Tanya Huff

This 3rd volume in the Vicki Nelson series was again a re-read, but I found I enjoyed this one more than the first two, having found them a little disappointing this time around. The villain in this story, a weak point in the other volumes, was far more convincing: it isn't a spoiler to say he was a pre dynastic Egyptian sorceror, sealed with spells into a sarcophagus which has been in the private collection of a aristocratic British family for the last couple of centuries but is now sold to the Museum in Toronto. Before his arrival, the disturbance to his sarcophagus gives him increasing freedom to send forth his ka - the Egyptian life force/personality - to influence the museum curator who has bought the sarcophagus for the museum in the (correct) belief that it is unsealed and therefore contains a mummy. And before long, he is feeding on the life forces of modern day people and beginning to establish a power base, in the service of his god but also ultimately to try to gain sufficient power to become godlike himself.

I enjoyed the Egyptology background and the idea that, in contrast to ancient Egypt where sorcery was believed in and the gods were real and most people were dedicated to a god from birth and had protections which kept them safe from the villain's machinations, the modern world has such a lack of religious belief that he is able to overpower and recruit without opposition.

I also liked the fact that Henry played a much bigger role in this story than the predeceding one and that he and Mike, Vicki's other lover in their love triangle, have to start to work together and to develop some mutual respect. Although it was never spelled out to him, since the events of the previous book which occurred a few months previously, Mike seems to have accepted the notion that Henry is a vampire. Possibly though, Vicki has a bit too much baggage in this novel and going forward in the series: not only is she suffering from the progressive eye disease which may render her blind and is the reason she had to leave the police force and is now a private investigator, it seems that her inability to commit to either man - or any man - is because her dad abandoned her and her mother when she was a child.

One continuing oddity is the way Vicki seems quite happy to share Henry with Tony, the young man who grew up on the streets but now has a steady job etc thanks to Henry. As Tony's former mentor who tried to look out for him, it is a bit strange that she thinks it OK for them both to have a sexual relationship with Henry (entailed in the blood drinking for a vampire, if a regular relationship is in place as opposed to hunting strangers). Henry isn't exactly exploiting Tony, but he is obviously a mature character at 450 years old whereas Tony is just around 17. The whole issue is dealt with very much as a casual side mention and Vicki seems to feel that open relationships are great all round: not an attitude most people can handle in practice even if they subscribe to it in theory.

The end of the story implies that there might at some point be more trouble with the god who lay behind the mummy's predations, but I don't know if that was ever followed through in a later volume.

As I enjoyed this one more than the two preceding volumes, it rates 4 stars.… (mer)

Another re-read of this series, which has not lived up to my memories, although the third volume was an improvement. In this book, the theme - having covered demons, werewolves, and an Egyptian mummy in the first three - switches to a combination of Doctor Frankenstein and zombies. Vicki, who has avoided taking calls from her mother due to busyness or not being in the mood for her mother's usual questions into whether she is getting serious with Mike Celluci or Henry Fitzroy (her mother has never appeared physically in the books before and doesn't know Henry is a 450 year old vampire), is devastated when she receives a phone call to tell her that her mother died suddenly of a massive heart attack at work. She rushes off to deal with the funeral, keeping her emotions firmly clamped down - apart from her usual anger - and the two men have to track her down to Kingston in time for the funeral. At which point, she discovers that the coffin is empty and embarks on an investigation, helped by the two men.

Meanwhile, the latest villains have been appearing in their own viewpoint sections - a whole group of them this time as there is a doctor who is administrator of the scientific department of Kingston University plus two graduate students, both geniuses it seems and both odd in their own way although the female student is a lot odder. And we discover way ahead of the three main characters what has been happening to disappearing bodies .....

I won't say much more about the plot as there are major spoilers otherwise. This story is a lot grimmer as Vicki takes blow after emotional blow and almost descends into a crackup, not helped by her inability to express any emotion apart from anger. I must admit to not really liking her as a character in this re-read of the series, and she seems to become more and more a caricature of herself as time goes on with constant breaking of household articles. Mike is a lot more sympathetic as a character, and near the end of the story shows his empathic and self sacrificing side - which turns out to be ironic, given the final resolution of the love triangle between him, Henry and Vicki. Henry is vulnerable here again as he was in volume 2, and has to rely on the other two to rescue him from a tight spot, and there is quite a high body count and plenty of action once the trio work out who is behind the body snatching.

Given my growing dislike of Vicki as a character I can only rate this at 3 stars. It would have made a good end to the series, although I did think on my original reading that the author could have tackled other traditional genre themes such as ghosts or the fae, but she did go on to write more books with the new character dynamic. I only have book 5 and having already read that, I don't think I shall want to track down the rest.… (mer)

This was a re-read of volume 2 of a series that I remember enjoying, and I had remembered that this was one of my favourites so it was a disappointment that it fell a bit flat this time around.

Vicki Nelson, ex-cop and now a private eye, is asked by her friend Henry Fitzroy, vampire and illegitimate son of Henry VIII (a historical character, who died at age 17), to save some friends of his from a sniper. The Heerkens family live on a sheep farm outside the town or city of London, Ontario - it was unclear in the book how big the place was. They are wer, which - as a nice twist - are a different species - werewolves are born, not made in this world. The author does a nice job of making them sufficiently inhuman in their focus on the present, inability to back down when their dominance is challenged - they simply have to go and guard the sheep at night making themselves a target - and dislike of crowded human spaces as smelly and noisy. Though it does eventually become irritating that they are too blinkered to take elementary precautions - it is a bit wearing in any book or film/TV show when the peril to characters is dependent upon them being "stupid".

Given Vicki's night blindness caused by her progressive eye disease, Henry drives her there and stays in a sealed room during the day, emerging at night to provide the cover needed when she is unable to operate. Yet he is quite ineffectual, becoming a target himself at one point. Meanwhile, Mike Celluci, Detective and Vicki's friend and partner in more than one sense, investigates Henry's background, becoming convinced he must be involved in organised crime, and eventually turns up to tell her so, but becomes embroiled in the investigation into the two previous deaths of Heerkens family members.

My disappointment with this book is that it seems awfully dragged out and Vicki rather dim frankly - it wasn't too difficult to determine who the initial killer was, although the water was eventually muddied with another villain operating for different motives. But although Vicki obviously does not have the resources she had as a police officer, I kept wondering why Celluci couldn't have checked whether anyone had a military background which would have made this a much shorter book! Also, Henry is very much in a back seat role - he does play a key part in the denoument but is quite a minor character otherwise.

A minor issue I had was that it got rather confusing as to who was who with the adult wer characters, given that every character has two names, one for human form and one for wer form. I could keep the main younger characters straight, but the relationships of the adults were not easy to follow.

The eventual solution relies on very old tech - reading through paper records - although at least the plot did not hinge on whether or not people could get through on landlines as in book 1 - I accept that the books were written in the late 1980s to early 1990s, but I think that aspect would deter younger readers. As with book 1, we do have sections in the viewpoints of the villains, but the second one to join in with the killing spree was not very convincing. The denoument does rely on a character acting stupidly but at least it wasn't one of the protagonists and was acceptable for that particular person.

One minor aspect of the story is a little bit odd - Tony, Vicki's street person eyes and ears, and a boy for whom she has had a mentoring/protective role previously, is revealed to be Henry's regular blood donor, a role which had begun in book 1 when Henry was seriously injured. As such a relationship - as opposed to Henry going out and hunting someone who is not a consenting adult - involves a sexual relationship, it is a bit strange that this has been going on for months while Vicki hesitates about following through on her attraction to Henry and Henry has been waiting for her to make the first move. It isn't the prior relationship between him and Tony that seems to bother her either, but the fact that Henry has been able to get Tony off the streets, something she couldn't do - she is more jealous of that than anything. I found it a bit 'dodgy' that someone, presumably vulnerable, has been brought into such a role, even though he has been fed and clothed well as part of the deal: as a Tudor royal, Henry feels responsible for "his people". This is all dealt with as a minor matter in the story rather than the big relationship dynamic/triangle that might have been expected. And when Vicki and Henry finally do get together the whole thing is rather a damp squib, based purely on a need for blood, and doesn't really gell with the love we have been told he feels for her .

So on balance given those issues I can only rate this as a 3-star read.… (mer)

Last in a series of re-reads for me. I had fond memories of this series, having read it years ago, but on this re-read found the main character, Vicki, increasingly annoying in her one dimensional Mrs Angry personality.

In this, she has progressed onto really mindless anger at times, because in the author's universe vampires cannot tolerate each other's physical presence, as intrusions on their hunting territory after the initial year or so when the 'parent' has taught the 'child' enough to pass as human when necessary and survive. That period having passed, Vicki has remained in Toronto with Mike Celluci now in the same relationship to her that she used to have to Henry, and Henry has moved to Vancover with Tony as his sole regular blood donor and sexual partner. But Henry requests Vicki's help when his nights are plagued by a spirit visitor who lacks hands and who responds to questions either by disappearing if the answer would be positive or by letting loose a physic wave of despair when the answer is negative - killing old people or babies in the vicinity and causing serious upset in anyone else. The body is found in the harbour but still cannot be identified - but the clue it provides is that one of the kidneys has been removed. And the culprits appear to be organ bootleggers operating for profit from a private clinic.

The relationship between Vicki and Henry established in earlier books is gone: the two spend their time snarling at each other or mindlessly launching attacks. Vicki becomes even more unlikeable than she was when alive as a result, although the two do find a balance finally, albeit precarious. Their friendship retreats again to a phone or email based one, which both can tolerate.

One element which was always a bit 'dodgy' was the dependence of the 17 year old Tony, ex street kid, on Henry, and his role as sexual partner back when Vicki was alive and also in such a relationship with Henry. The author does seem to finally realise this with Tony showing signs of wanting to break away and have a normal life, which he achieves by story's end.

One problem in this story is that the only supernatural element if you discount vampires themselves - in Huff's universe corporal beings with weaknesses and limitations - is the ghost (and the host of others that Henry senses) who keeps appearing to him, requesting vengeance in its indirect way. The villians are all normal humans, albeit criminal, violent or borderline sociopathic - rather like in the previous story, but in that, one of the victims was Vicki's own mother. Here, there isn't really much interest in that side of things, and the tension has to be racked up rather artificially by peril to Mike Celluci, and the constant sparring between the two vampires. The best character in the books, and probably in the whole series, is Mike with his superficial grumpiness hiding a noble nature - one that can't tolerate seeing Vicki cross the line into vigilantism. I had become increasingly irritated by Vicki and in this book find both her and Henry rather a pain frankly. Therefore, only a 2 star 'OK' rating and I won't be bothering with volume six which apparently was added at some point.… (mer)