Slacker Review: The Morganville Vampire Series by Rachel Caine

This series fell into my Vampire Reading Challenge.

I'd seen a bit here and there about this series, but hadn't really decided if I wanted to give it a read until I saw Danielle's review. Then I knew I had to read this series. I'm so glad I did!

There are 7 books out already, with the eighth, Kiss of Death, to be released April 27. I'm just going to give an overview of the books already available. Sort of. My original thought was to just link to Danielle's review and say "What she said.", as Danielle's enthusiasm for this series is very evident in her excellent review.

The story centers around Claire Danvers. She's some sort of child prodigy, a 16-year-old in her first year of college. She'd wanted to go away to an Ivy Leage school but her parents convinced her to attend a community college closer to home. The problem is, she's being bullied to the point that she almost died, so she decides to seek off-campus housing. She ends up renting a room at the Glass House with 3 other people: Michael Glass, the home's 18-year-old owner, Shane Collins, Michael's best friend, and Eve Rosser, a goth-girl works at a local coffee shop.

Here's the thing. Unbeknownst to Claire, the town is controlled by vampires. They are in charge of everything and (almost) everyone. Residents make regular "donations" to the local bloodbank and have vampire "patrons" so they can go about unmolested by other vamps. The residents of the Glass House fight the vampire control and do not have patrons. When Claire finds out what's really going on she's incredulous but soon has reason to believe.

I really enjoyed these books. Claire is a scrappy heoine who uses her smarts to work her way out of sticky situations. She's got a major crush on Shane (as do I!) and their relationship is sweet. Michael and Eve are good friends to have. Her roomates are fiercely loyal to Claire; the vamps on the other hand, well, the vampires in this series are in turn fascinating and creepy.

One of the things I like about this series is that you never know for sure who's on which side of good or evil or what any particuar vamp is plotting. There are a couple of characters that I think have Claire's best intersts at heart, but I'm not exactly positive. She does a wonderful job of navigating between the good and bad characters to keep her friends and the town safe and makes some very difficult (and dangerous) choices in the process.

I'm thinking this review probably doesn't make much sense, but there's so much going on at this point in the series that it's hard to put it all together. I can't believe I came into the series this late in the game but I'm glad I got to read the first seven books back-to-back. I'm anxiously waiting for Kiss of Death.

Be warned, however, Ms. Caine may well be the Queen of the Cliffhanger Ending. I'm just sayin'.

Here's my ratings so far:

1. Glass Houses: 4/5 stars
2. The Dead Girls' Dance: 4/5 stars
3. Midnight Alley: 4/5 stars
4. Feast of Fools: 4/5 stars
5. Lord of Misrule: 3/5 stars
6. Carpe Corpus: 4/5 stars
7. Fade Out: 5/5 stars

Thanks Danielle for recommending this wonderful series!!!