is this. Vampirism has been legalised in a single US state, making an otherwise ordinary area a haven for vampires. Other things have since crawled out of the closet, including the ability of some people to re-animate the dead. Anita Blake is one such person. She is also a vampire hunter, and is called in whenever a vampire goes rogue. There is only one sentence for vampire criminalism - execution.
So the scene is set quite nicely. The thing is with these books is that they are exceptionally easy to read. Pick up and put down anytime sort of stuff. It's not high-brow in any sense, and will not at any point have you reaching for the thesaurus, or leave you at any point wondering what the author is not telling you.
It becomes clear very early on that Laura Hamilton likes guns, and let's you know anytime someone fires, points, picks up, or re-adjusts in its holster, a gun of any kind. And she'll also let you know which kind it is, as though it would have any meaning to the casual reader.
That small obsession aside, the pace of the books is quite admirable. You really are tossed through the plot at some speed. That said, there is also always plenty of slack in the plot of all three books to accumulate a significant amount of sexual tension. Tension which does not find release in these three books but which, I am told, gets quite solid and graphic release quite frequently through the later episodes.
Other than it's obvious efforts to pull in an audience that really doesn't discriminate too much in what it chooses to read, the books are good fun, but don't really cme up with anything revolutionary. My only real gripe with the whole three novels I've read so far is that, very early on in the first book, Anita is awarded special powers over vampires. The author seems to realise that this is a mistake, and goes about the entire third volume in an effort to rid her of these powers. Just seems a bit daft to me.
All in all, I'd recommend a read, and may well come back to the series myself after I've indulged in some serious, high brow sci-fi...