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234 of 250 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fascinating and Highly Sensual Series, August 24, 2003
Dark Prince is the first in the fascinating and highly sensual Dark series created by the very talented Christine Feehan. It is a world of mystery, danger, intense emotions, extraordinary psychic and physical power. The Carpathians are a wise and ancient species, appearing just like humans except that they can live for millennia and have amazing psychic and physical powers. Only sunlight and violent wounding can destroy them. They sleep during the day, deep in the healing earth, and are awake at night, thriving in the darkness. They are in perfect harmony with the earth and all its plants and animals. They can shape shift into any animal and even become as fog. They move, travel and heal themselves with phenomenal speed. And they survive on human blood-yet they never kill the donor and gently wipe out his/her memory of their "feeding." The male is a predator, dark and dangerous, and this darkness grows until he finds his life mate-the feminine light that perfectly balances and illuminates his darkness. If he does not find his life mate soon enough, the male gradually loses his emotions and his ability to see in color. He is condemned to a lonely, dark and despairing world devoid of all happiness. When he does find her, he regains his emotions and his world becomes brightly colored, full of joy and hope. But for many hundreds of years no female Carpathians have been born, and few males have survived infancy. To make matters worse, many males who have not found their life mates have become so filled with dark despair that they have "turned," becoming vampires who can then feel exhilaration by murdering humans and Carpathians. Carpathian males have had to focus much of their energy on tracking down and destroying this threat to all life while themselves resisting the overwhelming temptation to turn. Some have tried to take human women as their life mates, but the women have gone violently insane when their bodies were converted to Carpathian and had to be destroyed. When Dark Prince begins, Mikhail Dubrinsky, the very wealthy and handsome prince of the Carpathians, has decided to walk into the sunlight and thus end his life. He wields enormous power over himself, others and all the elements, but his extreme loneliness and despair at ever finding a life mate have become overwhelming. He can no longer bear to go on, even though he feels a strong duty to lead his people and to wipe out vampires from the earth. He is afraid that he will turn himself if he waits any longer. And then he hears a sweet female voice in his head-one of compassion and comfort. Raven Whitney has journeyed all the way from America to the remote and beautiful Carpathian mountains for a much-deserved rest. She is a supremely gifted psychic who has assisted the police in tracking down mass murderers-a nauseating task that damages her body and spirit but which she undertakes because of her compassion for the victims. She is all that is light and goodness, and she reaches out to Mikhail when she feels his overwhelming loneliness and despair. She is herself no stranger to loneliness; she must keep as far away from other people as possible to avoid being bombarded by their thoughts and emotions. Mikhail is astounded by this psychic contact and immensely enjoys the teasing banter Raven mentally projects to cheer him up. He travels to her in the form of a bird and, observing her, realizes that she is his life mate. But how can this be? She is human. And how can he convince a woman who doesn't even know that Carpathians exist that she is his life mate? Mikhail and Raven embark on an extraordinary relationship-fun, tender and sensual-that keeps the reader riveted. In the meantime, they are faced with danger from a group of fanatical vampire hunters bent on killing anyone who's not human. Mikhail and Raven team up to stop them, but clash over Raven's determination to take an active role that often places her in grave danger. As a Carpathian, Mikhail is extremely protective and highly possessive of this woman he loves with a passion that goes beyond the most intense human feeling. He is tender, gentle and caring toward Raven while utterly ruthless and violent with his enemies. He will faithfully cherish her forever and will himself die if she does. Once life mates unite, they cannot live without being in frequent contact with each other. But how can he live forever with a human or convert her to Carpathian without destroying her? And how can he protect her from evils she doesn't realize exist? Dark Prince is a riveting story full of action, surprise, passion and the depths of love. Feehan has created a mesmerizing hero that every romance reader can fall in love with and the wondrous world of Carpathians that is fascinating to explore. I could not put Dark Prince down and am eager to read all the novels in this unusual and compelling series.
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48 of 49 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The author's cut has made a really good book even better!!, March 14, 2011
Dark Prince has been a favorite book of mine for a while. It is one of those books that I re-read at least a couple of times a year just because the story resonates. I'm not sure what I was expecting with the author's cut and the extra 100 pages (maybe a couple of deleted chapters...). Instead, we see the characters build and grow. In the original release, I always felt that Gregori was a stronger character than Mikhail, but with the restored pages, we see that Mikhail has some bite (pun intended!!) Not only that, but Raven is not quite the "Pollyanna" she comes off as in the original release. I like her even better, now!
I will admit to cringing when Mikhail started to use some Carpathian phrases near the start of the book, even giving an audible "OH, NOOOOOOOO". But, fortunately, the inserts are sprinkled in sparingly.
If you like the original, I think you will love the the author's cut. I do!!
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144 of 160 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
This Vampire Romance Needed an Editor ... and a Plot, July 28, 2005
This review is from: Dark Prince (The Carpathians (Dark) Series, Book 1) (Mass Market Paperback)
I had expected to enjoy the vampire romance, DARK PRINCE, by Christine Feehan, having read so many raving reviews about it. However, I should have paid closer to attention to the reviewers who termed the book "repetitive" and "boring," as I agree wholeheartedly on both accounts.
The gist of the story, in one sentence, is that Carpathian vampire prince Mikhail finds his life mate, a human woman with telepathic abilities, all the while battling evil vampire hunters determined to exterminate his kind.
It took me 3 weeks to finish 314-page DARK PRINCE, and that is abnormal for me, since I usually finish a book within hours. It felt like torture, reading this book, and I only made myself finish because I always wonder if it might get better. It did not.
So what are some of my grievances?
Well, for one, there is no tension in the book. Mikhail and Raven are in love right from the start, and have sex like 5 or 6 times by page 100. Where is the conflict in that? Why should I continue reading it? Well, apparently the author felt the laughable subplot in which Carpathian vampires are being hunted by vampire slayers was actually interesting. Sorry, no. The vampire slayers (repeatedly referred to as fanatical assassins) are a bunch of one-dimensional characters who die so fast it's not worthwhile to remember their names. They don't make for interesting or compelling villains.
Two, this book was in dire need of an editor. How many times does the author need to refer to Mikhail's predatory movements and muscular body or to Raven's innocence and compassion? Other phrases that became grossly overused included "little one," "her narrow rib cage," "her large blue eyes," "her large blue-violet eyes," "silky hair," "his voice was black-velvet seduction," "I'm an American," "I'm intelligent," and (my personal favorite) "I have brains." Yes, we all do, thank you.
Three, Raven was a stupid heroine. The whole book was mostly exposition in which she is arguing with Mikhail about everything and everyone, punctuated with my favorite idiotic repetitions of "I'm intelligent" and "I have brains." No you don't, not when you throw yourself in danger at every single turn, resulting in near-death experiences for you and the people around you. The ONLY time I thought this book was interesting was when Raven was stabbed five times in the gut. I was so happy! And that is really, really sad.
So, as you can see, I pretty much loathed this book.
Now, interestingly, my paperback copy of DARK PRINCE came with a "bonus" 150-page short story called DARK DESCENT, which I was very, very reluctant to read at first. Luckily, that story had a plot and lots of action, plus interesting characters, so I finished it in about 2 hours. DARK DESCENT is about how Joie, an American bodyguard and psychic, goes exploring in a cave and discovers her Carpathian life mate, Traian, as well as a bunch of really nasty evil vampires who want to kill them. While the story had its super-cheesy moments (why do people feel compelled to call vampires "blood suckers"?), it still was fast-paced and interesting, much more interesting than DARK PRINCE. So at least I didn't completely waste $7.99 on the book.
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