Cane, Laken: Blood and Bite (Rune Alexander II) (2013)

Blood and Bite

Blood and Bite was given to me as a reviewer’s copy.

As you all know I loved the first installment of the Rune Alexander series, Shiv Crew. Talk about dark. I am going to state one major complaint about Blood and Bite. It was simply too short. Way too short. I was having this humongously fun time reading it and then it was over. Bummer.

So now you know. I liked Blood Bite. There were still the “baby’s” that I thought were weird. Norwegians just don’t go around throwing endearments at people we like. I kind of wish we did.

Shiv Crew is still adorable. I want to give them all a big hug. You’ve got this gang of huge (except for Rune and Lex) guys running around killing monsters in monstrous ways and I want to give them a group-hug. I must be messed up.

The characters that are the most fun in Blood and Bite are Rune and Ellis. I think that these two characters are the ones that kind of carry the story or maybe the idea of Shiv Crew. Ellis is Shiv Crew’s assistant but also their mascot and heart. At least that is the way Rune feels. Without him she thinks she would fall apart. And Rune might be right about that. For in spite of her stay with the shrinks at the rehab Rune is still messed up, although she is dealing more sensibly with her “monster”. Her mantra has become: “I am my monster, and my monster is me.” Rune’s monster loves fighting. Rune is not averse to it either. If there is one thing she excels at it is fighting. Along with the fighting Rune instills a sense of loyalty in those who work with her (nut-cases excepted).

There are a couple of nut-cases in Blood and Bite. Nicolas Llodra, the vampire master, and Tim Emerson, the Church of Slayers, are the worst ones in Rune’s life at the moment. Nicky has gone bonkers. Insanity seems to be the doom of all vampires. Whether Rune is one is kind of difficult to say. She believes that herself, but we as readers are given hints that there is something else in her blood. Insanity is the one thing that terrifies Rune and killing Nicholas seems a mercy-stroke to her. If only he wasn’t holding something over the heads of Shiv Crew.

Tim Emerson is a nut-case in a human manner. We all know that the worst monsters out there are humans. When we go bad we seem to go all out. Fanaticism just gives us that push to do what we might otherwise hesitate to do. My opinion is that Tim Emerson would have been a cold-blooded monster even without the Church of Slayers. But getting rid of Emerson without proof is difficult.

Raze, our rat-loving, Shiv Crew member is out of jail and Shad returns from Philadelphia with his wife and son. Gunnar the Ghoul is stranger than usual. Ellis is having trouble in his love-life. And – to top it all – Rune’s house is burned down. Hurrah, let’s just give the girl another challenge.

I think there are probably authors out there who love to make the lives of their main protagonists as difficult as possible, and I suspect Laken is such an author. But it makes for a fun time for the reader.

Anyways, have fun. Oh, and there is no sex but some explicit violence.