Tough Book Challenge|Dark Lover by J.R. Ward

In the shadows of the night in Caldwell, New York, there’s a deadly turf war going on between vampires and their slayers. There exists a secret band of brothers like no other-six vampire warriors, defenders of their race. Yet none of them relishes killing more than Wrath, the leader of The Black Dagger Brotherhood.

The only purebred vampire left on earth, Wrath has a score to settle with the slayers who murdered his parents centuries ago. But, when one of his most trusted fighters is killed-leaving his half-breed daughter unaware of his existence or her fate-Wrath must usher her into the world of the undead-a world of sensuality beyond her wildest dreams.

I was recommended this series by a lot of people because it’s a paranormal romance and also more on the adult side. I can see why people love it, it’s certainly dark, it’s certainly explicit and romantic. Another reason why I wanted to read this series is because it was my moms favorite series. When she passed away, I kept her collection of all these books. They’re sitting in the bottom of my bookshelf as a little shout out to her.

But one big glaring bone I have to pick with this book is the way it’s written. More specifically, the fact that it’s written in 3rd person and jumps between a bunch of different characters. Within the first 10 chapters you follow Wrath, Beth, Darius, Mr. X, Butch, Marissa, and Havers. Is 7 characters really that necessary?

Now, a nice author friend (Amber Elby, check her out) explained to me that some books could be written like that to emulate T.V. shows. Because you jump between characters in shows to follow different story arcs. And yeah, I totally understand how that would be the case. In television, it doesn’t bother me in the slightest. But every time there’s a character change in a book, it drags me out of the story.

Normally I love third person. The only POV I actually can’t stand reading is second person. Thankfully that’s not normally how books are written, and if there’s any that are solely written in that POV, please let me know so I can avoid it like the plague.

Third person is great. As long as it’s only following a couple characters. First person is better, but that’s just me being picky.

Now on to what I actually thought about the book itself:

I actually ended up really enjoying it. I mean, it is very insta-lovey. I think Beth and Wrath only knew each other for about 30 seconds before they were madly in love, but whatever. They seemed really good together and I loved how Beth really didn’t take any shit.

The vampire myth in this book is pretty fantastic and *cough* they don’t sparkle, they burst into flames in the sun light, which is nice.

I loved hearing about all the brothers. And that’s actually why I went ahead and bought the second book. The second book seems to follow Rhage and I really enjoyed his character in Dark Lover.

Whether I’ll actually go ahead and finish the entire series is honestly debatable. I tend to like my series wrapped up with a nice little bow no more than five books in, but we’ll see. Expect a review for Love Eternal eventually. If I can get through the aggravating as hell writing style, of course.

4 Stars