Review: Haven't laughed that hard at a book in ages!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 10 13, 2012
Brought to you by OBS reviewer HeidiHappily Never After is an ebook novella Jeaniene Frost wrote to go with her Night Huntress series.  It originally appeared in the anthology, Weddings from Hell.  There is some contradictory information on the internet about where in the series it goes, but according to Frost's website it should go after the 2nd book, One Foot in the Grave.In this book, we take a break from Cat and Bones, although Bones is in a few scenes he is not the main event.  Bones's old human friend, Greta, asks Bones for help with her grandchildren.  Frazier has gotten in over his head with a local crime lord and has gone missing, while Isabella is being black-mailed into marrying that crime lord, Robert, to keep her brother safe.  Bones doesn't have time to take care of the matter himself, but asks one of the vampires he's sired, Chance, to do the honors.Chance is just supposed to use some green-eyed magic and make Robert no longer want to marry Isa, but he thinks Robert needs a little punishment instead.  That could just be a side-effect that Chance is already falling for Isabella and he feels a connection between them, but does she feel it too?I really wasn't sure I'd like this book since it didn't center around Bones and Cat, but I did truly enjoy this one and now I only hope to see glimpses of Chance in the future books.I already liked Chance, but then with two little words he completely raised my view of him.  It had been a long time since I've laughed that hard at a book and I thought I was going to die laughing.  Even hours later, I could think of it and still chuckle about it.  What were the two words?  Turbo Vagisil.  It was the last thing that I expected to come out of his mouth and it cracked me up!  Of course, you have to understand what happened earlier in the book for it to make sense."You're a beautiful young woman walking without an escort at one in the morning. Why doesn't one of your staff at least see you to your car?""Because they're not sexist pigs who think women are incapable of taking care of themselves."Chance rolled his eyes. "This has nothing to do with feminism. I'm all for gender equality, but the fact remains that women are targeted for more specific crimes than men, and the perpetrators of those crimes often look for circumstances such as these to attack.""See this?" Isa pulled something dark and oblong out of her purse. Chance's mouth twitched."Turbo Vagisil?""No, It's a taser!" Isa said indignantly. "I can take care of myself, Chance. I've been doing that just fine for the past twenty-nine and a half years before you showed up, remember?"I really enjoyed Chance and his humor although when he was talking he sometimes sounded like Bones, especially when calling people `luv'.  Unfortunately, I did find Isabelle to be a bit on the bland side, but not enough to make me not like the story.  Chance is definitely the outgoing fun one of the relationship!  And, I loved the getaway that Bones set up for the couple at the end of the book.I know a lot of people that will skip the short stories when reading a series; I used to be one of those people.  But this is a fun quick novella that you don't want to miss!This review and more at openbooksociety dot com