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Octavia E. Butler: Fledgling (Paperback, 2007, Warner Books) 4 stars

Shori is a mystery. Found alone in the woods, she appears to be a little …

Review of 'Fledgling' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

If you've read a lot of sexy vampire fiction, this doesn't depart too far from from the template. If you haven't¸this isn't a bad place to start, (although if you don't like sexy vampire fiction, I don't think this will change your mind or anything).

Notable departures include:
- instead of 'new vampire' explaining it to the reader, the protag is a vampire with an acquired brain injury who has lost her past and needs to discover who she is.
- if your problem is a sensitivity to the sun, maybe investigate melanin?
- relatedly, creepy fetishization of whiteness which can sometimes feature in the genre is absent.
- sexy vampire feeding is made explicit; protagonist is not so much bisexual as sexually attracted to her regular feeding partners; it's pretty much her sexual orientation.
- mandatory polyamory if you don't want to kill your regular feeding partners from blood-loss?

WARNING: protag appears to be 13, although she's over her half century. It's not fetishized, but she has sex with people while appearing to be 13, so that's there.