I………

Three and a half stars for enjoying it, but I feel like Anne abandoned plot in favor of the novel-length character sketch after book four. It feels a lot like a pantsed novel—no shade, I myself am a Pantser. The plot feels weak to me and then peters out.

Also, I quite liked Marius in The Vampire Lestat and The Vampire Armand, but this guy is prone to melodramatic snitfits. I didn’t like him as much in this one; I feel like he never gets over being a Roman Patrician who wants everyone to obey him. Also, after several novels where I felt Marius was the adult supervision of the vampire world, I felt let down by his childish arguments with the women in his life. In previous novels I had him pegged as a dom, but this guy? No way he should engage in SSC/RACK. In short, he didn’t feel consistent with the guy we saw in previous novels.

But somehow I still enjoyed this book.