Review: Enjoyable enough
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 06 17, 2013
Behind Blue Eyes is the first vampire novel I've read for review.  But a good book is universal so the genre shouldn't matter.  The story revolves around a vampire named Cain who is out for revenge against an evil vampire named Vasile. Cain used to be a goodhearted human, fighting a brutal war in France.  When he returns home from the war, he finds that his beautiful mother, Elizabeth, had been bitten and transformed into a vampire by Vasile (Vasile intended for Elizabeth to be his vampire mate, but Elizabeth shunned him for what he has done to her, so he left).  Elizabeth, kindhearted in nature, makes it a point to control her cravings.  Though she lusts for blood, she never kills or drains the blood of her victims like other bloodthirsty vampires do.  When Cain fell deathly ill and went into a coma, Elizabeth turns him into a vampire by forcing him to drink her vampire blood (so he may live). When Cain wakes up and finds himself extremely blood thirsty, he realizes what his mother has done.  Angry at Elizabeth, he begins to act like Vasile, killing humans right and left without compunction.  Horrified by her son's behavior and blaming herself for it, Elizabeth commits suicide.  The suicide slaps Cain into reality.  Anguished by his mother suicide, he vows to control his blood lust like his mother has so successfully done.  He promises to seek revenge on Vasile.  The effort to find the elusive vampire takes him on a never-ending journey. For decades, he wanders around, seeking out his prey. But every time he gets closer, something happens that allows Vasile to escape.  When Cain falls in love with a young woman named Mia, the relationship complicates his life.  Since he is constantly hunted by humans and has a powerful enemy in Vasile not to mention other bloodthirsty vampires, Cain feels he is endangering her. The threat is real and the readers can feel it.Though the plot may sound silly to non-readers of the genre, the author is able to create a compelling vampire world that is believable. Cain is a sympathetic character filled with empathy toward the weaker humans. I like the fact that he is guilt-ridden by his blood lust, agonizing whether God will ever accept him for the terrible deeds he has done, especially those before he was able to control his cravings.  His love for Mia is authentic and the reader sees that this vampire is a good person (a trait that carried over from his human days). Descriptions of blood lust are excellent and the immediate power a new vampire feels upon waking up is depicted in an engrossing way.  The fact that vampires can sense each other's presence makes for goose-pimpling high drama.Where the novel stumbles is in the transitions which seem choppy. The action scenes are glossed over, abrupt, and confusing.  One moment the vampire is chasing his prey, the next moment, the victim is already drained of blood:  "She turned to run but it was too late, he was too fast. Vasile almost completely drained Elizabeth of her blood then tore open his wrist and let his own blood seep down her throat. "In another scene, a vampire (who shall remain nameless) is talking to Cain on the phone, in the next sentence, the vampire's head is suddenly lopped off by a sword-wielding man.These types of disjointed killing scenes, which may be far too many, are repeated throughout the novel. I don't need to see the gore (and maybe that is what the author intended), but at least clearly lay out the scene to ground us to what is happening.The novel has quite a few unexplained coincidences.  In one scene, Elizabeth's friend Ann is telling her about women found in London who had been bitten and drained of blood.  In the next telegraphed scene, we find Ann falling victim to the same fate by the same perpetrator (Vasile). In the succeeding chapter, we find Vasile coincidentally stalking Elizabeth (this is not a spoiler since it happened in the beginning).Some may think I did not like the book, but I did. At the very least, I found it interesting enough to finish.  I enjoyed the love story between Cain and Mia, and appreciated how caring he is toward her. I like the vampire world the author created with verisimilitude. The characterization is quite good and with Cain's inner conflicts, makes him a sympathetic protagonist. The last part of the book, when Cain was trying to protect Mia from humans and vampires, kept me turning the pages.  Except for the actions scenes, the narrative flows relatively smoothly, with a few bumps here and there.I rate this book between 3 and 3-1/2 stars but will round it off to 4 at Amazon since I see potential in it.  I hope the author goes back and fixes these problems and allow the novel to shine.  Rewrite then polish, polish, polish.  With Kindle publishing, it only takes a second to re-upload a better version.