A Shade of Vampire Series Review.

I finished it.  The entire series.  There was a lot of skimming involved, but it happened.  And it was miserable.  Honestly, by book 4 I had absolutely no clue why I was continuing to do this to myself.  I mean, am I really that stubborn when I made a decision to do something?  I am, apparently.  

I will say that the books eventually get better.  Not better as in them being good or anything, rather better as in you no longer feel the need to toss your iPad in the middle of the road so it can be run over repeatedly because you've lost all hope in books.  Okay, so that's a little dramatic.  I'd never willingly let anything happen to my iPad.  It would have been considered it I had borrowed a copy of a paperback from a friend.  Friends don't let friends read questionable books and all.  Unless you are me and obviously lack common sense.  

Anyhoo.  

I never saw why this is so warrants so many 5 star reviews on Goodreads & Amazon.  The writing was disjointed, plot lines were tossed in with little understanding, characters were absolutely idiotic, eighteen year old girls were knocked up by their ex-vamp new husband (honeymoon baby, cue the awwwws) and said babies (twins!) are apparently going to be so amazingly awesome that the bad guys want to kidnap said children and we never find out why.  Please, authors, stop with the it is so amazing for teenagers to be pregnant, husband or not, story lines. It's not adorably sweet.  

I just need to stop now.  Bottom line is that I kept reading out of curiosity about the reviews and since the books were a part of Kindle Unlimited it didn't cost me anything this month.  But now I am going to get back to my HP reread and remind myself that there are books out there that do provide good literary influences for teenagers.  

1 Star out of 5.  Yeah. 

Amity by Micol Ostow

To be published 8/26/2014

My Rating: 3/5 Stars

I was actually fairly surprised by how much I liked Amity.  It had a bit of a viscerally poetic feel too it. 

It added more of what I actually wanted to see from other books on the happenings at Amity. It was throughly creepy and incredibly disturbing, all the while making the story very readable.  Even if you already know the story, it gives you a little more and makes you want to continue on to see how it is going to play out with the new families. 

Speaking of the new families. This follows two separate families, complete with vastly different dynamics, over the span of 10 years.-It seems the horror only happens in 10 year spans in this storyline.  Interesting way to answer some questions there.- I think being able to directly compare the happenings between the families and how different people react to Amity is what made this intriguing.  Who is strong enough to save themselves?  Who is going to succumb to the house(her)? Who is going to enjoy succumbing to the house(her)?  It does have it's creepy-ish moments, but it's the psychological aspect that kept me turning the pages. 

The reasoning behind the lower rating from me was the ending.  It was far to abrupt.  We know to expect 28 days. We know the general idea behind what has happened and what may happen.  However, it sets up for a surprise twist ending that eventually just fizzles out.  It wasn't enough to end with the bang that the author seemed to be shooting for. 

Overall, I enjoyed this. It most definitely should be noted that this is a YA take on the Amityville horror, so you shouldn't go into expecting to read something akin to a Stephen King novel.  For the genre, though, it works. 

*Arc provide by Egmont USA via NetGalley for a fair and honest review.