The Rogue Hunter

By Lynsay Sands

Book 10 in the Argeneau vampire series.
In the world of Lynsay Sands' vampires, which are not like the old-fashioned kind of vampires, each vampire gets one life mate. How does he or she know their life mate? Because they can't read their life mate's mind. Normally they can read minds, so when they come across someone they can't read it can only mean they have finally found their life mate, a person to love for forever.
Garrett Mortimer is a vampire and a rogue vampire hunter. He tracks down vampires who are feeding off of humans which is forbidden by the vampire council, as it attracts unwanted attention from humans. Such a vampire is suspected to be located near a lake in the woods so Garrett moves into a cabin on the lake. In the cabin next door are three young women spending a few weeks on summer vacation. One of the women is tall, lanky, flat-chested Samantha Willan. Garrett isn't attracted to Samantha at all and is very dismayed to discover he can't hear Samantha's thoughts. In all his 800 or so years he has never had this happen to him. Looks like Samantha is his life mate. Too bad for a guy vampire whose ideal mate resembles someone like, in his words, Jessica Rabbit not Olive Oyl.




Maybe he will learn to love Samantha. But how will Samantha take the news that her hot new boyfriend is a bloodsucking fiend?

This was an pretty good story. But these new modern goody-goody vampires are a little white bread for me. Also, while the title of the book implies it will be about tracking down the rogue vampire, that actually plays very little part in the story. Mainly it is about Samantha and Garrett getting together. It's not a great story but I did find some parts of it surprisingly amusing.

Love Bites

By Lynsay Sands

Rachel works in the morgue. One night a guy is brought in who was the victim of a car bomb. As she starts to prepare his body for the post mortem, she notices some rather odds things about his injuries. Like they seem to not be as bad as when his body was first brought in. And like maybe he has a heartbeat. But before she can take a closer look, a man bursts into the morgue and screams that the victim is a vampire and he wants to behead him with a large ax. Just as he swings the ax, Rachel, anxious to protect what maybe not a dead body but a living patient, steps in front of the ax and takes the brunt of it. It is a fatal blow. The man, seeing what he has done, flees.
Etienne, the dead body, wakes up to find Rachel dying. The only thing he can do to save her is to make her like him, a vampire. He and his family sneak her out of the hospital and to his house, there to guide her through the process of learning about the vampire life and, incidentally, to fall in love.

Like so many modern vampires, Etienne and family are not like the old-fashioned vamps. Yes, sun is a problem, but can be tolerated briefly. Garlic, crosses, holy water are not effective against them and they rely on packaged blood for nourishment. Biting people is frowned upon and those who do are dealt with by the vampire community. Oh and the vampirism is the result of a type of nano that lives off blood and keeps the vampire's body healthy and strong. As Rachel discovers when she completes the change over and finds that her breasts are perkier than she can ever remember. Also her scars disappear, including the fatal blow that almost resulted in her death. Which makes me wonder, if old injuries heal themselves, does that include her hymen? Which would of course continue to repair itself after each act of intercourse...
Anyway, this story is basically a romance novel with a vampire twist. It has lots of graphic sex scenes including one in which Rachel gives Etienne a blow job and finishes it off by biting his penis and drinking his blood. It's pretty gross. Not as gross as the blowjob talked about by the whore in PELIKAN, but still it's right up there. The story isn't too long on plot as most of the story scene never leaves Etienne's house except for a two brief excursions, one to a vampire night club and another to Etienne's mom's house. In fact, until the end when the ax guy finally makes his reappearance, there just isn't much happening at all. Just a lot sex. It's really just porn for women. I'm not a fan of it and, adding in the rather thin plot, I have to say I didn't really care for the book. There are several more in the series, of which I plan to read none.