Into the Fire (Night Prince #4) by Jeaniene Frost

Vlad and Leila face an insidious threat – a connection to Leila that could kill her but can’t simply be burned away by Vlad’s vast power

And when an unknown force with unknown motives and powers co-opts that bonds, it forces them to seek new alliances and venues to ensure safety. This is a threat that direct confrontation and threat cannot defeat; instead a delicate cat-and-mouse game ensures

They enter the world of magic – of powers and abilities that may even outstrip Vlad’s terrifying fire.

One thing I like about this book is how it deals with some extremely powerful characters. I’ve seen many book series that have run into serious problems because they’ve allowed their characters to have such an immense power creep.

This series started with major power hitters from the beginning. Vlad is impossibly powerful and Mencheres just takes this to the next level. These characters are unassailably powerful and in many ways it should take out a lot of the conflict of the series. This usually leads to stories being pretty convoluted in ways to disapply their powers (or just have the characters forget they have these powers) – or we have constantly escalating enemies

Instead we have enemies using lots of cunning, hiding from Vlad’s direct powers, not allowing direct confrontation. The tension and frustration of these mighty characters trying to bring their powers to bear but being unable to actually really works. And it works that the ending becomes an anti-climax because of that – because cat and mouse can be wonderfully tense but when the cat actually finds the mouse? It’s short – and that’s ok. They set up a good dynamic besides that.

On top of that I like how Vlad’s arrogance is often a problem, he charges in expects everyone to cower in front of him and is generally absolutely terrible at any kind of investigation. Intimidation, death and power are his skill sets and none are applicable here.

The action scenes are interestingly well done, the tension and worry and the prices they have to pay are all well laid out. I am tired by Vlad’s eternal “protectiveness” of Leila but she does resist that nicely. If ineffectually.

I like how we get more of an insight into magic in this book. I wouldn’t say it actually added to the world building of this series in any great detail – instead I’ll say that it hinted a lot as to what could be possible and the power and forces that are out there. It laid the groundwork for Leila to become more of a power and laid out the possibility that there are forces out there that Vlad may have to respect.

There are a large number of dead people in this book. The collateral damage is immense. And I can buy that Vlad doesn’t care – after all, his whole persona is that he is ruthless beyond ruthless. But Leila appears to be equally uncaring. Oh she’ll give lip service but then we’ll move on leaving absolute carnage in their wake all the time and she won’t spare more than a second to consider this

Bound by Flames (Night Prince #3) by Jeanine Frost

Vlad and Leila’s lives are still overshadowed by the ongoing threat from Vlad’s most ancient and powerful enemy. That enemy has focused on Leila as a weak link in Vlad’s life – and he is determined to keep her safe by whatever means necessary, even if he has to put her in a gilded cage; whether Leila likes it or not

But that crushing hold is not just destroying their marriage – but it is ultimately fruitless against an enemy that knows him so well

It would be nice to have one book go by without Leila being kidnapped. Especially since this book contained a lot of graphic torture and sexual assault that verged on the torture porn at times; the only thing that really stopped it was the surprising casualness that Leila often referred to it. Like she was skinned, absolutely skinned alive which happened in the down time (which I appreciate because we do not need a graphic description of that) but the way she refers to it feels roughly on par with mentioning someone cutting your hair. I had very little sense of trauma from her after what she went through which made the whole thing feel kind of off to me.

There’s also a completely gratuitous sexual assault scene. It’s an odd scene in that both parties are doing the very best to avoid a rape and everything that happens is to stop a rape – but because it’s used to stop a rape both parties seem to miss that it’s still sexual assault and still not a happy, fun situation. Leila’s muted reaction turns a lot more focus on Vlad’s reaction – in fact the whole focus of Leila’s abuse is Vlad, Vlad’s anger, Vlad’s pain, Vlad’s past love who died for him, Vlad debating whether he should be with Leila and put her at risk, Leila worried about Vlad blaming her – Vlad Vlad Vlad Vlad.

The whole thing feels unnecessary as well – like Vlad couldn’t have been super enraged and outraged by Leila’s kidnapping, there was no need to throw in rape as well.

There are some decent elements to the whole scene though; there is an express rejection of her sense of blame. And she may have been kidnapped but she’s also heavily involved in her own rescue which is certainly a good way of working through the whole kidnapping trope.

I also like that there’s a lot of rejection of the idea that Vlad needs to keep her safe. Not, necessarily, by saying she can look after herself (ableit she can to some degree) but by showing the extremes he has to go to to keep her safe and how even those aren’t guaranteed – but by taking those steps he damages their relationship and drives her away. Ultimately he’s destroying their marriage in a futile attempt to keep her safe by endlessly smothering her and overruling her agency. And it’s not just her words that counter this, the plot of the book expressly shows how ridiculous Vlad’s plan is; not just for Leila but how he himself nearly fails without her.

Up From the Grave (Night Huntress Series #7) by Jeaniene Frost

Kat and Bones have a very happy life having found a sense of normality and peace – but not so much for Tate and the other members of her team. Working under the devious new director, Madigan, they all seem to have disappeared mysteriously. Obviously Kat and Bones can’t let that slide – especially since it’s clear that Madigan is hiding something that the Vampire and Ghoul nations will need to know about

When they find the full extent of what he was doing, not only is it horrific but it has horrendous potential consequences should the results be known. And not cleaned up

But cleaning it up means the death of a child who has already suffered so much – Kat must find a way to prevent disaster striking them all, and living with the aftermath

This book has a moment of utter guilty pleasure epic for me in the middle which had good and bad points. On the good – while I like character development and nuanced plot lines, sometimes it’s fun to read about pure mayhem, well written, glorious, bloodthirsty chaos! Especially in this genre where the actual sheer destructive power of vampires is surprisingly often muted. It’s an abstract, or buried under mustiness, or fear of humans finding out or something. There’s usually an urge to keep the mayhem off screen or have it in bouts followed by lots of guilt.

This? Not so much. This was a pack of vampires against a human opponent who had effectively declared war. Destruction, mayhem and a whole lot of “you REALLY shouldn’t have done that” follow and it was epic, it was exciting, it was glorious, it was carnage and the bodies piled high and I should have been so very disapproving as the red shirts piled up in glorious bloody heaps – but I wasn’t. Because they’re vampires and someone has screwed with them and if you’re going to screw with super powerful creatures then you should expect to have your arm ripped off and you to be beaten to death with the soggy end.

It was epic and I loved it. It was a great and glorious ending

In the middle of the book.

It kind of took me a long time to get back into the story after that. I had had my grand finale. I had had Kat and Bones establishing their Happily Ever After – and it did it really well. The book opened with Kat thinking how perfect her life was, how she loved her husband, how she loved her friends and how she had, over the course of the series, completely resolved all of her self-hatred issues (which has been a fun and complex journey to follow). With the big glorious slaughter with Kat, Bones and just a few of her allies slaughtering their enemies with ease and glee, it established that Kat’s happy life was also secure because they were all far too powerful to be messed with any more. It was a great ending.

But the book kept going. Part of that is I get the sense that Kat’s HEA was somehow unsatisfactory – especially since a child was then inserted to “complete” Kat and Bones’s family and I’m not sure how happy I am with that. Kat and Bones had an epic HEA, I’m not sure why it would be broken without the addiction of a child figure to make it more real.

Not that I didn’t like the storyline of finding and protecting Katie. In fact, it was an excellent contrast to the slaughter they had just unleashed. There we got to see how ruthless, how dangerous they could be when it came down to protecting themselves against outside threats. Anyone who threatens them, anyone involved in actions against them, will be slaughtered – brutally and epically. However, the other side is not only do they spare the innocent but they’re not willing to see an innocent killed just because it would be convenient to preventing the vampire/ghoul world being shattered by tension again. They’re ruthless, but they’re just, they’re harsh, but they have limits.

And I think that contrast would have been far better served and far better done without Kat having a super special reason to care for Katie and this freaky forced relationship that I just didn’t really buy. And “didn’t really buy” unfortunately holds for a lot of the story – Bones pulls a trick we’ve seen him do before but it works because he’s decided to keep a load of his growing powers secret from Kat for… reasons. And Denise is an awful, terrible character – not because of her personality, but her power set is world breaking. She’s too powerful. She’s too useful. She just wanders in and FIXES things, she’s a friendly Deus Ex to help the author out of a tricky spot.

Twice Tempted (Night Prince #2) by Jeaniene Frost

 Leila is reviewing her relationship with Vlad and is concerned. She doesn’t know where it’s going, she doesn’t know whether he’s tiring of her like he has so many others and, ultimately, she doesn’t know if she’s going to be happy. Increasingly as the days pass and Vlad racks up one faux pas too many, it seems the answer is that she’s not going to be. He is not going to return the same depth of love se feels for him – and seems closed to the very idea.

So she leaves before getting any more hurt.

And then someone tries to kill her.

Presumed dead, she needs to find out who tried to kill her, who is hunting her and stop them to protect herself and her family. But she also needs to know why. Is it her enemy? Is it Vlad’s? Or is it… Vlad himself, motivated by his overwhelming pride and unwilling to swallow the insult of her leaving? Which leaves her with terrible choices of who to trust.

I was impressed almost from the beginning by the writing of this book. After all, this isn’t just the second book of a series, this is a book that rests on the Night Huntress series of world building. The temptation to infodump is very very high. But it’s not only masterfully resisted – but the world is wonderfully presented. Little side references like Leila being careful not to fry the shower, her immunity to fire and how that relates to Vlad’s power, her thinking back to the last time she was kidnapped – it all serves extremely well to fill in the past story without us ever once having an info dump or a convoluted moment or a great, big, clunky “as you know… let me explain the plot to you”. The past is explained – but it’s a reminder for a reader who hasn’t read for a while, not an attempt to re-tell the whole book.

And the story itself flows well. It’s wonderfully focused on just one storyline, side issues crop up now and then to each side, there are issues and distractions, but they’re brief and more re-direct the main story than they mini storylines in their own right. The protagonists act in a sensible and realistic fashion, there’s a lot of real emotion, a lot of realness and lot of believability. And not once did I want to lay about the characters with a large haddock for their sheer foolishness.  Everything’s just so well balanced – enough mystery to intrigue, but not so much that it’s lost and hopeless. Enough questions to stop it being linear without becoming distracted. Enough action to be exciting without it being a slog of battles and enough capability from Leila for her to seem competent and strong without her seeming ridiculously perfect and overpowered. All the conflicts were real, both against the enemy and Leila and Vlad’s emotional conflicts, nothing seemed convoluted, nothing seem contrived. It all worked

Review: Once Burned by Jeaniene Frost, Book 1 of the Night Prince Series

In the same world asthe Night Huntress series we’ve moved the focus away from Bones and Cat to Vlad. Vlad Dracul, or, as he hates to be called, Dracula. He lives with the myth that has grown around his name, based on a core of truth but heavily embellished by his enemies, he ultimately has one aim as a vampire – to keep his people safe, no matter who he has to hurt and what he has to do (including impaling) to make that happen.

And someone is trying to kill him and to do that they’re using our protagonist, Leila. Since being struck by lightning, Leila has the ability to see people’s history (reading their past and their sins on their skin) connect to their present and even see their future. Used properly she can see where someone is, where they’re going to be – and when they’ll be alone and vulnerable. Abilities that are certainly a threat to Vlad, but also an asset to him in finding who wishes to kidnap Leila and kill him.

It’s a solid truce, but Leila is confronted with the brutal reality of Vlad’s ruthlessness, she’s willing to work with him, but what would he have done to her, to her family, if she had not been? And how does he treat those who cross him and can she live with that? Especially with her growing attraction to him, compounded by the fact he is immune to the lethal electric shocks her body produces, making him one of the few men she can touch. Unfortunately, he’s also one of the most arrogant men she has ever met – and has a nasty habit of reading her mind and intruding on even her most private thoughts.

This is the same world as the Night Huntress series, which I always loved, following Bones and Cats adventures as we saw an ever growing larger and more impressive world. Even when focusing on just the vampires, (though there are far more than just vampires there) the politics and the intricacies of that world were always great fun to read.

We don’t see a lot of this world in this book, since it is very much stand alone and reading the other series isn’t required, but we do get hints of it coming through, connections and guest appearances that mean if you have read the other series, you can feel the continuation and the stretching of the canon which I really enjoyed. We do follow Vlad, who was an intriguing character from the previous series, but, I have to say, not one I enjoyed very much then or now.

The story itself isn’t original – she has a special power that makes her valuable and the people after her need to be stopped and she kept safe. But it had enough twists to keep it interesting; Vlad’s uneasy relationship with his past, his history and the myths that have built up around his name was a nice twist. Her relationship with her family, her dealing with his ruthless and extreme nature, the way her powers interacted in the mix especially when met with mind reading as well – the core story wasn’t original but the embellishments were. And sometimes I don’t think a story has to be original to be told well so long as the world and the characters can carry it.

The pacing was good, I was never tempted to put the book down, the descriptions were appropriate, even the musings and the internal monologues were appropriate and in context; even the sex scenes fit both the pace and theme of the book. It was nicely put together.

I like Leila as a character. She has an interesting power that makes her valuable and sought after – as well as giving her the ability to defend herself when needed, but it doesn’t make her super-woman and has limits that prevent any kind of “awesome chosen one” level. She can channel electricity (shocking people she touches, even accidentally) and she can read people’s “sins” in their skin – seeing their worst actions and reliving them. She has endured a great deal (and has a tragic childhood and a dead mother, of course) and through that has become jaded and cynical – but not in a bitter, withdrawn manner. She doesn’t trust easily, she doesn’t expect much and, in many ways, she is inured to pain and suffering in many cases because the power of her touch means she has already lived through the worst deaths imaginable. I like how that is done to not take away the horror of torment and torture, while at the same time making the commonness of it something that Leila can endure and move past. If I have a problem with her power, it’s that she didn’t develop it, Vlad had to show her how to use it and it has some dependence on vampire blood – it feels like it couldn’t just be her power, Vlad had to be behind it somehow.

She is kidnapped and suffers terribly for it – but she also rescues herself and ruthlessly deals with her tormentors in an extremely satisfying manner. She has a tragic past and it does mark her with guilt and worry, but she doesn’t spend a lot of time angsting over it, we don’t have long internal monologues nor do we have wailing. Unfortunately, she does have guilt – which is rather misdirected. She reconciles with her family, it’s touching but it’s also a little contrived, like too many major issues are forgiven and covered too quickly and too easily.

Unfortunately, while I do like a lot of things about these characters, they have elements that bother me – and it’s these elements that largely throw a spoke in the wheel of an otherwise great book. Pretty much everything else in the books I like, I’ve always liked the world, I like the majority of the characterisation, the story is pretty good – but the characters have elements to them that I don’t like which, in turn, brings the book down.

Cover Snark: And 2 Seconds Later, Our Heroine Fell Over

Now, Urban Fantasy covers go to many lengths to try and sexualise their heroines. Bodys care contorted, ridiculous costumes

And, sometimes, even gravity is defied! Yes, we’re not going to let a piffling thing like gravity prevent us from posing these women! I have a mental image of the camera snapping and then these women collapsing painfully into a heap.

Ok, maybe these women just have really strong thigh muscles after posing for different covers. But I still think they’re 2 seconds away from their arse meeting concrete.

Cover Snark: She Must Be Freezing

I am repeatedly impressed by how hardy and powerful the female protagonists in Urban Fantasy are. They can take down vampires, werewolves, sorcerers, zombies and all manner of dangerous monsters. And they can do it even in the most ridiculous poses and in the most impractical of armor.

But, I think, more than anything that convinces me these women are superhuman is their ability to endure any weather. Back off, Mother Nature, the Urban Fantasy protagonist will not let your freezing winds or driving snow prevent her from being scantily clad and sexy! This gives new meaning to the phrase, suffering to beautiful.

Good, gods is that ice she’s knelt on? Certain parts of her anatomy must be getting one extremely chill wind with that pose. Maybe this is a new version of Sookie Stackhouse using icepacks to cool her Yahoo Palace? That is one place where frost bite would not only incredibly bad, but painful.  If you must introduce your lady bits to something cold, wouldn’t it make more sense if it were something like this, as macabre as this particular toy is?

And her knee? Kneeling barelegged on ice must freaking hurt. We’re beyond pins and needles here, this is swords and sabres. It makes my bones ache just looking at it.

She is wearing a halter top in the snow. A halter top in the snow. Her arms are bare along with most of her chest In. The. Snow. She is quite literally freezing her breasts off. It almost feels silly to say that her trousers are providing no insulation and her legs. She must be blue with cold, because of this much bare flesh, in the driving snow. I feel an urge to wrap up in a woolly dressing gown and get a big cup of hot chocolate just looking at this picture.

Also, how is it that she thought to wear boots (yes, I’ll be kind and call those ridiculous boots winter ready) and not think about a coat, or for heavens sake a sweater?  I suppose having your boobs hanging out is far more important than protecting yourself from hypothermia.

Cover Snark: Bring on the Mantitteh!

We have done several cover snarks now that show endless depictions of women in body twisted, leg cramping positions to show their spilling cleavage and asses firmly held in extra-tight leather.

After so many sexualised images of women in these ridiculous poses, we feel the need to balance a little: BRING ON THE MANTITTEH!

 

It may tell you nothing about the book, nothing about the plot and nothing about the characters but ripple, waxed torsos decorate many a cover and sell many a book. And, of course they’re wonderful code for the steamy content within. (Actually, since we’re not the biggest fans of Paranormal Romance compared to Urban Fantasy, we often regard the Mantitteh as a warning sign for a book we won’t enjoy that much - MANTTITEH! Be warned, humping lies within!)

Review: One Grave at a Time by Jeaniene Frost, Book 6 of the Night Huntress Series

Cat and Bones have finally settled many things in their lives. The ghoul uprising is over, Cat is settling into her new life as a vampire, the lines are secure and all is peaceful in life.

Of course, that can’t last. And they are approached by a friend of Fabian, their friendly ghostly ally, called Elisabeth. Elisabeth is an ancient ghost with a mission – to kill her murderer. Which she achieved soon after death

Unfortunately, her murderer became a ghost. And Elisabeth wants to kill him again. Especially since her murderer, Kramer, was an evil, misogynist witch hunter who not only tortured and killed women in life, but has continued to do so in death. As an extremely powerful ghost, Kramer can manifest on Hallowe’en and during that time he tortures, rapes and murders women with the help of an accomplice.

Cat and Bones most certainly are not going to stand for that. But exactly how can one kill a ghost? How can you even fight a ghost that you can’t touch –and is capable or throwing rocks, boards and cars at you with enough force to crack skulls and shatter limbs? And how do you keep the ghost’s victims alive against such a force?

This story is interesting because the great and vast powers Cat and Bones have acquired are so utterly useless against a spectral foe. It’s actually interesting to see the protagonists so helpless when they’re so powerful without a convoluted reason for it.

At the same time, the ghost can’t realistically kill a vampire, at least, not easily. It actually makes for an interesting and quite a novel book – more an active game of chess or cat and mouse rather than a full on physical confrontation as each are forced to deal with their own limitations in order to actually face the other.

Of course, this does have a trade off with frustration. Frustration while they are unable it fight, frustration that more can’t be done. Frustration that neither side seems to be getting anywhere. I’m not sure if this is a bad thing of the book –because I think we’re supposed to see the frustration of the situation. It’s frustrating but probably meant to be – there’s a horrendously evil force doing evil things right there that we’re powerless to stop.

While the enemy is a horrendous misogynist evil rapist and there is some appropriation of the witch trials in including him, at the same time it is done that expresses much of the misogyny of those trials and it is deeply satisfying to have Kramer smacked around on a regular basis and eventually thwarted by Cat, yes yes it is. However, I am noticing that as Cat has become a touch vampire, her injury level in these books has gone up considerably though what that injury actually means has gone down.

Review: This Side of the Grave by Jeaniene Frost, Book 5 of the Night Huntress Series

Cat is adapting to her new life as a vampire – and not just a vampire, but a vampire that feeds on other vampires and absorbs their powers – powers that she isn’t always old enough or strong enough to control. More, a newly raised vampire whose powers just killed one of the most powerful living master vampires

And this is a problem for Apollyon, the Ghoul. Or at least a convenient excuse for him. Using the image of the powers Cat has displayed, he is inciting the ghouls to raise up against the vampires, claiming they will use her powers to dominate, enslave and butcher ghouls.

Apollyon is now travelling from city to city, inciting ghouls to hatred – and it’s not the first time he’s used a half-vampire to try to start a war against vampires – last time the half-vampire was killed to placate him. Cat isn’t best pleased with this proposal.

So the hunt is on – to find Apollyon, to discredit him, to stop him by any means necessary – and before more masterless vampires are hunted down or too many ghouls are recruited to the cause.

We had plot, plot and more plot! Indeed many of the sex scenes were taken as a given rather than something that had to be excessively described, and relationship angst came in the form of long needed revelations rather than the eternal moping and misunderstanding. In fact, Cat made little breakthroughs with Mancheres so perhaps we can finally leave her constant suspicion and sniping behind. After the emotional maundering of the last book, this was a wonderful change of pace.

Another wonderful change was Cat’s actions and involvement. After the last book where she spent the vast majority of it being dragged around in other people’s plans, here she was involved. She didn’t always take charge and sometimes she had to follow as much as lead – which was appropriate all things considered (why should the millennia old Mancheres defer to Cat after all?) but she had constant input, intelligent input and was a meaningful part of their plans as well as adding her own plans and ideas that they followed. She was integral, not just for her special shiny powers, but also for her own choice of what to do and how to do it. In this book she was not just a strong, intelligent woman with her own ideas and unwilling to be dictated to, but she was also a team player – and I think that’s important. Often in Urban Fantasy “strong, independent woman” and “works well with others” are considered mutually exclusive – either she’s domineering, violent or drives people off, or she’s a passive follower. Or she refuses to work with others and insists on doing her own thing. This was one of the few times we see a character who is happy to work with others, as an equal, without having to be a complete arsehole or a complete puppet or a loose cannon. 

Review: Destined for an Early Grave by Jeaniene Frost, Book 4 of the Night Huntress Series

Cat is all settling down for a relatively quiet life. Having defeated the attack on their line and Bones now firmly ensconced as the co-ruler of the line with Mancheres, it’s time for a holiday. But, naturally, nothing is that simple.

There is a powerful vampire out there who has his eyes on Cat. Gregor is ancient, more powerful than Bones and is known as the Dreamsnatcher – and for good reason. With the power to invade people’s minds while they sleep and even kidnap them over vast distances, he’s a terrifying enemy.

Cat has to go on the run – a flight that literally takes her around the world, but always in secrecy. Scarcely being able to sleep safely, she has to travel in ignorance of where she is – not even knowing the continent she’s on, for fear of Gregor plucking the information from her brain. In endless frustration, she has to leave her rescue in Bone’s hands, ignorant of his plans.

Worse, as they flee they learn that Cat has a history with Gregor – a long and intimate history that has been erased from her mind. Both Bones and she have to worry about what happened in that time – and what Cat really felt for Gregor. All the while with Cat’s frustration over Bones’ plans and her acting in the dark to try and help him drive a wedge between them.

And if that weren’t enough, the ghouls are worried. If she is this powerful as a half-vampire, what would happen if she were raised as ghoul rather than a vampire? Would she have the powers of both? The answers are worrying people and making them easy recruits for Gregor

 

Last book I felt the series had really picked up. We had tension, action, a lot of lovely world building, an epic enemy and a focus on some powerful, character driven plot.

Which made this book rather disappointing.

At Graves End, by Jeaniene Frost, Book 3 in the Night Huntress series

Cat's world is heating up as she gets further and further away from her job as a vampire hunter. More and more vampires are recognising her as the Red Reaper and her reputation as a warrior and killer is beginning to precede her. And she'll need every bit of her skills as war comes to her door.

It's a war that attacks her mother and her mortal friends. She's forced into hiding, constantly seeking both safety for her loved ones as well as the identity of the vampire that is attacking her and Bones – and setting off a full scale war between their bloodlines.

And in this war we have Mancheres, Bone's grandsire, who has entered an alliance with Bones so their vampire lines can fight together against the massive threat against them – but Mancheres is hesitating and he is not telling everything.

Meanwhile, Cat's old team is going through changes as Bones meets his promise to turn one of them into a vampire. She laos has to deal with the large number of vampires and ghouls Bones and Mancheres have summoned to help them fight the war – and hope dearly that it will be enough.

This is an epic fight for survival, with two vast forces clashing with no mercy or quarter given.

Cover Snark: Oh The Thigh Muscles!

We are introducing a new feature on Fangs for the Fantasy - cover snark. Some of covers on even our most favourite Urban Fantasy books, just beg to be giggled at. We realise authors that don’t necessarily have a lot of power in choosing their covers nor would we judge the content of the book on this basis, unless of course the book has a protagonist of colour but the cover portrays a White person - but we will enjoy a good snark, yes yes we will.


One thing we do see a lot of is similar poses on covers - especially the ridiculous ones that make us giggle.

This one we have to call the “sexy leg cramp”. In theory, these women are aggressive and violent hunters and are ready to leap into action, probably to stake or stab something. Instead I think their legs have gone to sleep trying to hold that pose (and display said legs as much as possible). Their thigh muscles must be killing them and they’ll probably need a hand up to their feet again. Looking at them; it is impossible not to picture a massive cramp that would require hours of massage to alleviate.

Traumatised Youth in Urban Fantasy

What shocked us most about this trope, as we went through our Book Review Master list, was how common this trope was. Literally, we went down our master list and struggled to find series where this trope didn’t apply. No, seriously - nearly every last series we’ve read included this trope. It has become less of a trope and more of a requirement in the genre.

Ilona Andrews’ Kate Daniels series has Kate with a dead mother, a dead stepfather and a hard childhood training to be a killer

Jennifer Estep’s Elemental Assassin series has Gin who was tortured and her parents were murdered when Gin was a child.

L A Banks’ Vampire Huntress series has Damali who lost her parents to vampires and demons when she was a baby

Jim Butcher’s Harry Dresden series has Harry orphaned and then raised by an abusive (and evil) wizard.

Jeaniene Frost’s Night Huntress series has Kat’s mother raped by a vampire who then brought Kat up to loathe herself.

Charlaine Harris’s Southern Vampire series has Sookie as a sexually abused orphan

LJ Smith’s Vampire Diaries has Elena and Jeremy both as having recently lost their parents.

The very premise of the Secret Circle requires that all 6 witches have lost a parent - or two.

Kelley Armstong’s Otherworld series sets new records with unhappy childhoods - Elena lost her parents as a child and was traumatised watching them die then went through a series of foster homes when she was sexually abused. Clay was abused as a child and ran away. Jeremy’s father was abusive. Jaime’s father was dead and her mother was (and is) abusive.

Laurell K Hamilton smashes Kelly Armstrong’s record - Anita lost her mother, Jason had an abusive father, Stephen and Gregory had a sexually abusive father, Nathanial had an abusive father - and of course Meredith Gentry has been beaten, tortured and faced repeated attempted murders by her aunt and uncle and has an abusive mother. The majority of the characters have an abusive or tragic past.

I could go on - Morgan Rice’s Vampire Journals, Patricia Brigg’s Mercy Thomas series, Cassandra Clare’s Mortal Instruments, Yasmine Galenorn’s Sisters of the Moon, Seressia Glass’ Shadowchasers, Kim Harrison’s Hollows, Vicki Petterson’s Zodiac series, Nalo Hopkinson’s Brown Girl in the Ring, Lauren Dane’s Goddess with a Blade - on and on, but tragic childhoods seem to be standard throughout the genre - an inclusive list would literally involve referring to nearly every book we’ve read and every series we’ve watched. It’s almost as thought the authors believe that the reader cannot identify with protagonist unless they are suitably traumatised in some manner. And we’re not talking about loss of a parent - we most certainly know that there are innumerable single parent households where the children have had happy and joyful childhoods. But these are not them. Perhaps the greatest link between these childhoods is not so much the loss of a parent - but suffering, tragedy, pain and angst.

In some ways the ubiquitous nature of lost parents and suffering children makes it impossible to absorb the impact of any of them. It reminds me of Monty Python’s 4 Yorkshireman sketch (originally taken from “At Last the 1948 Show” It has reached the point where it's almost a competition). I can see it now:

Author A: My protagonist had a sad childhood, no-one understood her.
Author B: Well, my protagonist was misunderstood and had a tragic accident
Author C: My protagonist was misunderstood AND lost her best friend
Author A: hah, well My protagonist lost her best friend who died in front of her
Author C: in front of her? My protagonist was splattered by the blood
Author B: Well my protagonist lost her mother - who died tragically in front of her AND was splattered by the blood
Author A: Well MY protagonist lost her mother AND her father and held their hands as they died
Author C: My protagonist lost her parents and was tortured horribly my vampires for 2 weeks
Author B: 2 weeks? My protagonist dreamed of only being tortured for 2 weeks! She was tortured for 10 years!
Author A: MY protagonist was tortured for 100 years in a special pocket dimension of torture!
Author C: My protagonist was tortured in the pocket dimension of torture AND sexual abuse...

And so on and so on. It has reached a point where I read of a character with a terrible, tragic past and I feel no impact from it. It has been so over done that it has lost its emotional impact. It has been used and abused so often as a form of cheap and quick drama that it is demeaned and diminished. I dislike intensely that these life changing and often horrific experiences are reduced to cheap drama and empty characterisation.

And it is empty. Very rarely do these characters have much in the way of long term effects from their traumatic experiences. We rarely see any of them seek therapy, or any kind of help to deal with their past. At best we see a few nightmares or sad moments designed to make them look tragic (or to add a brief barrier in the romance before the magical healing sexing kicks in) rather than to analyse the effects of the abuse. It is offensive that these real life horrendous experiences are treated so cheaply and used so casually without the respect and caution that they deserve. I also believe that this minimises the difficulties of people who suffer with PTSD and similar issues. How many times does true love - or even just good sex - cure the troubled heart, the hurt mind and the scarred soul? Major mental illnesses, extreme past trauma, doesn’t disappear on the wave of a magic wand or by applying a penis the size of one’s forearm. It sets up the idea that if you just push the trauma aside it will either dissipate or become easier to live with over time, or that it is easily solved and cured. To be clear, these are life shattering events and it would not be a weakness to seek help nor are they always cured.

So why do we have this repeated? Well it’s easy characterisation. The traumatic past sets the protagonist up as an underdog, the wounded character that we’re supposed to feel sorry for. By being pitiable we’re supposed to instantly root for the character - we want her to succeed and do well simply because she has been through so much. It’s instant (and lazy) way to get us to identify with the protagonist and to like them. And, again, that is problematic because these really devastating experiences are being used so cheaply - so disrespectfully.

Another usage for the loss of parents also works in a way that it leaves the female protagonist open to the influence of the supernatural. They are isolated, vulnerable and often lacking role models or people they can trust to advise them. In some ways this adds to the predatory nature of many of these relationships especially when we also consider the age gap between the supernatural creature and the, often, school aged protagonist. They are easy prey - wounded, alone and often with less support - which is, in some ways, further victimising them.

Many of these traumatic experiences are also outright abusive. The thing about growing in an abusive situation, is that it is far more often that when one matures the abuse is so normalized that when it occurs again it is seen as acceptable. There is no recognition that they are repeating the past or how the past has influenced their decision to accept clearly abusive relationships. That the woo is used to excuse the violence, stalking and manipulation ends up giving them cause to justify their repeated acceptance of this behaviour thus continuing the cycle.

Of course this is all serves to enforce the role of woman as victim and is therefore highly sexist. Women are not the heroes of their own stories and are only redeemed by the love that enters their life rather than finding the inner strength to seek help or to refute the abuse entirely with a declaration that they deserve more out of love, life and relationships.

All in all, this trope of abused and traumatic childhood is problematic on many levels. It cheapens and exploits severe abuse. It demeans how much this affects your life and it uses severe abuse not as a topic to explore in itself - but as a tool to be used for cheap and easy characterisation. These topics deserve better - and, really, is it really that necessary for every protagonist to be that tragic?

One Foot in the Grave, by Jeaniene Frost. Book 2 of the Night Huntress Series

Cat is back. Now at the head of her own government established force to police and hunt down vampires. 4 years have passed since the last book and she's grown to a powerful, confident leader and a lethal warrior.

But 4 years have also passed without Bones who she can't stop thinking about. As is almost inevitable, he finds her. But he's not the only blast from the past that shows up on her doorstep – her old boyfriend is leaking information about her too assassins and her father, the vampire who raped her mother, has finally raised his head on the scene and it doesn't look like a happy reunion.

And one of her targets got away – well she let him get away. And now he's intrigued and curious and wants to add Cat to his collection of toys. He's unwilling to accept no for an answer and is quite happy to target her colleagues and family to make it happen

And through all this she has to reconcile her old love with her new job, convince her vampire hunting work mates to accept Bones or to decide whether she should leave the job or again deny her lover – to say nothing of her mother who still carries a bitter hatred for all the undead.

Halfway to the Grave, by Jeaniene Frost, book 1 of the Night Huntress series

Cat's father was a vampire – a vampire who raped her mother and was never seen again. She has been raised to hate  all of the undead – and even a part of herself, constantly checking herself – and being checked by her mother – to ensure that she never becomes everything she fears. As part of this – she hunts. She hunts the vampires who troll the bars and clubs, cheered on by her mother.

Until she meets Bones. A vampire who isn't so simple, and a vampire who shakes Cat's oh-so-simple world view. Increasingly she realises that not all vampires are as she always imagined – nor are all humans so clean as she'd like to think. It grows further confusing for her as her relationship with Bones deepens into something more.

Not that Bones is peaceful – he's a vampire with a mission – and that mission involves the deaths of many more vampires and shutting down a predatory ring that no-one would argue is anything but evil.