What a fantastic book. Amazing writing.

I had come across this book over and over again. I had passed it up because I thought it was for teen agers. I was so wrong. The person who changed my mind was Justin Furstenfeld, Blue October's front man and Entertainment Weekly. Justin was opening up for Stephanie Meyer's book signing sessions. He commended her writings on his website as well. After viewing this I was intrigued. A week later the movie was on the front cover of Entertainment Weekly. Although the cover does no justice to Edward Cullen, the handsome, model looking vampire. That was it. After viewing and reading the article. I had to get the book. In the article the author states she was writing for herself and not in particular to teen agers. I was sold. I ordered the book and I have now read the whole series.

This book is about eternal love. A love that lives on forever. Literally. It's about acceptance. And it's about the love of family. The Cullen family is a great family of vampires. A handsome father and beautiful mom and four beautiful vampire babies that are perpetually teen agers. This modern story of vampire amour isn't your Nesferatu type. There are no coffins and they don't prey on humans. They are vegan vamps. Yes, indeed.

This is a classic girl meets vampire, girl falls in love with vampire story. However, there are complications. What is life with out complications ?? What can you do ? You will love this story and get caught up in it. Be prepared to fall in love with the heroine, Bella Swan and her boyfriend, Edward Cullen. You will giggle when she ogles his body and chest. And you will love him when at a restaurant the waitress is falling all over him but he doesn't even notice. He only has eyes for Bella. MERCY ! Where can I get one ? Don't you just hate when those skanky waitresses start coming on to your boy friend ?
You wouldn't have to worry if you had a boy friend like Edward.

The writing in this book is impeccable. My hat is off to Stephanie Meyer whom I pray keeps on writing. Her writing will make you cry and touch you straight in the heart. She is a jewel of a writer and I hope she continues to bless us with her talent. There are no graphic sex scenes here. It doesn't need it. It's perfect just the way it is.

Get this book and get ready to be swept away to a world where you can fall in love with anyone. Okay, so what if he has fangs. He's worth it. Mortal men could take a few lessons from the ever dapper, ever eloquent, ever attentive, ever a vamp - Edward Cullen.

If you want to enhance your reading. Read this book while listening to Enrique Inglesias'"Insomniac" c.d. He has songs about vampires, in some you can hear some wolves howling, and in one song he even sings about"Sweet Isabel". With Enrique or without him you will totally fall in love with this story. Enjoy and get ready for an adventure.

A Ghoulish Delight for Both Adults and Kiddies

Gaiman is a master story-teller, there is no doubt about that, but it's very hard to think of him as a children's story-book writer (and yes I know he has written other children's books before, but they always seemed...not quite right). However, after reading through this novel of his one can clearly see that he has the skills necessary to delight and educate the young ones without dulling it down too much or losing the young ones on the way.

The story can be considered to be an homage to Kipling's"Jungle Book" with excellent references being made to Kipling's story that are easily recognizable. The hero of the tale, Nobody Owens, is endearing, while at the same time not a weak character. Except for the fact that he was raised by ghots of the graveyard, he is an entirely believable character, which makes the novel even more enjoyable.

Fans of Gaiman will not be disappointed by this novel, those new to him will definitely enjoy it, and those who are looking for a good book to read to a child will also be well served by this.

After the boring, out of sync rubbish of Demon Apocolypse, and the uneventfull mess of Death's Shadow Mr.Shan is finaly back

Now, befoe you read this and start shouting 'IDIOT' i would just like to say this, i AM a HUGE Darren Shan fan, but lets face it, Demon Apocolypse was utter garbage, it strayed from his style with bad writing and the stupidest plot twist of all time.
And Death's Shadow wasn't much better, it was uneventfull and provided next to no story advances (impart from the death of a certain character), suffice to say his last two were horrible weak points.
But now we have Wolf Island, a story running parralel to Death's Shadow (cliche or what?), but hell is it GOOD!
The story advances in leeps and bounds, making up for the past two rubbish books, the characters feel more like what they did in the first four books (thankfully), making the veterans of the series relate and like them again.
The writing style is back to, in Demon Apocolypse and Death's Shadow he seemed to of been suffering from a horrible writers block in which he had to force story out, but it's clearly been kicked out o the way now.
It's smooth, violent and gritty, just how it should be.
In two words: Much better

poorly written.

Laurell K Hamilton's books have been getting steadily worse for a long long time. I'm still reading in the hopes that she'll start to show some of what used to make her so enjoyable again. The early Anita Blake books were quite entertaining and when the Merry Gentry series started I really enjoyed the first few books too. Sadly things started to slide when the books lost all plot and descended into almost constant sex scenes that spanned the whole entire book. I enjoy sex in books but not to the exclusion of plot. This book can't be tarred with that reason for being bad however as the sex is kept to a minimum - well as minimum as LKH seems to be able to keep it these days anyway and there is a storyline of sorts.

To summarise the plot, the book starts directly after the events of A Lick of Frost (Meredith Gentry 6) with Merry in hospital after being raped by her Uncle Tarranis (Merry shows almost no signs of any trauma - very strange) then a plot to kill Merry's guards begins to unfurl and Merry calls up te wild hunt in revenge to go chassing after the plotters. And that's about it as far as plot goes, Merry reacting to all that the seelie and unseelie and the sluagh and the goblins can throw at her while gaining magical power ups from the Goddess. There is a plot, even if it's mostly the tying up of old threads and dealing with random people that get in her way.

The real problem I found was her repetitive and silly descriptions that read as if they had been lifted directly from one book to the next. On more than one occasion I laughed out loud they were so bad - it sort of spoils the mood of the story when the terrible prose distracts you from the plot. Everything is all sparkly and moonlight lit with detailed pointless descriptions of hair and clothes and rose petals raining from the sky.

I enjoyed the early Merry Gentry novels and I suppose that this book could have seen an end of the series as many of the loose ends from previous books have been tied off. Her father's killer has been unmasked and her enemies defeated for the most part. Unfortunately I don't think that this will be the case and more stories will be spun out with Merry doing more sparkly, magical, and wonderful things with new powers given conveniently by the Goddess just in time and with conversations that start in the middle of the action and just drag on and on to showcase Merry's wonderfullness. I think LKH need to take a break from writing for a while not churn out a Merry and an Anita book every year. She needs to go back and re-read all her books and rediscover her characters for herself and maybe things might improve. I'm still reading in hopes they do but i'm not sure how much longer I will be.

Fascinating... Enjoyable

First book I have read by Karen Chance, and found it enjoyable.

I liked Cassie, at times she could be infuriating... but thats normal, charactors can't always do what you want them to do.

I liked the fact that we got loads more magical creatures like demons and mages, and can't wait to read the 2nd in this series.

I definately recommend this book to anyone who likes fantasy, vampire, werewolf type fiction.

awsome

this seiries is by far the best.i started reading shan at an early age and ive grown up with the dementor but i moved to china so cant get this book ive tried to get my sister to get me it but she didnt aw well,the last book was one hell of a clif hanger who would have thought that juni had turend evil!its really awsome.cant wait to get this book

Slawter review

The book takes off where Lord Loss ended, with Grubbs, Bill-E and Dervish Grady all try to live a normal life. Then a horror movie director invites them to come an join her as they film Slawter, the most realistic demon film ever.
But who is this director really working for?
Why are children going missing?
And why are the Demons on set looking realistic... too realistic?

Lord Loss is back, and wants revenge on Grubbs.

BUY THE BOOK! It's brilliant.

slow

a good book...

but not up to normal shan standard

a cliffhanger

Its not as good as the others but its still quality!!

This book is another from the Demonata series (by none other than Darren Shan) and continues from Bec. With the re-introduction of a previous character into the book, the book becomes a tool of questions as you start to wonder why on earth the new character has arrived.

Apart from that the book progresses a litte slower than usual but still packed with violence and action. The one big down point is that the book ends on a very interesting cliffhanger, but believe me when I say this... this book is just a warm-up for the next :D (I have read the next by the way)

Chilling

a very un predictable tale with lots of gore and humore

a fantastic shock @ the end of the book

cheers shan

Courtesy of Teens Read Too

Bec has never led a normal life, or was never given the chance to. Born only remembering her mother and how she passed away, Bec was saved by a village's priestess who urged the village leaders to let her live. Making her the priestess's apprentice, Bec was able to learn the magic and potions that would be used in aid of those who fought in battles.

Unfortunately for Bec, she didn't know how many battles her village would be facing.

Never a quiet night, Bec's village is continuously invaded by demons, the Fomorii, who come to tear the village apart. And every night Bec must use what she has learned, which isn't much since the priestess was killed way before she was able to pass on everything she knew.

Used to having other villagers come through, Bec's village is visited by Run Fast, a boy who says that his village is in trouble. Unsure of his story or of what side he is on, the warriors feel an obligation to help and so set off to end their fight. Usually the priestess does not go along with the warriors, but this time Bec sees fit to travel with them, hoping that this journey will help her figure out what troubles her and hopefully to become one with her surroundings and her magic.

Fighting off the demons is not an easy feat, especially since both worlds have just been connected, making it easier for the demons to enter, multiplying their numbers every time one is killed. Magic is what destroys them -- and the lives of the villagers and the warriors are in the hands of Bec.

Thrilling and different from the other novels in the series, BEC is a courageous novel that leaps off the pages and plays with our imagination. The descriptions are vivid and the story is unique. With an ending that will leave you breathless, BEC is a great addition to the already popular series, THE DEMONATA.

Reviewed by: Randstostipher"tallnlankyrn" Nguyen

Suprise ending!

This book is pretty awesome, I couldnt put it down, I read it within a day, and the ending was such a suprise. This is a book I could deffinatley read again!

The plot thickens!!!

This is an excellent addition to the Merry Gentry series, whilst it continues the theme of sex, more sex, and yet more sex, it continues to move the story on.
You find yourself empathising with Merry as she tries to look forward to what happens if she does get pregnant and has to stick to one man, and worries about who it will be, and what will happen to the rest.
The continuing peeks into the minds of the supporting characters really helps to draw you into the world.
Once again another page turner - keep you up all night till you've finished it - book from LKH.

Overrated, Pointless and Creepy

My class and I read Coraline at school over the period of a few weeks, and after hearing all the hype about Gaiman's works I must admit, I was disappointed with Coraline.

The book starts out alright, a young girl in a huge scary house, with a door that appears to be uninteresting, but as the book progresses the whole thing becomes fast-paced and pointless.

We, as the readers, are forced to endure pointless conversations and long and boring descriptions of every little thing that Coraline goes through. There were many times where I got incredibly bored reading it, something which I wasn't expecting at all.

There are parts that are bone-chillingly creepy though, but more creepy in a slightly disturbing way than in a scary way. The Other Mother was most definitely the creepiest thing in the book, with her paper white skin and large black button eyes.

Most of the characters in the book were either boring and undeveloped with no personality what-so-ever, or horrible, creepy and unlikeable. Coraline herself is possibly the most unlikeable person in the entire book, as she is completely unsocialable and comes across as a trouble-maker.

I'm 12 years old, and the book was boring for me to enjoy , but would be much to creepy for a younger age.

All-in-all, this book is creepy, pointless and boring, with the exception of a few minor parts, which is why I gave it 2 stars.

Sophie (On my Mum's Account)

Just another predictable novel...

With a cover as flashy as this you'd atleast expect something along the lines of decent writing...
But no. We get this...
I couldn't get any further then the third chapter - I got so bored early on, probably because i've grown up reading books from the great authors, Darren Shan, Ray Bradbury, Keith Gray... ETC...
This had the lamest main character i think i've ever come across, she had no personality, not at the begining anyway! Pfft! That's certainly a few quid that could have been spent better!
Acctually it was a kind of good idea, but i guess the authors simple writing techniques had rather let the book down a bit to much, i may add...

Good story - Buy Skeleton Crew.

Just a short note to say this story is available in the book 'Skeleton Crew', which is much better value for money. Stephen King is a master of the horror novel, but a lot of his short story collections are highly underrated.

Darren Shan Books

Me and my friend was late for class nd we really needed a reading book for registration or we will get detension. So me nd my m8 ran 2 da libary 2 choose a book. He loves darren shan books so he got 1, i grabbed a random book by darren shan 2, it was called"Cirque du freak". I fought the title was lame but when I read da book, i was astonished! Now I'm buying the saga of Darren Shan after reading 1 book.. I think that proves how good his books are. U will keep reading, if ur gonna stop on one page- u will jus carry on reading without realising. His books will change ur life forever.

Imaginative dark vampire adventure....

After watching the first few episodes of True Blood on HBO, I was enthralled with what seemed to be a darker, more humorous updated version of Buffy The Vampire Slayer and discovered the series was based on a set of novels by Charlaine Harris.
I ordered the first four and read them within a week. Whilst they were markedly different from HBO's version, I quickly became involved with the characters and the world in and around Bon Temps.
The novel revolves around a mind reading waitress, her vampire boyfriend and the emergence of Vampire society. The setting of Louisiana is original and the characters of Sookie and the vampires around her are fascinating. We don't leap immediately into the supernatural world, but learn along with Sookie, that not everything is as it seems, and whilst exciting - there is a much darker undertone.
Charlaine writes fromm Sookie's perspective - you can almost hear the southern drawl as the chapters progress, and Sookie's spirited and sometimes hilarious narrative keeps you riveted. The typical and traditional gothic stereotypes of vampires are deftly sidestepped, and Charlaine doesn't reinvent the concept of vampires as much as reinvigorates them.
The only shortcoming of this book is that it ends too soon, but on the plus side, the continuing books in the series are consistent and builds on previous storylines, subplots and characters. I can't believe I've not picked up these books before now, and am lookinng forward to reading the rest of the series.