TEST
The Huntress is a fast-paced vampire tale that delivers a potent combination of action and emotion.
When she was a child, Camille Howard discovered the bodies of her murdered parents. As heir to their vast fortune, she was hounded by the paparazzi all through her childhood, even as she had to watch her parents’ killer go unpunished. Wary of people’s attention, she never let herself open up to anyone, until she met Griffin Montfort while studying in London. They fell in love, and for the first time, Camille let someone into her heart.
Then they made a trip to Romania, where Camille was doing research on vampire folklore. She never expected to be exposed to the real thing. While staying in a Transylvanian village, Camille learned of the strigoiaca, a group of female vampires who capture men and feed on them for months until they die. One night, the strigoiaca descended on the village, catching several men, including Camille’s beloved Griff. The encounter immediately changed Camille’s priorities, transforming her into a vampire hunter. She believes there’s a chance she can save Griff before they kill or change him, and she dedicates all her energy and resources to taking him back. She doesn’t want to kill the strigoiaca; she wants to capture them for scientific research to see if their vampirism can be cured, especially if she needs such a remedy to save Griff from whatever they might have done to him.
Her mission hits an obstacle when a mercenary known as Sargent enters the picture. Hired by some of the village women to avenge their lost family members, Sarge has only one goal: to kill any and every vampire he can find. He thinks Camille’s a fool who has no idea what she’s dealing with in her quest to find the strigoiaca. Camille knows she’s not going to get rid of him, but she may be able to use him to her advantage. The strigoiaca don’t come after women. She might have to use this man as bait in order to save the one she loves.
This is a real pageturner that moves at lightning speed. As is usually the case with a book like this, a few things are sacrificed to the sake of the fast-moving plot. The characters are drawn in broad strokes, clearly laying out their motivations but not going much further than that – I wouldn’t exactly call them well-developed. The first several chapters alternate between the present day and the events leading up to Griff’s abduction by the strigoiaca. But the scenes showing Camille’s romance with Griff aren’t as affecting as they could be, which is somewhat of a problem since so much of the story is based on their love. It also would have been nice had the author offered more description and a sense of place to her foreign settings (London, Transylvania). Her writing is terse and spare, not bothering with any more detail and exposition than is necessary. It helps maintain the propulsive pace, with a constant flow of action and dialogue, but the settings sometimes aren’t as vivid as they could be.
I mention these weaknesses upfront because I think it speaks to how good the story is that they really don’t matter much in the overall scheme of things. Yes, it could have been executed somewhat better overall, but Green’s ideas and storyline are so strong that it’s still a good read. As a purely visceral experience, it succeeds. It’s very exciting, with strong emotional undercurrents and an unexpected poignancy. Some of the sequences offer such a dizzying barrage of action I found myself flipping through the pages so fast I almost got paper cuts. It would be easy for scenes like this to become confusing, but that never happens. I had to admire the author’s skill at pulling off such heavily action-oriented scenes.
The characters aren’t deep, but they are compelling and empathetic. Camille and Sargent are both damaged characters who in some ways have surrendered some of their humanity in the single-minded pursuit of their goals. Camille doesn’t always make the wisest choices, but the author makes it easy to understand why she makes them and to feel for her. Sargent is a dark, tormented man seething with so much hatred and bitterness he doesn’t see much else. Griff is initially introduced as such a pure, romantic figure that he’s a little boring, but the author develops his character in interesting ways. The story builds to an emotional climax that’s very effective and bumped the grade up from a B- almost for that alone.
I do wish the book had been somewhat longer, allowing for more development of the characters, setting and certain plot points. But it’s hard to care when the story is blasting along in a rush of action and emotion, which is most of the time. One of the stronger entries in the Silhouette Bombshell line I’ve read so far, The Huntress is a great thrill ride and a very good read.
Grade: B
Book Type: Series Fiction
Sensuality: Warm
Review Date: 13/01/05
Publication Date: 2005/01
Recent Comments …
Yep
This sounds delightful! I’m grabbing it, thanks
excellent book: interesting, funny dialogs, deep understanding of each character, interesting secondary characters, and also sexy.
I don’t think anyone expects you to post UK prices – it’s just a shame that such a great sale…
I’m sorry about that. We don’t have any way to post British prices as an American based site.
I have several of her books on my TBR and after reading this am moving them up the pile.