Review: Good stuff in a small package
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 11 20, 2013
The rock band Crooked Fang is in a state of hiatus, mainly due to their lead singer getting fried in a rather nasty house fire.  Bass player and arrogant vampire Xan Marcelles has been sitting around doing nothing for the last month, and that suits him fine.  But one phone call changes all that, and now he's taking his unpredictable friend Nin with him to Texas to execute six vampires.  Xan used to be good at his job; but that was then, and this is now, and now might be one job too far.Traitors, by Carrie Clevenger, is a novella, but it is in all essence the sequel to her popular novel, Crooked Fang. Once more we meet up with Xan Marcelles, bass player and self-confessed idiot, and to be honest it was a joy to be with him again. The book is written through Xan's perspective, and this is what makes it such a brilliant read.  His comments and musings are straight to the point, sometimes amusing, and the story flows easily through his mind.  There's so much more to this character than just an obnoxious bass-playing vamp.Plus Traitors has a whole bunch of good stuff in such a small package.  There's a great soundtrack, and you can almost hear in your head the songs that are mentioned. And at last there's some great vampire on vampire sex, which was noticeably missing from the first book, and this particular scene was written extremely well.  The climactic fight scene down in Texas is superb, loads of action, Xan's good side along with his brutal side coming to the fore, and a good dose of gore, too.  There's also a gripping car chase, and one particular maneuver which will please Hollywood stunt men everywhere, but which gave me the one minor gripe I have with the book.I'll look past it, though, way way way past it, because this story is so much more than one fleeting moment. Crooked Fang was awesome. Traitors is fantastic.  All that does now is put pressure on Ms. Clevenger to produce something even better for the next book in the series.