As psychics all over the
city are being savagely murdered, a piece of the past half-demon bounty
hunter Dante Valentine thought she'd buried is stalking the night with a
vengeance.
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I know a lot of people held issues with this book due to Dante’s almost non-stop grieving, but the end was such a nice change to me from the first book and made my heart grin. Unfortunately Valentine encounters yet another tragedy in this book – a new loss that I hated. The grim flashbacks that hinted her former childhood was horrible is even more in color and complex now. She comes to the heart of the horror in the battle finale and it was disturbing.
The pace is almost non-stop as Dante, the main character, rarely allows herself to sit down. She does think though, almost non-stop, with almost everything reminding her of her past or the horror of the last book’s ending. It can get tiring at times but I was grieving with her since I read these back to back.
Dante is incredibly violence so that is never shied away from. The flashback sequences are disturbing for more than violence, however; they also focus on rape and power exchange, control and abuse.
She is a necromance, but not in the same manner and power as Anita Blake, it’s completely different for this series. The world is woven well, although not with as many supernatural creatures a lot of series have. Little is done with her necromancy.
After reading this book I was curious about her evolving changes from her transformation and to see what the future holds. It’s a truly dark, gritty series that doesn’t shy away from mental horrors, depression, violence, and the scum of the earth. There isn’t any happiness in these books, nor peace. The height of the story and what drives the character is how unsettled and unbalanced she was and continues to be.
Book Quotes:
“His smell—the scent of a demon, cinnamon incense, amber musk—wrapped around me, filled my lungs. I felt like I could breathe again, without every breath being tainted by the stench of dying cells. The smell of him seemed to coat my abused insides with peace, and flow down into the middle of my body to spread through my veins. I filled my lungs again. While I could, before what was undoubtedly a hallucination vanished.”
