 2008-11-05 - A torture to read.
This book is so boring that I have to make myself to finish reading. A waste of time.
 2008-11-05 - dark curse book
I loved this book, great read, can't wait until the next book in the series comes out.
 2008-11-02 - Die hard fan having a hard time here
I discovered Feehan's series two years ago, and at the time I systematically devoured all of the books released in about two weeks time. I have to say that Dark Legend and Dark Demon are two of my favorites.
Once caught up, I began the fan's burden of waiting impatiently for new books to come out one by one as the year progressed. I tried getting into her other series as a means of distraction, but as enjoyable as some of them are, they don't really compare to the mythos she's created here in the Dark series.
Well, when Dark Possession came out, I had a really hard time. Feehan's blatant theft of White Wolf's World of Darkness games has always been a bit bothersome, especially when she pulled the mages in (mages who get corrupted into vampires by way of greed is the storyline for house Tremere in Vampire, the Masquerade), but injecting "eco-protectors" that are nature magic using Werewolves got a bit much, even for me.
On top of the plagiarism of ideas, Dark Possession was not very well written. The dialog and flow of events would get jumpy and confusing at times - like she didn't have as good of an editorial staff telling her where to go back and check flow in certain passages. Also, her heavy handedness with Solange and her obvious lifemate status with Zacarias was a bit harsh going down.
I thought maybe that I was imagining the drop in quality, so I went back and re-read the series from the beginning - nope, I wasn't imagining it. Books like Dark Desire and Dark Challenge are just much better framed, with better development, more seamless transitions and dialog, and more character development. They're also a bit longer - and the pages used for development show the benefit of the work.
So, it was with a bit of trepidation that I picked up Dark Curse. I wanted to know about the De La Cruz brothers and I had high hopes for their lifemates.
Unfortunately, I was disappointed. I didn't have the problems that some other reviewers had with Lara as a character - having a flawed heroine is not a problem and I agree that her fractured nature seems like a deliberate attempt to illustrate her mental scars. Unfortunately, Feehan has done the same kind of damage better in characters like Destiny, Jaxon, and Skyler.
Using language is not a bother - I've gotten used to it in my plethora of fantasy novels, and she was very good about giving us an approximate translation immediately after for those of us that didn't want to break pace to look up crap in the back of the book.
My biggest problem was the book itself. Again, jumpy imagery and flow, again, confusing switches between character focus, description, and dialog. Again, poor plot diagram and obvious places that needed better fleshing out - again, it looked like she isn't using or listening to editors of the same honesty and caliber as her previous work.
The book ends abruptly, with no resolution on Lara's status in the Carpathian society. The inclusion of extremophiles feels well researched but not well communicated and not embraced enough to connect the reader well with what Feehan is trying to convey.
I feel she needs to go back to her roots, spend time in the heads of her characters and spend the pages making us love them as opposed to trying to come up with the next weird gimmick to toss into the story line.
Most of us are here to find out what happens to our favorite characters, not to have to filter more incidental facts into an already convoluted storyline. Finish what you started with the mages, let us fall in love with your characters, stop adding more layers to a stack of problems that you haven't finished developing yet.
I'd rather read a sweet story about Skyler falling in love with Dimitri - focused on character development , a strait forward plot and no more weirdness piled on top - then another book like the last two.
2008-10-29 - Great storyline progression.
I was very happy to see some storyline progression in this series. Christine has gotten better at limiting the repitition inharent in the early books of this series. I can't wait for the next installment.j
 2008-10-29 - loved it
i loved this book. i was astonished by how well it was written: even when i disaproved about how some characters were acting, it was always very realistic and i can understand them.
the hero was strong and stubborn but sensible and sensitive when he needed to be so, the heroine was emotionally broken but could still retain her strength and compassion.
the only thing i didn't like about the book was the abrupt ending. it didn't really feel like a closure. something was missing. and althouh i didn't care much for all of that 'carpathian' language, it was interesting. i still wish it was replaced by a more 'complete' ending though.
so basically the only thing i would change is remove the last pages on carpathian culture and lengthen the novel itself.
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