Customer Reviews

Realm of Shadows

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

That lovely maximum, 'even Homer nods' (even the best author occasionally falls asleep at the wheel) is the only explanation I have for this book. Shannon Drake is an excellent writer, that being said, you'd never know it by reading REALM OF SHADOWS. Why?

Well for one thing, the female lead in the story is an annoying little snot named Legion--er, I mean Tara who has a bad habit of hanging out with American vampires in France. Now I understand why Tara is skeptical about the whole, supernatural world being real, thing. Really. But there is a difference between cynical and tedious and it took Satan THREE HUNDRED PAGES before she stopped saying: "No... it can't be. This isn't real! It's not happening, blah-blah-blah." Mind you, she was cool with the fact that her boyfriend (Trent) can read minds and hypnotize with his eyes, because--can't everyone? But the minute he tries protecting her, returning her stuff, saving her life or warning her of danger and suddenly tall-dark-and-furry is just a BIG JERK.

M'kaay.

The freakiest part of the book, I think, wasn't the werewolves, vampires, and mad scientists though. It was Tara turning into Buffy the Vampire Slayer going on 'killing spree' in the last 50 pages. What was up with that? Suddenly her usual diatribe of, "You're lying, this isn't happening, its not real!" gets turned into, "You talk'n to me? Are YOU talk'n to ME?" and things just went down hill from there. For those of you are new to Shannon Drake's work, my recommendation is to just pretend this book doesn't exist. (Realm of what? Nope, never heard of it.) Then go read Deep Midnight or any of her others because she really is a great writer--usually--but, yes, even Shannon Drake nods.

I have read Shannon Drake before, and for the most part I have enjoyed her books. I wish I could say the same for this one. This is a contemporary romance novel set outside of Paris. The setting a small town outside of Paris where two female cousins are worried about their aging grandfather who they think is going off the deep end because he believe in vampires. Sounds good except that it never really goes anywhere. There are many charactors in this book. It would have been nice to know some detail about their lives. Everything is very obscure and no one is really brought to life. The love interest between Tara and Brent is so lukewarm that it's practically none existant. It's hard to believe that this is even a romance novel. It is about as romantic as a TV dinner on a Saturday night.

This is not Drake's best. Some Characters are back from her Beneath A Blood Red Moon Series. This book fails to make the reader really get into the book emotionally. I feel that the author may be trying to introduce us to a new series of books with more nightworld creatures with the introduction of warewolfs into the vampire stories and vampire hunters but this is not Shannon Drake's best. For a really good book read When Darkness Falls.

Shannon Drake/Heather Graham really needs to get out of the horror/romantic suspense genre. This is the fourth book by her I've read and out of all of them only the first one, Beneath a Blood Red Moon is worth reading. Maggie, the vampiric heroine of the first book, was a strong, clever, compassionate heroine, but after that, Drake has given us nothing but nosey dingbats caught in the middle of a conspiracy of darkness. It wasn't quite as bad as Drake's last offering, Deep Midnight and she's cleaned up some problems that have plagued her earlier works.
Tara Adair has come to Paris to visit her ailing grandfather at the request of Ann, her French cousin. At the same time, a crypt is being execavated. A horrible murder occurs and a ruthless vampiress is terrorizing the city. Gramps keeps mumbling about something called the allience and vampires, and Tara just keeps running into weird people like Brent Malone.
The characters are all pretty much one-deminsional but Drake has kept the unnessecary cast of thousands to a minimum. Drake still has a problem with keeping her facts straight; Jade DeVeau is said to be still a human though in the last book said she was a vampire. Who finally get to see Rick, a loose plot thread from the 2nd novel, and Lucien and Ragnor are trotted out for no reason at all. Drake still has a problem with inserting weak, confusing scenes that make the novel seem campy, like they are from a teen slasher flick. The conspiracy of darkness is better plotted and less far-fetched than the one in Deep Midnight, but it is contered by a very far-fetched conspiracy of good. Now the secret-anti-vampire-society of the Alliance I could believe but not a weak vampire intelligence network that realies on physic vision to locate evil-doers.
Tara almost seems to play no real part in the plot at all. Her cousin Ann plays a more important role than she does in moving the plot along. Tara's romance with Brent is horribly under-developed. These characters don't even really trust each other before they are sleeping together, and Brent's secret seems to make no emotional impact on Tara. But the only reason Tara is even the book (and here's what ruins it) is that she is destined to be the next vampire-slayer of the Alliance! So the evil guys have cooked up this whole conspiracy to pick off her, Ann, and gramps when they could have picked the dingbat off at in time in the last 30 years if they were really worried about her! Ha! And she can suddenly defeat the super-powered vamps with no training. No, all she needs to be handed a sword and a squirt-gun full of holy water.
The half-hearted supense is were the novel's main problem thought. There is no other-worldly scary atmosphere. Shannon really can't make these novels scary because she always uses fluttering shadows and bats and wolves appearing out of nowhere. Atmosphere depends on a combination thing, and it isn't going to work if these are the only two images she can think of.
In conclusion, I'm never going to read another Shannon Drake book unless her next book is agreed upon by all to be a work of literary geniuis greater than War and Peace.

I consider myself an avid reader and love the vampire genre. I'm also a fan of historical romance and romance in general. This book was so confusing. I could never tell who was having what dream or what thoughts. I kept with it though, thinking it had to get better and that some questions should get answered soon. Well, you practically have to wait until the last chapter - the epilouge. And then things are wrapped up so fast. It's almost like the author didn't know how the book was going to be from one chapter to the next. I've read other Shannon Drake novels and this is the first I've been disappointed in. Save your money and choose another book.

I bought this book several weeks ago,and it sat on my to be read pile. I read several low reviews and I decided to give it a shot. I really enjoyed this book, the whole protector of the Allience was an interesting take on the Vampire and Werewolf genre. Tara and Ann are cousins and both are grandaughters to Jacques DeVant a now American and French protector. Ann sends for Tara her American cousin and both girls are thrown into a whole new situation. I have never read her earlier books so I never met Lucian or Jade,two very interesting indiviuals but Brent was a very hunky and interesting person, and I'm so glad that he and Tara got together at the end. Please give this book a chance you might really enjoy it.

I found the book tiresome. It was definately not up to the usual standard for Drake.

There is no doubt that Realm of Shadows is a good read. All of Drake's mysteries are excellent. Never have I gotton bored with her writing, and I always keep turning and turning those pages until I come to the end. While reading this book or any other books written by Drake, readers must keep in mind that appearance can be deceiving. An okay person who seems quite nice in the beginning can suddenly reveal his or her true identity as the ultimate villain- like ___ in this story... (don't want to spoil it for you!). That is what keep those pages turning and make Drake such an excellent writer!

The story plot started out very good.The first couple of chapters had mystery and excitement. I was looking foreward to seeing how these two indviduals were going to get together and solve the mystery. But it started slowing down and the connection just wasn't there. The Characters started out good,but she left them all hanging with no real meaning.
The only real mystery in this book was how all the characters were related to each other.
The love story in the book, if you can call it a love story, was short...you would miss it.( I am not sure if this book was meant as a vampire love story or just a vampire story) The story all together was chopppy. The heroine in this book, if you want to call her that, was not a very good one. The ending of the book had a lot to be desired. This book had potential but got lost somewhere.

On a positive note, the plot of the novel had a lot of potential. Two cousins (Tara and Ann) fear that their aging grandfather (Jacques DeVant) is becoming mentally unstable when he starts insisting that vampires exist and that an archeological dig at a local church must be stopped before a terrible evil is unleashed on the world. Jacques convinces Tara to visit the site and soon after, she becomes embroiled in a nightmare she cannot accept or control.

The first few chapters of the book were interesting. Lots of mystery and things popping out of nowhere, but after a while the action became repetitive and the story got stuck in a rut. The majority of the scenes revolved around Tara denying that vampires exist even though she is stalked by shadows and fluttering bat wings. There was no gripping suspense, no goose bumps, no nerve-racking tension. There was also no romance between the main characters of Tara and Brent. The author spends a lot of time expressing Tara desire for Brent, but I could not decide if the desire was real or just something that the vampires were hypnotizing her into feeling.

Another major problem I had with the novel was the way action hopped from scene to scene. You would be right in the middle of the drama, a monstrous creature looming up behind you, when WHAM the focus would be altered and you would be yanked to a total different location and a different set of character. A few pages later the focus would return to the looming monster, but by then the tension was broken and the suspense gone.

So in conclusion, good plot but poor execution. Choppy writing, mediocre suspense, and a disappointing lack of romance.