From the jacket: "Welcome to the Castle of Dark Dreams. It’s the yummiest attraction in Live the Fantasy, an adult theme park where women who dare can take sexy role-playing to new erotic heights. Just by looking at the castle you know that only dangerously tempting men would play here. Three brothers—Eric, Brynn, and Conall McNair—run the castle. Okay, so they’re not quite human, but that’s a secret. This night Eric, the castle’s resident vampire, will prove that he’s everything bad should be.

Talk-show host Donna Nolan is on the trail of the weird and wacky in the Castle of Dark Dreams. But thoughts of a juicy interview to enthrall her listeners disappear when she meets Eric. With the coldest blue eyes and the hottest mouth she’s ever seen, he’s a primitive call to the wild in every woman."

So that's the story. They end up together, as all romances should. She shoots herself up with vampire blood to make herself immortal. They live happily ever after.

"Wicked Nights" is misleading if you're hoping for hot, sexy nights with a real-life vampire. The only "wicked" thing is the shoddy writing. The character development is disappointing, at best. They are two-dimensional, unsympathetic, and Donna was the most annoying twit I've encountered in at least three years. While Eric is the usual dark-haired, dark-hearted vampire -- and I would be all over him like white on rice if he lived up to his description -- he lacked any depth or motivation. Donna is too busy yammering away (verbally and internally) instead of enjoying herself while this perfect speciman is banging her senseless. Nor do I understand the author's motivation with Donna imposing her personal (read: human) moral compass on a pack of men who have lived on this earth for 800 years or more. Lopping off the heads of one's immortal enemies isn't a bad thing. It's what they do. At least they have some semblance of personality, barbaric or not.

Is this a romance? Is it erotica? It is apparent the author is unsure of her sexual footing when she feels she must inject the word "erotic" into every single chapter, and yet hasn't a clue as to the word's meaning. The scenes vacillate between coy euphemism and graphic, with most encounters reading as if they were discussed over high tea with a gaggle of blushing virgins. When the author finally decides to break loose with a ménage à trois pirate fantasy involving the main characters, she doesn't have the tits to make it a real encounter. Instead, she settles upon spinning it into a hologram version cast from the vampire's mind. I'm all for escapist fantasies, but that isn't erotic. It's a bullshit cop-out. I've had more erotic entanglements being home alone with a Johnny Depp movie and fresh batteries.

I continued to read this nonsense in a vain hope it would a) make sense, or b) get better. Since neither happened, I'm glad I didn't spend money on it. It's a library copy, else I would use it to line the litter pan.

Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0425200329