32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Nancy Collins At Her Best, December 20, 2002
This review is from: Midnight Blue: Sonja Blue Collection (Paperback)
For anyone interested in dark fantasy, goth themes, and/or what I'd now call the "Vampire Genre", this book is great! If you have read Nancy Collins before, be forewarned that this is a compilation of three novels: Sunglasses After Dark, In The Blood, and Paint It Black. It's frustrating to invest in a new book, only to discover you've read it before! However! Although this book is actually three separate works, they fit together perfectly. Since the huge response to Anne Rice's Interview With The Vampire, and her subsequent novels, I couldn't get enough of vampire heroes and especially, heroines. Nancy Collins was not only there with a believeable heroine, but one living in the present day. Sonja Blue is tough, vampiric, and very much one to hold a grudge against the Vampire who made her "unlife" what it is today! On a crusade to eliminate the one who took away her human self, she fights a constant battle to hang on to her own humanity. The battle to hang on to her mental equilibrium, and pacify the vampire personality that shares her mind makes her tough but practical, and down to earth, and it's easy to identify with her. The beginning of the book was the only place that might have lost me, and there's my only real critisism. It takes a while to catch on to the plot, but it's worth it to hang in there! Once you get the idea of what's going on, it's smooth reading all the way to the last pages. One of the features that Collins uses in her "darker" reality, is that of creatures such as Ogres, and Werewolves, although it takes a special kind of human, or another "pretender" as she calls it, to know who is human, and what is not. The surroundings of the characters, from goth bars, to cheezy Southern "faith healing" ministries lend a lot to the plots as well. I think my favorite thing that sets Nancy Collins apart from other good authors of dark fantasy/horror, is her ever present dry wit. Tanya Huff is another author who shares this ability to make her heroine leave you laughing at some of her hiliarious descriptions of events, characters, or occasional side comments. Another great thing about this book is the ability to follow Sonja Blue even after the book has been read. I love authors who create characters that make you yearn to see more of them. For those folks who have not encountered her yet, Nancy Collins has several other books and short stories in which Sonja is featured. Fans of the White Wolf Series will also be able to see elements of the "Vampire: The Masquerade" series in the subsequent book by Nancy, A Dozen Black Roses, without sacrificing the quality of her work. Other Sonja Blue books include Darkest Heart, and Dead Roses For a Blue Lady.
Other authors that I enjoy that write dark fantasy and vampiric fiction with recurring main characters include Alice Borchardt, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, and Barbara Hambly, in addition to Anne Rice and Tanya Huff.
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23 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Vampire Terminator, August 12, 2001
This review is from: Midnight Blue: Sonja Blue Collection (Paperback)
If Buffy is the slayer and Anita Blake is the executioner then Sonya Blue is the vampire terminator! You will get that assumption when you finished the unforgettable epic dark fantasy book chronicling the bloody exploits of one Sonya Blue a young woman who once a rich young heiress by the name of Denise Thorne until she was raped and drained of blood by a vicious vampire by the name of Morgan.Now as Sonya blue she hunts down other vampires hoping to find and destroy Morgan.She must also contend with her alter-ego a sadist demon called the Other that shares her mind and who gains pleasures from killing and pain.In the first book:Sunglasses after dark.You first meet Sonya as she escapes from a mental hospitol and battles a sinister lady televangelist who also is a telepath.She tells you in her own words on how she became a vampire and how she decides to hunt other vampires called pretenders and their human psychic slaves called renfields.The second book:In the Blood sonya with the aid of private eye goes after Morgan.This book gives you more of understanding of Sonya and her terrifying world that invisible to normal humans.A world of vampires,demons, werewolves and succubus.The last book:Paint it Black Sonya finally accepts herself as a vampire as she continues her vendatta against Morgan.Collins has introduces us to unforgettable heroine who is witty and sexy,violent and who still holds our sympathies even after she commits shocking deeds.She also gives a some great characters like private eye-Palmer who agrees to help sonya is her battles and soon regrets it.Anise-the doomed vampire/hybrid who used by Morgan is his attempts to create a master race of vampires.Pangloss-the powerful vampire who made Morgan and now seeks to destroy him.Lethe-the daughter of Anise who transformation will change the world.Collins's Sonya Blue novels are the best dark fantasy since Anita Blake series and filled gruesome scenes of monsters,magic and menace as Sonya takes us guide tour of her frightening world!
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A 'Dark' Read...., December 23, 2006
This review is from: Midnight Blue: Sonja Blue Collection (Paperback)
...But a great read. This Collection really gets you started in Sonja Blue and her life, or un-life(?). This is a dark series and makes Buffy stories look life the cotton-candy stories they really are. This is great urban fantasy. I have really just recently goten into urban fantasy and and digging thru alot of diffrent books. This one one of the first. Great way to start, I think. I am putting this on my keeper shelf and think you should too.
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