Review: Unsuccessful marriage of category romance and paranormal genre
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 05 19, 2014
THE STORYRachel’s sister Kirsten is engaged to the greatest scumbag on planet Earth IRHO (in Rachel’s humble opinion). The problem is - Kirsten refuses to see it. Desperate Rachel will stop at nothing to save Kirsten from making the biggest mistake of her life, even blackmailing a vampire to help.THE CHARACTERSRachel should be shy computer geek. I use the word should since I never saw evidence of this fact, except that writer told us so. Rachel is sure quick to jump and use the opportunity to blackmail a vampire. What should I do if I accidentally ran across a vampire feeding on another human? Vampire, a paranormal creature, that I though existed only in fiction? Scream and run like hell in opposite direction.“I’m not going to hurt you.”“That’s exactly what a vampire about to hurt me would say.”“Touche. But I’m really not.”“Not a vampire?”“Not going to hurt you,” he corrected.Well, lucky for Rachel, Charles is a “friendly local vampire” (blame him for the lousy and inaccurate pun, I am only quoting). And Charles is here to investigate if Brent (Kirsten’s fiance) is blackmailing his brother’s girlfriend Alice (Charles’ brother not Brent’s brother). Honestly, retelling this book is similar to explaining a plot of some telenovela.THE ROMANCEThe one thing that could redeem Don’t Blackmail the Vampire was good love story. But everything between Rachel and Charles was familiar cliche. There is instant attraction and lust between them. The sex is fantastic and we are subjected to a looooooong descriptions of it (more than 30% of this short book). And, in a couple of days, >BANG< the-one-and-only-true-love!CATEGORY ROMANCE + PARANORMAL = ?Covet is an imprint of Entangled publishing that specializes in new genre, a mix of category romance and paranormal. I was intrigued how this is going to turn out. It’s been raining a lot last couple of days and I was looking for warm, fluffy book, but sadly Don’t Blackmail the Vampire missed its mark with me.Here are formulas used to write Don’t Blackmail the Vampire:paranormal romance – world building + ALL the clichescategory romance + add word vampire when mentioning hero + references to blood and biting, especially if sexual tension is highThere is not even an attempt to explain any history behind vampires their customs etc. The important fact is they are here and they are super sexy.IN THE END...Blackmailing anyone should be risky and vampires even more so. Although headline hints of danger and intrigue, Don’t Blackmail the Vampire was mostly boring and full of cliches. This marriage of category romance and paranormal genre didn’t work out for me.If you are turned on with a fantasy of having a vampire for a lover, you might enjoy Don’t Blackmail the Vampire or if you enjoy reading category romance and are willing to overlook paranormal elements. But fans of paranormal romance who would like to read really good love story featuring vampire should better go with Black Dagger Brotherhood series or Night Huntress series.Disclaimer: I was given a free eBook by the publisher in exchange for a honest review.