Title: A Shade of Vampire
Author: Bella Forrest
Published: December 14th, 2012
Source: I received a copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review
Blurb from Goodreads: On the evening of Sofia Claremont's seventeenth birthday, she is sucked into a nightmare from which she cannot wake.
A quiet evening walk along a beach brings her face to face with a dangerous pale creature that craves much more than her blood.
She is kidnapped to an island where the sun is eternally forbidden to shine.
An island uncharted by any map and ruled by the most powerful vampire coven on the planet. She wakes here as a slave, a captive in chains.
Sofia's life takes a thrilling and terrifying turn when she is the one selected out of hundreds of girls to join the harem of Derek Novak, the dark royal Prince.
Despite his addiction to power and obsessive thirst for her blood, Sofia soon realizes that the safest place on the island is within his quarters, and she must do all within her power to win him over if she is to survive even one more night.
Will she succeed? ...or is she destined to the same fate that all other girls have met at the hands of the Novaks?
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Excerpt from A Shade of Vampire
by Bella Forrest
I’d been meandering along the shore for about an hour
when I suddenly sensed that I wasn’t alone. Someone was approaching me from
behind. My heart leapt. I was so sure it was Ben, that when a stranger showed
up beside me, I couldn’t hide my disappointment.
He must have noticed, because a smirk formed on his
lips. “Were you expecting someone else, love?”
I eyed him suspiciously, remembering how many times my
father had told me not to talk to strangers. I looked him over, taking in his
appearance. My eyes widened. I couldn’t find words to describe how fine a man
he was. He was almost beautiful. The first thing I took notice of was how his
blue eyes were about three shades brighter than any I’d ever seen before. It
was such a stark contrast to his pale – almost white – skin and dark hair.
Standing beside me, he was easily more than half a foot taller. His height,
broad shoulders and lean build reminded me of Ben, but he had a presence that
was far more imposing than my best friend’s.
My gaze settled on his face.
I realized that he was inspecting me just as closely
as I was him. His eyes on me suddenly made me feel uncomfortably vulnerable. I
gave my father’s advice a second thought, but quickly canceled out all notions
of heeding to his counsel when I reminded myself that he stopped caring a long
time ago.
I straightened to my full height and mustered all the
courage I had to keep myself from running away from this stranger.
Big mistake.
The confident smirk didn’t leave his face for even a
moment.
“Like what you see?”
“A bit full of yourself, aren’t you?” I scoffed,
annoyed by his audacity.
He stepped forward, closer to me, and leaned his head
toward mine.
“Don’t I have the right to be?”
He knew he looked good and wasn’t about to act like he
didn’t.
“Whatever,” was my oh-so-brilliant comeback.
My shoulders sagged with defeat as I took a step back,
unsettled by how close he was now. I rolled my eyes and did a one-eighty, not
quite in the mood to play whatever game this stranger was proposing.
I would soon realize that I was about to play his game
whether I liked it or not.
He grabbed my arm and turned my body to face him. This
motion alone made every single internal alarm I had within me go off in a
frenzy.
This man was danger and I knew it. I tried to wriggle
away from his touch, but I was no match for his strength.
“Tell me your name,” he commanded.
I was about to refuse, but was horrified to find
myself blurting out my name in response.
“Sofia Claremont.”
As soon as I revealed my name, his eyes lit up with a
kind of sinister approval. Then he reached for my face and traced his thumb
over my jaw line.
“Hello, Sofia Claremont. You’re one stupid girl for
taking a walk alone at this time of night. You never know what kind of evil a
pretty little thing like you could happen to come by.”
I found myself wondering exactly what kind of evil he
was. But I was suddenly overcome by the sensations that were surrounding me. My
senses took in everything at once. I heard the waves, felt the sand, smelled
the ocean salt, tasted the flavor of cherry and saw the stranger’s manic
appearance as he stuck a needle to my neck. The effect was instant. I was
barely able to gasp, much less scream. I went from sensing everything to
sensing absolutely nothing.
My last conscious
thought was that I may never see Ben again.
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Review
My thoughts: When the author asked me to do a review of this book, she sent me the first six chapter so I could have an idea about it, and I was instantly craving for more.
The story is narrated from two points of view: Derek's and Sofia's.
It is Sofia's seventeen birthday, and with his family out of the picture, the only one who could make her feel loved is her best friend, Ben. But, he forgot her birthday and she's so mad at him and his stupid new girlfriend that she decides to take a walk by the beach. A huge mistake. There she meets a stranger who turns out to be a vampire and as if the day wasn't already turning out to be pretty bad, this man kidnaps her and take her to The Shade.
The Shade is a sanctuary for vampires located in an island, where is always night and they are protected and served by humans slaves.
Sofia goes from being the girl who nobody pays attention to at home, to be the one that everyone's trying to get a piece from -literally. That bothered me a bit, because it's a little stereotypical and I've read it a lot of times, but I understand it is necessary for the sake of the story.
Well, Sofia is to be delivered as a slave to the prince of the shade, Derek. He's a powerful vampire who has been asleep for the last 400 years. At first I though Derek would be this mean, hateful vampire who takes advantage of his position and just thinks of human as food and nothing else. But I was quite surprised to find out he's anything but. He's aware he's a monster which ironically makes him less a monster than anyone of his kind. After all this vampire is the classic good guy, he shows interest in preserving humans lives but he's still a vampire and has to struggle with his need of blood, a conflict between what he wants and what he needs. Besides, he has origins quite interesting, bonus points for a point of view I've never read before. You'll have to read it to find out what I'm talking about. He's sweet and fair and oh God he's good looking. He doesn't treat Sofia as a slave and with time he learns to see her as an equal and that's what captivated her. He's not like the hideous jackass of his brother, Lucas, nor cold as ice like his sister Vivienne.
Sofia is a strong character, she learns to suck it up after she learns she won't be able to escape without getting killed in the process.
The chemestry between the two of them is great from the beginning, they comfort each other without even knowing it. When they first met I though Sofia had lost her mind telling him "I know an excuse when I hear one. Don't you dare deceive yourself into believing that you're the victim, Derek Novak". I mean, good Lord! He could've killed her just for saying that. But since then, I started liking her a whole lot more, because she showed she's able to stand up for her life even when the chances are against her.
I love learning about The Shade from Derek's point of view it was great that he was just getting to know this new world too, because through his eyes we can learn how everything is like and I could picture all of it pretty easily.
Near the end, there were a few twists I sure as hell didn't see coming and that made this book so much better!
Overall I think this is a great book and I'm amazed at the length of it, because in so little amount of pages, the author was able to create a story, a world and characters well built and interesting.
The story is narrated from two points of view: Derek's and Sofia's.
It is Sofia's seventeen birthday, and with his family out of the picture, the only one who could make her feel loved is her best friend, Ben. But, he forgot her birthday and she's so mad at him and his stupid new girlfriend that she decides to take a walk by the beach. A huge mistake. There she meets a stranger who turns out to be a vampire and as if the day wasn't already turning out to be pretty bad, this man kidnaps her and take her to The Shade.
The Shade is a sanctuary for vampires located in an island, where is always night and they are protected and served by humans slaves.
Sofia goes from being the girl who nobody pays attention to at home, to be the one that everyone's trying to get a piece from -literally. That bothered me a bit, because it's a little stereotypical and I've read it a lot of times, but I understand it is necessary for the sake of the story.
Well, Sofia is to be delivered as a slave to the prince of the shade, Derek. He's a powerful vampire who has been asleep for the last 400 years. At first I though Derek would be this mean, hateful vampire who takes advantage of his position and just thinks of human as food and nothing else. But I was quite surprised to find out he's anything but. He's aware he's a monster which ironically makes him less a monster than anyone of his kind. After all this vampire is the classic good guy, he shows interest in preserving humans lives but he's still a vampire and has to struggle with his need of blood, a conflict between what he wants and what he needs. Besides, he has origins quite interesting, bonus points for a point of view I've never read before. You'll have to read it to find out what I'm talking about. He's sweet and fair and oh God he's good looking. He doesn't treat Sofia as a slave and with time he learns to see her as an equal and that's what captivated her. He's not like the hideous jackass of his brother, Lucas, nor cold as ice like his sister Vivienne.
Sofia is a strong character, she learns to suck it up after she learns she won't be able to escape without getting killed in the process.
The chemestry between the two of them is great from the beginning, they comfort each other without even knowing it. When they first met I though Sofia had lost her mind telling him "I know an excuse when I hear one. Don't you dare deceive yourself into believing that you're the victim, Derek Novak". I mean, good Lord! He could've killed her just for saying that. But since then, I started liking her a whole lot more, because she showed she's able to stand up for her life even when the chances are against her.
I love learning about The Shade from Derek's point of view it was great that he was just getting to know this new world too, because through his eyes we can learn how everything is like and I could picture all of it pretty easily.
Near the end, there were a few twists I sure as hell didn't see coming and that made this book so much better!
Overall I think this is a great book and I'm amazed at the length of it, because in so little amount of pages, the author was able to create a story, a world and characters well built and interesting.
I would recommend it for: Fans of YA and Paranormal genre, fans of vampires and everyone who has a little time, because it's a short book and you can read it in less than a day.
Rating:
Quotes:
Sofia: “I know an excuse when I hear one. Don't you dare deceive yourself into believing that you're the victim, Derek Novak.”
Sofia: “Because I don’t believe that you are a slave to what you’ve become. I don’t believe that you simply can’t.”
Derek: "But I was a coward. I dreaded to think of what would happen once I actually died. What happens to the living dead once they pass away? I shuddered every time I found myself thinking about it.
It was perhaps quite a strange thing that the undead could be so afraid of death, and yet it was true.
I was afraid to die, so I went to sleep instead."
About the author:
Bella Forrest has been telling stories pretty much since she could talk. Instead of having her parents read her bed-time stories, she would prefer to share with them her own made up tales.
As she grew older, she developed a passion for the fantasy genre. She's an incurable Potterhead.
Her debut novel, A Shade of Vampire, was released on December 14, 2012.
The book became a Number 1 Christmas Bestseller in Vampire Romance, Paranormal and Fantasy on Amazon.
If you sign up for personal email updates from her here: http://www.forrestbooks.com ,
you'll be the first to hear about her new releases.
Bella Forrest has been telling stories pretty much since she could talk. Instead of having her parents read her bed-time stories, she would prefer to share with them her own made up tales.
As she grew older, she developed a passion for the fantasy genre. She's an incurable Potterhead.
Her debut novel, A Shade of Vampire, was released on December 14, 2012.
The book became a Number 1 Christmas Bestseller in Vampire Romance, Paranormal and Fantasy on Amazon.
If you sign up for personal email updates from her here: http://www.forrestbooks.com ,
you'll be the first to hear about her new releases.
And here are a few places you can hang out with her!:
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