Title: Twice Bitten
Author: Rayna Vause
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Length: 200 Pages
Category: Paranormal
At a Glance: Overall this was a good book, a good premise that with a few tweaks, could’ve been a lot better. If you like good villains and a vampire that’s not necessarily a nice guy, give this one a shot.
Reviewed By: Kel
Blurb: With a new species of vampire stalking the streets, the stakes are high. But that’s not the only reason hearts are on the line.
Danny Reynolds thought Kieran McCade was the one—true love and hot lust forever—until Danny found out Kier’s bloody secret and ran away screaming. Months later, Danny is facing his own paranormal crisis, and he needs Kieran’s help, but are there enough ways to apologize for breaking a vampire’s heart?
Nothing about Danny’s transformation is normal—not the attack that led to it, and not the symptoms Danny’s plagued with—but being in close proximity to Kieran is even worse than becoming a thing that goes bump in the night. Danny and Kieran aren’t the only things threatening to bump each other off, though. Secret organizations and clashing vigilante agendas want to get their hands on Danny. His only hope is to find a fix for his problem before he’s either captured or his abnormal transition starves him to death.
Danny and Kieran might have a real chance to repair their broken romance… but only if they keep Danny alive!
Review: Twice Bitten is set in a world where vampires exist. While most of the population doesn’t know they exist, there are some that do. Including an organization known as Purity, whose sole goal it to eradicate vampires to keep the regular community safe. Unfortunately, there are some in Purity that feel what they do isn’t enough.
Danny Reynolds is a regular person, working at a library and loving his job. He knows about vampires because his brother was attacked and tortured by a group of them, and he was dating one, though he didn’t realize it at first. Danny is an interesting character. He’s how most people would act if they found out they were dating a vampire, especially after their brother had been savagely attacked by a group of them. It wasn’t easy for him to go to Kieran, but with everything that was going wrong after he was bitten, I don’t blame him at all. It took courage to go to someone who had hurt you, and you had hurt in return, to ask for help. Throughout the story, you get to see Danny come to grips with what’s happening to him, from fear that he’ll become something he hates to finally accept that not all vampires are like the people who hurt his brother. That humans can be more monstrous than the monsters.
Kieran for his part agrees to help Danny. He’s never stopped caring for him and even though Danny hurt him badly, he’s willing to at least try to help because he can’t stand seeing Danny so afraid and hurt. Not many people could do that, and it shows just how much Kieran does care for Danny that he’s able to put all that aside to help. Of course, it’s not easy as Kieran and his friends have no clue what is happening to Danny or why. But Kieran keeps trying, saving Danny from himself and from Purity that is tracking him down.
Purity is an organization that wanted to protect people from rogue vampires, the ones that kill indiscriminately, but along the way they lost their focus. The doctor in charge, Lydecker, has become obsessed with trying to turn his son back into a human, doing things that would horrify most people. The person in charge of Purity, Miranda, has her own agenda and does even more horrific things than Lydecker. They’ve become misguided and think that they are doing good. There is a saving grace in Purity, Michael Rogan. He sees what Purity is becoming and while he wants to protect people, he can’t let Lydecker or Miranda continue. He’s Purity’s conscience, wanting to turn it back into what it once was but powerless to do so. He does end up helping Danny and Kieran; without him I don’t think they would’ve survived.
Most of the story revolves around Danny and Kieran trying to find out why Danny’s reacting to his attack the way he is. There’s some good tension going on with that, though we find out the reason fairly fast. There’s also the “will they get back together or not?” plotline through the whole story, and I found myself rooting that they would. Would Danny become ok with turning into a vampire? Would Kieran forgive Danny for running away? It does get resolved in a fairly satisfactory way.
Possible Spoiler
There’s a lot good with this book, but there are some things that I wish the author had included. I would’ve loved to have gotten a backstory about Purity: how they started and when they became twisted. Was it only when Miranda took over, or was it happening before that? How long had Purity been doing its work, and who started it? While it’s explained that the vampires keep a very low profile, how long have they been integrated into the regular populace? Also, I wish there hadn’t been so much POV hopping with the characters. I would’ve been ok without knowing Lydecker and Miranda’s thought processes. It would’ve been more of a surprise to find out what they were doing and why when the characters found out later in the book.
Overall this was a good book, a good premise that with a few tweaks, could’ve been a lot better. If you like good villains and a vampire that’s not necessarily a nice guy, give this one a shot.
You can buy Twice Bitten here:
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