Book Review
Title: Guilty Pleasures (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter Book 1) by Laurell K. Hamilton
Genre: Paranormal, Romance
Rating: 4.5 Stars
The opening to Guilty Pleasures wasn’t amazing but it was interesting as we are introduced to Anita Blake, who is an animator, someone who raises people from the dead. She is being asked to take on Willie McCoy, a newly made vampire as a client but she refuses despite his protests and veiled threats about the people he works for. After finishing her shift with the police she receives a phone call from Monica Vespucci, about her friend Catherine’s bachelorette party that night and she agrees to go. They end up at Guilty Pleasures, an all vampire strip club where they run into Jean-Claude, a master vampire. He and Anita seem to have some history between them as she is attracted to him and she intrigues him as she is able to resists his vampiric gifts such as enthralling and he is determined to put her under one day. On this night she witnesses a vampire feeding and there seems to be something off about Anita that may suggest she isn’t human but nothing to confirm it yet. However, she is called into work to consult on some murders that have taken place and she theories that it was done by a new kind of ghoul or a flesh-eating zombie but neither really fit the bill.
After returning to Guilty Pleasures, Anita sees Catherine almost bitten by a vampire, Aubrey and stops it attacking the vampire in the process but Jean-Claude steps in to stop it explaining that they lured Anita there for a reason and she decides to hear them out to protect her friend. They explain that they work for a vampire named Nikolaos and Nikolaos wants her to investigate the vampire murders that Willie mentioned and she agrees to spare her friend. She ends up being taken away by Jean-Claude and imprisoned as Nikolaos tries to frightened her. However, when Aubrey injured Anita, Jean-Claude shared his stamina with her meaning she is immune to most vampiric abilities now. When she comes face to face with Nikolaos, she is a child vampire with a god complex, as the other vampires mention that by the end of the night she will be everyone’s master but Anita isn’t going to allow this. She brings in a zombie who witness the murder of a master vampire, which has bumped Jean-Claude up from the 5th most powerful vampire to the 3rd. The zombie’s mind has been broken by its master so it can’t tell Anita anything and this sets off Nikolaos rage but Jean-Claude protects her even though he seems to be terrified of Nikolaos himself. With the strings of murders, including those of two master vampires, Anita knows whatever is killing them isn’t going to be easy to find or kill so she is going to need all the help she can get but she doesn’t seem to have many useful friends for this situation.
As she is escaping with the help of Zachary, Anita ends up running into a face from her past that she wasn’t expecting to see again the form of Valentine. In the past, Valentine almost killed Anita until she splashed him with holy water scarring his face very badly and even though she is under Nikolaos’ protection for now he warns her that it won’t last and he will come for her when it runs out. After Zachary and Winter gets Anita out she returns home to find another face from her past waiting for her, this time it is another vampire hunter, Edward. Edward is seeking information about certain vampires presumably to kill them and Anita can’t give him the information he wants but he does help her gets some weapons. Anita explains that if she is the Executioner then Edward is Death itself especially for vampire and I know to see this crazy dude in action one day. One important thing to note is that during the escape from the dungeon Nikolaos was holding her in, something happens to Anita. I am not sure what it is but there is some blue fire that enters Anita causing her eyes to glow blue but she hears Jean-Claude’s voice during this which is impossible since he is fighting with Nikolaos right then but it is something for me to keep an eye on. So far, I am really enjoying Guilty Pleasures and I flew through the first 16 chapters in something like two hours so I am excited to see where the book and series go.
As we approach the halfway mark in the novel, Anita is in deep in something she doesn’t really want to be involved in because her friend’s life is on the line. Anita with the help of Ronnie is digging for the information that Edward wants on Nikolaos’ daytime residence, where she would be hidden from the sun as he seems to want to take her down but she hasn’t got it and she only has 24 hours before Edward shows up expecting the information. Meanwhile, she is visited by Phillip, the stripper and vampire junkie from Guilty Pleasures and he wants to help her because Jean-Claude hasn’t returned and he seems genuinely concerned for the master vampire. Despite her instincts, Anita accepts the help from Phillip and he suggests they will have more luck getting the information she wants at a freak party where humans and vampires mingle for various reasons and she is going to attend with him but she is going to have to show off her scars. She also gets information that Valentine got to Phillip years ago and he’s the reason that Phillip is a junkie, while this isn’t confirmed it does beg Phillip as mildly trust-worthy in her book. She dresses for the party and prepares for every situation but she knows she won’t be allowed her blessed cross or her larger weapons at the party which isn’t a good thing since Anita is well known in the vampire community which isn’t a good thing but I can’t wait to see what goes down in the second half of the novel.
As we cross into the second half of the novel, Anita goes to the party with Phillip and she immediately has to start stamping down her lust for him because she doesn’t trust him enough. I agree with Anita on this as she knows if the vampires ask it of him he will betray her but she needs to trust him for this to work. After arriving at the party, Anita realises there is a large sexual element to it which is something she isn’t comfortable with and when people attempt to make moves on her, her anxiousness gets the better of her until Phillip steps in and protects her. Throughout the time they are at the party, Phillip has to resist the urges to indulge his addiction and this surprises Anita and makes her a little warmer towards Phillip. However, when Nikolaos arrives at the party mainly because there are other vampires trying to force Zachary to raise a century old zombie and they are failing Anita steps in to help him as an Animator, but she soon learns that Zachary isn’t alive himself which puts her in a difficult position. When Nikolaos realises what Anita has done she demands Anita’s blood in return from freeing the zombie, and not harming Zachary or Phillip and Anita has no choice but to agree. This is made worse when Edward turns up at the party as he still wants information on Nikolaos that Anita doesn’t have and her time is running out. It seems that Anita is stretched thin and needs help but the only person she knows that could help her right now is Jean-Claude and he has vanished into thin air.
As we approach the final section of the novel, the story is really beginning to heat up and I can’t wait to see where it goes. It seems that Anita has sort of solved the vampire murders as she knows Edward is working for the Church of Eternal Life and is the most likely person behind the killing since he wants to get to Nikolaos but when she receives a message that Nikolaos has taken Phillip from Willie she rushes to help him without backup. At the Circus of the Damned she comes face to face with Nikolaos, Aubrey and Valentine as they torment Phillip who Nikolaos believes is Anita’s lover. However, during this exchange Nikolaos explains that Jean-Claude has put a second mark on Anita, allowing him to feed off her strength so that he doesn’t weaken while trapped in the cross bound coffin and it also allows him to communicate with Anita in her dreams. Nikolaos also explains that when she receives the fourth mark she will become Jean-Claude’s human servant which isn’t something Anita wants. While Nikolaos grants her a moment with Phillip, she promises to rescue him but Nikolaos works some powers on her ordering the other vampires to kill Phillip. Anita manages to kill Aubrey before he can seriously hurt Phillip but Nikolaos bites Anita causing her to pass out and when she wakes up she is at Guilty Pleasures and she knows Phillip is dead. I really liked Phillip so I was surprised to see him killed off so early in the series but it has given Anita the drive to destroy Nikolaos once and for all.
As we cross into the final section of the novel, there’s a lot that happens and it sets up the rest of the series nicely. While most of the novel was a self contained novel with Anita solving the vampire murders and dealing with Nikolaos there was also an overarching storyline of her connection with Jean-Claude and the meaning behind that. Honestly, I really enjoyed Guilty Pleasures, there wasn’t any smut which I wasn’t expecting but I have been informed that comes later in the series and I hope it is with Jean-Claude. I was heart-broken by certain deaths in the book and there were characters lost that I wanted to see more of but overall, it was an engaging and entertaining read and I can’t wait to read The Laughing Corpse as soon as I can.
Buy it here:
Paperback/Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
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