Novel Review: Undead and Unpopular (Undead, #5) by MaryJanice Davidson

Genre: Adult Paranormal/Supernatural Romance

Rating (Out of 5): ~3.5

Publisher: Penguin (Berkley Sensation)

Spoilers?: Very Minor.

Goodreads Synopsis:

Vampire Queen Betsy Taylor already has plenty on her plate. For one thing, next week is her birthday - the big 3-1 in human years, and one in undead years. (Yes, she bit the dust on her birthday last year.) On top of that, she still has wedding plans to finalize - and it's not helping that the prospective groom is avoiding anything to do with it. And then there's her decision to stop drinking blood - something she has yet to share with Eric Sinclair, her fiancé - who also happens to be the vampire king...

So the last thing she wants to deal with is uninvited guests, even if they happen to be the powerful European vampires who have finally come to pay their respects the week before her birthday. Some of them don't want Betsy as their queen and will do anything to get rid of her. As if turning thirty last year (not to mention dying) hasn't been traumatic enough. And trying to give up blood is making her really cranky... But who has time to sulk? Well, Betsy does...

Available on Amazon.

Review:

I don’t seem to have too much to say whenever I read a volume of this series. It’s usually just pretty good, not amazing, not bad. I go through the volume rather quickly and then want to read the next one right away.

There was a lot of the same stuff in this book, much like all the others. I like Davidson’s writing, I like the characters, and I usually like the humor, but sometimes it’s a little too much. I wouldn’t mind some serious time, and sometimes the jokes seem to be trying too hard and fall flat. Sometimes, though, it doesn’t, and it’s nice when that happens.

In this book, some new vampires come to town to greet their queen, and some of them cause some trouble. We see Liam and Sophie again, who I very much like (who were in a previous book, as well as having their own story in an anthology). There’s some serious drama between the group, with a somewhat surprise conclusion that I liked. There was a scene where I thought Betsy might do something to take charge, to prove that she’s the queen, she’s in charge, and if they do something wrong she’s going to do something about it, but she didn’t get to. That makes me wonder if she’s going to do something in the future or not, because I really hope she does.

There was also a zombie in this book, which was a surprise and made me feel a bit bad for Betsy because of how rattled she was from it. I’m not quite sure what’s to come of it, but I’m looking forward to it.

There was also some drama for Jessica that was sad. Betsy's birthday happened, and that was nice, although didn't get much attention. There was some blood drinking issues between Betsy and Sinclair that were interesting and I liked the conclusion of, as well as Sinclair's continuous avoidance of wedding plans, which I hope changes in the next book, and I hope there's more attention for them in the next one as well.

I'm still enjoying this series, and hope to start the next book as soon as I get it.

Novel Review: Dead and Loving It by MaryJanice Davidson

Genre: Adult Supernatural/Paranormal Romance - Short Stories Collection

Rating (Out of 5): ~3.5-4

Publisher: Penguin (Berkley Sensation)

Spoilers?: No, just general plot.

Goodreads Synopsis:

 The Barnes & Noble Review
The queen of comic, erotic, other-species romance brings her best setups and hottest sex scenes to this four-novella party. Three of them feature the baaad Wyndham werewolves, who find unanticipated love with often reluctant earthlings.

In "Santa Claus," Alec Kilcurt, the most powerful werewolf in Europe, falls for Santa-clad Giselle Smith and wins her over with lots of oral sex and a heavy Scottish accent. In "Monster Love," bad-tempered Janet Lupo is kidnapped by a sexy werewolf. Then there's the story of Doctor Drake Dragon and his unusual encounter with Crescent. Finally, following the events of Undead and Unreturnable, a psychic werewolf, Antonia Wolfton, receives a vision to show up at Queen Betsy's Minneapolis home to help and falls hard for George, the fiend in the basement. It's all pure Davidson fun. Ginger Curwen

Available on Amazon.

Review:

I don’t really have a lot to say about this, so this is probably going to be a small review, but I did want to talk about this book.

Dead and Loving It is a collection of four short stories by MaryJanice Davidson, some from the Wyndham Werewolves series, and one of them from the Undead series. Now, I read the first three stories a while ago, and enjoyed all of them and read them rather quickly. My favorite was probably Santa Claws, a story in which a werewolf finds his mate in an insecure woman collecting donations during the holidays. However, all of the stories were very cute and funny.

The last one, though, is the one I wanted to talk about most. It’s the one from the Undead series, about George the Fiend. And, my biggest thing about this, is the fact that I didn’t pay attention to what it was about when I read the first three, only that it was based after Undead and Unreturnable, and so I had to read that book first, and then after reading it and reviewing it, and mentioning how I wanted more of George in that review, I picked this up and read it and found out that Davidson had wrote a whole short story for George. I was very surprised, but also very excited.

And the story, A Fiend in Need, was very cute, and funny, starring a werewolf who doesn’t turn into a werewolf but instead has visions, and I really enjoyed it. I liked Antonia, the girl who falls for George (whose name is actually not George), and I still really enjoy George’s character, and their romance was rather odd but adorable. Mostly, I was just pleasantly surprised with this little story.

Now, I’m very much looking forward to reading the next book in the Undead series, where I will hopefully get to see more of Antonia and George.

Novel Review: Undead and Unreturnable (Undead, #4) by MaryJanice Davidson

Genre: Adult Supernatural/Paranormal Romance

Rating (Out of 5): ~3.5

Publisher: Penguin (Berkley Sensation)

Spoilers?: Somewhat minor/Yes.

Goodreads Synopsis:

 MaryJanice Davidson gives vampire queen Betsy Taylor a Christmas to remember in this fourth funny outing in her bestselling Undead series. This time, Betsy's holiday cup runneth over. For starters, Betsy's mother has finally erected Betsy's tombstone in the local cemetery. A psycho nut job serial killer is targeting tall, thin blondes in the Twin Cities: women who look like Betsy. Her vampire mate, Eric Sinclair, is balking at wedding planning and at the modern notion of communication, while her hateful stepmother has just had a baby. Of course, it's time for the irrepressible Betsy to launch an advice column for vampires trying to cope and to team up with a freshly killed ghost to track down her murderer. But why does her sister, Laura, keep taking out that sword? As usual, Betsy floats triumphantly in a sea of chaos, helped and hindered by the usual madcap cast of vampires and humans. (Plus more on Goodreads.)

Available on Amazon.

Review:

I enjoy these books. I like them enough, they aren’t my favorite, but they are easy and fun to read. Generally when I finish one book, I want to immediately read the next one, which is nice, but I also don’t really have a lot to say about each book.

In this book, Betsy is having some troubles with Sinclair, pertaining to him finding out that she can read his mind during sex but he can’t read hers but the book says he should be able to. Betsy’s step-mother also gave birth so she now has a little brother, who seems to particularly like Betsy, which Betsy enjoys because (1) her step-mother doesn’t like it, (2) she gets to spend more time with him, and (3) she likes kids and this way gets to be around him, since she is now unable to have her own. There’s also a serial killer around the neighborhood killing women who look like Betsy, and Betsy ends up finding the guy when one of his now-dead victims comes to her for help.

I liked the Sinclair plot line, as I always do, because I love romance and smut is always fun. There wasn’t really that much time given to Betsy spending time with her half-brother, but I did like what I saw. And the last, serial killer plot line got barely any time, and seemed mostly like a ploy to introduce a new character, Cathie, who is a ghost and seems to be sticking around because Betsy’s life is much more interesting than hers was. Also, to bring Nick, the cop that liked Betsy, into Jes’ life.

Oh, also, there was some drama with Laura, Betsy’s sister who’s a spawn from the devil. I didn’t mind Laura before, but now I don’t like her so much. She went a little crazy at one point and attacked George the Fiend, the vampire that the old master made and starved, and so turned into a twisted creature but, with Betsy’s blood, is starting to turn normal again. I like George, and am looking forward to him turning more normal and talking more, and I just kind of like him for some reason, and so I do not forgive Laura for attacking him. I don’t even care as much that she attacked Betsy, but that does make it worse. I think her punishment was good, but I’m still not happy with her, and I do believe that she’s only going to turn more evil later in the series.

There was also a small plot line with Jon, a character from an earlier book who liked Betsy, who is staying with them and taking a college class and writing a story about Betsy, which unless something big happens with it later, I don’t really care about. Although, one thing bothered me with that: he’s taking a biography-type class, and brought it up to the teacher to write a biography-type story about a fictional character that he’s making up, to cover for Betsy. My problem with this is that, it isn’t a biography if it’s a fictional character. That’s a novel, a fictional book. Not non-fiction. If you wanted to pass something real off as fiction, then take a fiction writing class. That just annoyed me for some reason.

That’s pretty much all I have to say. I liked the book, and am looking forward to the next one.

Novel Review: Undead and Unappreciated (Undead, #3) by MaryJanice Davidson

Genre: Adult Paranormal Romance

Rating (Out of 5): ~3.5

Publisher: Penguin (Berkley Sensation)

Spoilers?: Some.

Goodreads Synopsis:

 Reluctant vampire queen Betsy Taylor may rule the topsy-turvy world of the undead, but now Betsy's discovered that she has a long-lost half-sister who's the devil's daughter--and destined to rule the underworld.

Review:

I really enjoy Davidson’s style of writing. I like her random, Gilmore Girls’ esque style, and I enjoy the stories she tells. The one thing that bothers me, and that I really don’t want to get too tired of, is how similar all of her stories are. Her main characters tend to have a hard time opening up to love, are very open with how much they cuss, the guy tends to fall first, and a lot of the time they even kiss or have sex before they’ve fully fallen. And I don’t mind all of these things, but doing it in every story can get a bit old. I just hope that I don’t get too tired of it too fast; which might mean that I should slow down the time between books.

Anyway, this is the third book starring Betsy Taylor, and I have been enjoying this series so far. In this book, Betsy finds out that she has a step-sister, while dealing with the fact that her step-mother is pregnant. And then, when she tries to read that all-special Book of the Dead, only to kind of turn evil for a short while. Some drama goes on between her and her best friend Jess, and then something happens between her and Sinclair before she finally admits to herself that she loves him and they become engaged. But only because it will make her feel more official about it, while it’s already official in his head, what with their being King and Queen together. Also, her step-sister is the daughter of the devil and is supposed to cause the end of the world, but she doesn’t really have any interest in that.

That pretty much sums up what happened in this book, in as little detail as possible.

I already said that I enjoyed it, and I did.

I’m looking forward to reading the next one, as soon as my local bookstore gets it in. I’m interested in all the wedding stuff that’s going to happen, now that Betsy and Sinclair are married, as well as just the general romance between them. I want to see more of their friends, and just whatever drama is going to come up next.

Novel Review: Undead and Unemployed (Undead, #2) by MaryJanice Davidson

Genre: Adult Paranormal Romance

Rating (Out of 5): ~3.5

Publisher: Penguin (Berkley Sensation)

Spoilers?: Yes.

Goodreads Synopsis:

 Nothing can make Betsy Taylor give up her shoe fetish - even dying and rising as the new Queen of the Vampires. Being royally undead isn't all it's cracked up to be - there are still bills to be paid. And Betsy is determined to live as normally as possible, even if it means getting a job. A "feet" she accomplishes with panache, landing her dream job selling designer shoes at Macy's.

Things couldn't be better - except for her new friends, who keep pestering her while she's on the clock. As if she has time to socialize when there are deliciously sinful shoes to try on - and buy at a discount. It seems that vampires are being murdered in St. Paul, and they're all clamoring for Betsy to do something about it. The worse part is she's going to have to enlist the help of the one vamp who makes her blood boil: the oh-so-sexy Sinclair. Now, she's really treading on dangerous ground - high heels and all...

Review:

I really enjoy Davidson’s books, her style of writing, her characters, and I just seem to eat up her books rather fast. This one, for example, I read in one night, not even meaning to. She has really fast, random-ish dialogue, in a bit of a Gilmore Girls way. Sometimes that’s hard to pull off, and I’m not going to say that Davidson does it amazingly, but she does do it rather well. And in a way that pulls me right in.

Her main characters, at least Betsy and Fred the Mermaid, seem to be rather alike, but that doesn’t bother me too much. And while I think I like Fred more than this series, I am rather enjoying this one. The first book was just good, about a 3 star, but this one was really good. It’s kicking it up, I guess.

I didn’t review the first book, which was a bit of an oversight on my part, but in that one, Betsy turns into a vampire, and ends up being the Queen of them, says The Book of the Dead, because a lot of normal vampire killing things don’t work on her, even though she’s new and still young. She ignores most rules and tells her best friend and her family, and even makes another human friend, that she’s a vampire. And by the end of the book, she has killed the King and is trying to not like Sinclair, who she inadvertently made her King by sleeping with him.

This book starts three months later, when Betsy decides that she needs to get a job. Her best friend, Jessica, is rich and paying for most everything, even though Betsy doesn’t want her to. She’s living with Marc, who’s her male best friend and gay, and then Marc and Jessica decide that they need to all live together in a bigger house when their current one gets termites, so they buy a mansion. Betsy, who is obsessed with shoes, gets a job in Macy’s shoe department. Then she finds out that some people are killing vampires, and they attack her vampire friend Tina. Then they attack her, then she ends up being friends with them, kind of, and figures out that they were only being used by some other vampire out to take her place, and it was surprisingly easy to get to her.

By the end of the book, she’s contemplating her feelings for Eric, who, along with Tina and maybe some other people?, have moved in with her. She’s discovered that most vampires do not accept her as their queen, she can see ghosts, she doesn’t have a job anymore, although I don’t see why she needs one. Apparently, whenever you kill a vampire, and she’s killed three, you get all their stuff. Surely that comes with money, especially when one of them owns several businesses all over the world.

Now, that’s all I’m going to say about the events, because I have given enough away.

I enjoyed this book more than the first one, and already have the next one waiting for me, so I plan to get to it soon. Very soon, hopefully. Being the romance junkie that I am, I'm hoping there will be more romance, more Sinclair, in the next one.