Man in Tweed dot Com

Books 07 — 09

This post was written by Mike

Book 7: Undead and Unappreciated by MaryJanice Davidson

The wife brought this home from the library by accident she was trying to get Undead and Unworthy so I can catch up before reading the newest.  This is a Betsy the Vampire novel. Light, little nutritional value, but sweet and happy. The series is the lemon meringue pie of the literary world. And I love it. This particular book starts getting into the whole Book of the Dead and what can happen if Betsy actually reads it. We meet a new character, kill off a bunch of stupids, meet an old character in a new way.  Rating: B

Books 8 and 9: Dead Witch Walking and The Good, The Bad, and the Undead by Kim Harrison

My biggest problem with Kim Harrison is the fact that I’ve read her completely out of order and haven’t the foggiest idea where anything is supposed to happen in the Hallows series. We were house/dog sitting for my in-laws and they have the omnibus collections and the novels that follow. I decided it was a good a time as ever to try and read the series properly. DWW is a great introductory novel to a rather neat universe. Instead of focusing on hard science the world went to microbes and genetically modified everything.  Tomatoes killed the world by accident and the ‘supernatural’ element came out of the broom closet to keep life working. Harrison works hard at pointing out the little things that make her universe unique like mundanes having a panic attack at tomatoes (and the subsequent move of pizza parlours to the realm of the vampiric) to witches not knowing how to swallow an aspirin.  The GB&U however has always bothered me. I found it boring in parts and this time around I just skipped over a whole section (dinner in the restaurant). However I now know what it is that bothers me. These two novels should, by rights, be one gigantic novel. I understand why they aren’t. I understand why the second novel can stand on its own. I simply like it less and quite frankly there are probably a lot of readers out there who will consider it to be the deeper novel of the two. I do like the series and will keep reading it, in order this time. Rating: A + B = B+

Tags: 95 Books