Karissa E. (ophelia99) reviewed on 3/19/2009 + 2527 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 4

Ah, the next book in the Meredith Gentry series (book #6 if you want to keep track). This is a series that I read because I like reading about the Seelie and Unseelie courts. I am not sure why else I read it. The plot is complex and interwoven and the characters interesting. Meredith herself is an interesting contrast of personality traits. Like most of Laurell Hamilton's books I think I can best review this by breaking it down into the good, the bad, and the ugly.

This series makes no secret about devoting itself to sex. Strangely this book was lacking in the proliferate number of pages devoted to sex scenes. There were a measly two sex scenes; no sex until around 200 pages into the book...I mean wow! That's got to be a record. There is a lot of talking about sex. So onto the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The Good
- The plot moves...seriously the plot actually advances in this book (notice I didn't say quickly). A good portion of the 300+ pages are devoted to plot!
- We get to hear about Frost's past; I love Frost and I loved hearing about his past.
- Amazing fairy things continue to happen and amazing creatures are introduced
- The book focuses on 4-5 of Merry's "men" instead of having her sleep with a plethora of them
- The Red Cap goblins are back; I love them.

The Bad
- Continuous rants about how every kind of sex is acceptable take up loads of page space. We get it, S&M can be a good thing, multiple partners can be fun...now let's move on.
- Merry humoring her thousand year old boyfriends' need for constant emotional support; geez if I had to try and not to hurt the feelings of 20 guys at once I guess it would take time...but does it have to take up soooo much page space???

The Ugly
- Merry's guards seem to never be around to guard her when something extremely bad happens...what it up with that!
- This whole book, like the last two, spans a time frame of maybe a day.
- Rumors are that Swallowing Darkness is not the end, we will continue to be tortured by this incredibly strung out story.
***SPOILER START****
- Much of the book is taken up preparing with you for a sex scene between Merry and the goblins but it doesn't lead much of anywhere.
***SPOILER END*****

Okay so, in general this book had more plot and less sex than I was actually expecting so that is a good thing. It focused more on characters I like and less at throwing in a billion new men for Merry to have at it with. All-in-all I wasn't disappointed. I read a ton of paranormal genre books and these books are still very creative and reasonably well-written compared to most of them. I know it's easy to gripe about the lack of plot, etc. etc. I am guilty of that too; still Hamilton is a good writer. I mean how many other people have made erotica hit the New York Times bestseller list?

I'll read the next book because I am a sucker for the characters. I am hoping the series doesn't drag on for too much longer though. Seems to me the overall story could come to an end soon.

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