Valerius is stern, serious and is duty conscious.Tabitha is funny, eccentric and totally outrageous.Combine the fact that he’s a sort of vampire and she’s a vampire hunter.Bring them together and you get a match made in hell.
Or perhaps not.
First some background info.Greek goddess Artemis recruits people who have been unjustly murdered into her own personal army.She resurrects them and let them have a day to avenge their death.They are known as Dark Hunters.Dark-Hunters are immortal(unless their heads are cut off).But they have fangs and can’t get in sunlight which makes people mistake them for vampires.And before you ask, they don’t drink blood.Their souls are in the custody of Artemis.
Appollites are a race cursed by Appollo(Greek sun god) to live only for 27 years.They have fangs and cannot tolerate sun light and they live among humans.Some of the Apollites found a way round Appollo’s curse.They extend their life-time by taking human souls. Dark Hunters were created especially to eliminate them.Each Dark Hunter has a squire to attend to his needs.
Valerius, the hero of this book is a Dark Hunter sworn into the service of Artemis.He currently serves in modern day New Orleans.However the other dark hunters in New Orleans(who used to belong to the countries conquered by Rome in their life time) would not have anything to do with him since Valerius was a Roman General in his life-time and bore a marking resemblance to his grand-father who was a sadistic Roman who conquered many races.A bitter enemy is Kyrian an ex-Dark Hunter who suffered terribly under the hands’ of Valerius’s grand-father.
Tabitha Devereaux is Kyrian’s sister-in-law and shares his prejudice about Valerius.However on close contact she finds that Valerius is nothing like she heard and is a honorable man if somewhat more prideful.How Tabitha gains Valerius’s soul from Artemis(who is always reluctant to let go one of her Dark Hunters) and how they survive Daimon attack of New Orleans forms the rest of the story.
This is the fifth book in Sherrilyn Kenyon’s Dark Hunter series.It is a mixture of supernatural, romance, suspense with a heavy dose of laughter.You can meet characters from her other books here.Acheron who is the leader of Dark Hunters, and his love-hate relationship with Artemis is very interesting and complex.Acheron’s pet demon Simi, Kyrian’s squire Nick, Kyrian, Valerius’s brother Zach all form interesting characters.This is the kind of book which makes you involved with the characters.You care about what’s happening to them and want them to have a happy ending.My only complaint is that the book was over too soon.
Warning:The sex scenes are pretty explicit.But it is not porn.I recommend it for anyone above 16.On the other hand teenagers today being more exposed(thanks to cable tv)younger teens may not find the scenes shocking either.