OK, I can forgive this novel everything I found a bit lacking in it (there weren’t that many things either) because Shayne Leighton is 21 years old.

For anyone writing an interesting, original novel at that age, I really feel I have no argument as to the quality of the story and the dialogues.

Besides, even though several times while reading it I wanted to pick up something else, each time I went to check if I can continue reading this story, I got pulled into it. So, basically, Shayne is a very good story-teller.

The thing I wanted to read more of was the background of the society where the reader finds herself.

There is nothing on that subject which is something I really missed. But if I got it right, this is only book one so there might be an explanation in the next one.

The story revolves around vampire Valek who saved a baby girl in Prague and he raises her as her daughter even though she is no vampire but a human child (although I’m not so sure about that). The story begins with Lottie being old enough to fall in love with the eternally young looking vampire (she’s 20) and there is a fae who wants her for himself and here the plot thickens in previously unguessed ways.

There are parts of the story where reality feels as disjointed as in Alice in Wonderland, then we have the feelings of forsaken (or lost) love in the manner of the young, and some rather romantically pathetic feelings. Coupled with dialogue. 😀

But generally speaking, it was an interesting and unconventional read.

One thing I couldn’t really understand is why the vampires in this novel kill their victims when it becomes obvious later on they can drink without doing so? Is it that they don’t want to leave witnesses? Because it seems these vampires have no hypnotic skills so everyone would remember being bitten…

Tagged: Book review, Fiction, Of Light and Darkness, Prague, Shayne Leighton, Vampire