Rating: 0.0

When telekinetic and mental ward patient Rachel Ackart is contacted by the manipulative spirit of the vampire Andre Espinoza de Madrid, all sorts of chaos is put into motion. Andre has managed to convince the addled Ackart that he is her dead lover, Josef Neumann, and that only she can bring him back from the dead.

As Andre’s only sane infected victim on base, it’s Captain Scott Boulder’s task to attempt to put things to rights. Determined to stop Ackart from accomplishing the tasks Andre has put before her, Boulder and his sidekick magician Leah Maguire battle genetically modified vampire victims and match wits with rank determined to get in the way of what’s right while trying to convince Ackart that Andre is all a dream.

Rank manages to foil Boulder and Maguire’s attempts through bouts of incompetence and idiocy, and Ackart manages to take off with Danton Dumas, Andre’s only other surviving victim (of dubious sanity), kidnapping Maguire in the process.

This book was not to my taste at all but then again, neither was its predecessor. It’s not so much the lack of a plot … there is a plot, no fear, but it was stretched from what could have been a short story into a novel by repeated contrivances.

My dissatisfaction in large part stems from the fact that the entire story rotates around problems created by minor characters that could have been easily addressed. Major character repeatedly (not once, but several times) instructs, screams, etc to idiot boy to not shoot/speak/fill-in-the-blank in several situations. Idiot boy(s) does so. Said situations blow up as a result when peace accords would have been reached. Rinse, repeat.

That was like eating stale chips the first time. After several repetitions, I really needed something to wash down that flavor. I’m hoping the next book on my pile does so.
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ISBN: 978-0-345-50105-9
Publication December 30, 2008, by Ballantine