Product Description

You never forget your ex-fiance. And when the call came at three in the morning, I thought for a moment it was him. It wasn't. It was his brother. And it wasn't good news. Apparently, the former love of my life had got himself thrown into jail for assaulting a woman. Since I make my living as a preternatural expert, I tend to believe almost anything's possible. But though he may be one of the monsters, Richard would never harm a woman. So here I am in the wilds of Tennessee, Anita to the rescue. I've got just a few days to spring Richard and find out who framed him - and why. There's a full moon coming, and if my werewolf love is still behind bars when it rises, he'll be facing a lot worse than an assault charge ...Look out for information on this and other titles on the Orbit website at www.orbitbooks.co.uk

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3133 in Books
• Published on: 2000-12-07
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 418 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
When Anita Blake, necromancer and vampire executioner, started sleeping with the vampire Jean-Claude, she thought she was done with her relationship with Richard, leader of St Louis' large pack of werewolves. She loves him still, but she could not cope with watching him eat a defeated enemy.

When he is accused of rape in a small corrupt town out in the sticks she joins his pack-mates and his family in trying to clear his name and finds herself in trouble as usual. For one thing, Richard has made an enemy of a powerful sorcerer whose foes tend to turn up horribly dead; for another, she and Jean-Claude are trespassing in the territory of another vampire Master, one who feeds on fear and can spread a deadly rot with his touch.

As always, Laurell K. Hamilton writes well about both sexual passion and the sheer wild thrill of powerful magics--these are books written without the brake on, in which anything may happen and every climax just leads to further wonderful excess. Hamilton is good on cityscapes--here she proves herself just as accomplished with the beauty and terror of dark woods by night and the tang of blood on cold clean wind. --Roz Kaveney

Review
'Death and gore galore ... Hamilton writes with ease and vigour..." SHIVERS 'I was enthralled - a departure from the usual type of vampire tale which will have a wide appeal to any reader hunting for both chills and fun' ANDRE NORTON 'This fast-paced, tough-edged supernatural thriller is mesmerizing reading indeed' LOCUS 'Supernatural bad guys beware, night-prowling Anita Blake is savvy, sassy and tough' P N Elrod, author of THE VAMPIRE FILES

LOCUS
'This fastpaced, toughedged supernatural thriller is mesmerizing reading indeed'

Customer Reviews

More about Werewolves and Richard
Richard is in jail back home in Tennessee, accused of rape. So Anita goes to help him out. But there's just a few little problems on the way. The local police are framing Richard for some reason; Richard's bodyguard werewolves don't trust Anita; there's a full moon a few days away, and if Richard is still in jail then, his cover will be blown; the local Master vampire Colin thinks this is just a takeover bid, and refuses Anita permission to visit his territory; and to top it all, Raina's munin is beginning to possess Anita. And when Anita is finally forced to do something that she thinks makes her one of the bad guys, it's a bit of a problem, because she has to battle a demon, who has power only over bad guys...
Rather more sex and rather less detection than I would have liked. But it's still a gripping series, with some good twists, and a couple of new monsters. Anita finally seems to have solved the problem of choosing between Richard and Jean-Claude: the obvious solution, but with some less-than-obvious consequences.

BLUE MOON Introduces A More Vulnerable Anita Blake-Terrific!
Anita Blake, Executioner, necromancer, lover and human servant to Jean-Claude - the charismatic Master Vampire of St. Louis, lupa of the Thronnus Roke Clan lukoi, and Nimir-ra of a pard of leopard lycanthropes, is changing...more so all the time. When Laurell Hamilton introduced her to us in "Guilty Pleasures," Book One of the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series, she was a 24 year-old, smart, attractive, feisty, super-independent dynamo, who raised the dead for a living. She was almost a normal 21st century career girl. Of course she staked rogue vampires as a sideline, but we all have our quirks. Anita's preternatural powers have been steadily increasing, and in "Blue Moon," book eight in the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series, the lines are really beginning to blur between her humanity and the supernatural. Always an uncompromising and tough lady, she has developed a hardness, a detachment, that frightens even herself.

Anita, Richard Zeeman, (an alpha werewolf and her old boyfriend), and Jean-Claude, (her present lover), had formed a Triumvirate of power - Master Vampire, Ulfric and necromancer. In other words, when the three connect, they exude tremendous force and are able to do much more magic than any one or two can do alone. The three are still bound to each other, even though Richard is furious with Anita for dumping him. She had to choose between "a flesh eater and a bloodsucker." Do you see a pattern here?

Late one evening Anita receives a phone call from Richard's brother. Zeeman had been spending the summer in Meyerton, Tennessee, studying the Lesser Smokey Mountain Trolls which live in the area, and fulfilling the requirements for his Masters degree. He has been arrested for the rape of a local women, and is obviously innocent of the charge. Richard is squeaky clean, the ultimate Boy Scout, and very gentle, especially for a lycanthrope. To make the situation worse, a full moon will occur in five days. As luck would have it, this month, August, is a blue moon month - that means two full moons in 31 days - a phenomenon which arises every 3-4 years. And we all know what happens to werewolves during a full moon, don't we? Richard has not "come out of the closet," so to speak, to his parents, his employers, or to many other humans. Basically, he needs to get out of jail pronto. Anita flies down to Meyerton to give him a hand and get him a good attorney. At Jean-Claude's insistence she is accompanied by an entourage of body guards. Colin, the master of the local vampires does not want Anita and cohorts on his turf - for any reason and has made some serious threats. So, vampires Asher and Damian, and lycanthropes Jason, Zane, Cherry, and Nathaniel are there to keep her safe - although, as always, Anita turns out to be the one who does the most protecting. Werewolves Jamil and Shang-Da are around for Richard, to assist him and to join in the Blue Moon celebrations with Verne, the local Ulfric and his pack..

Freeing Richard proves easier than tangling with Colin and crew, plus the corrupt local police, and an assortment of other heinous monsters - there's pure evil on the loose in these hills!! There are some interesting twists in character development in "Blue Moon." Anita is more vulnerable here than previously. She has to confront her mixed feelings for both Richard and Jean-Claude, come to terms with Raina's munin - the vengeful spirit who possesses her from time-to-time, make a decision about her reluctant status as leoparde-lionee of the Saint Louis wereleopards, and face her own ignorance in terms of the power she possesses. Anita fears that she is rapidly becoming as much a monster as those she hunts...and loves. Hamilton succeeds beautifully in developing this vulnerable side of Anita, without sacrificing the plot. However, at this point in the series a change was needed. There had to be more to Anita than one tough cookie who goes up against the monsters and wins, repeatedly. This is one of Laurell Hamilton's best novels - tightly plotted, well structured, including wonderful dark humor, acerbic wit, and plenty of thrills and chills.

Just a word about the sexual content in "Blue Moon." I do not find it any more excessive or graphic than what one reads in most popular fiction - bestseller lists included - nor what is shown on afternoon TV. It would not be realistic to write about a healthy, single woman of 24 and exclude sex. Anyway, I loved this book and certainly recommend it!
Jana

A change in direction from earlier books.
If you are a fan of Richard, then you'll love it. If, on the other hand, you can't stand the biceped boy-scout, then this isn't really the book for you.

This book concentrates on several different things: Anita's indecision about which of the 'boys' she loves; how she is coping with what she perceives as a moral slide; were-politics, of both pack and pard; Richard's acceptance of what he truly is... and so on. This is a rather more introspective novel than the preceding ones, with much focus on relationships.

There is of course the obligatory bad evil monster guy that Anita defeats, and again, we have Anita discovering hidden preternatural powers. These seem to be recurrences through each book, so if you've read the preceding novels, this shouldn't come as much of a surprise.

This book does not focus on the vampires in Anita's life to a great extent. Yes, some are there, but you get the feeling it's purely for the sake of including them, rather than for an actual purpose.

I am not a fan of Richard, to put it mildly - I also found his behaviour in this novel out of character. It doesn't mesh with his previous portrayals, and that weakens this for me. Having said that, it surpassed my expectations from the title (Blue Moon clearly indicated 'Richard-centric' to me) and I have still read it more than once. However, it languishes as my least favourite of all the Anita Blake novels.