Review: The level of unimportant description was rife throughout the entire story
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 06 21, 2013
bookshelves: indie-review-copies, smashwords-review, aussie-authors, 2-star-review, editing-required, indie-author, paranormal, yaRecommended for: serious vampire fansRead from June 17 to 20, 2013 -- I own a copy, read count: 1Night Realm is a paranormal, young adult-ish book that incorporates a crime/detective story in too. The criminal side of the story was quite well researched and I thought it was believable, although not too intricately written. I would have liked to see more of that side of the story.The paranormal side of the story leaves little to the imagination. It is much the same as any other vampire book, if you've read Twilight or Vampire Diaries you'll likely know just about everything there is to know about being a vampire in this book (alas - they don't sparkle).The side stories and characters were flat, it was fairly obvious that they were created and introduced for the purpose of being killed or used in some way in the story. While the main character (Ryan) was fairly developed, his sister Chelsea, left quite a bit to be desired. Her thought processes seemed scattered and some of them completely out of character, or the character I created from my understanding of Darren's writing at least.I had issues with the haphazard way in which Travis (Chelsea's mysterious boyfriend) was willing to do as Chelsea asked after such a short period in time of them being together. This 'Oh, I've just met you but I will die for you, you must be my soul mate' crap that's cropping up in young adult books these days is seriously insane! It doesn't work, it ruins an otherwise reasonable story most of the time and despite the fact that falling in love at that age does feel like that, it still leaves this reader with a very unnatural feeling.The story in itself is not that bad. I probably would have given this a 3 out of 5, but I struggled immensely with the crazy amount of detail given to mundane every day things.Each time Ryan entered a room we were given a run down on every piece of furniture and person in there, in intricate detail. Every time Ryan felt the need to have a shower, we knew every step of the process.I get that certain chracters are habit driven, some are very alert and observant, but the reader simply does not need to know all that stuff UNLESS it adds to the character, further develops the plot or ties in later in some way. To me, this felt like there had been a word count total set and Darren fell about 10,000 words short. Seriously not needed.An example of this was at about 23% in, I'm paraphrasing here, but each thing listed is mentioned in the story:Ryan lathered himself up, danced around under the water, patted himself dry, brushed his hair, sprayed on cologne, put on his undies, picked black slacks over a suit, debated on a white, black or charcoal shirt, put his wallet in his back pocket and his keys in his front pocket.This level of unimportant description was rife throughout the entire story. It is not needed.I did notice a couple of other things:55% - Why is it that no one even slightly thinks about the bite wounds being made by a vampire? Yes, we all believe they are not real, but just about everyone knows what one is and despite the immediate feeling of being stupid that would come from thinking it could be a vampire, it - to me at least - seems to be the first and most natural conclusion. They could of course then talk themselves out of it, but really, the fact that NO ONE says "Oh hey, that looks like a vampire bite" to me seems completely and utterly unnatural and unbelievable.96% - 'but I'm not (no) match for him, unfortunately.'The ending... what can I say?!It was cheesy and made me want to throw up a little in my mouth.**Note: I was provided an electronic copy of this book in return for an honest review**