When an inexperienced young werewolf wanders into a Greenwich Village speakeasy looking for adventure she soon finds more than she bargains for. She is saved by a vampire and her friends who take the young innocent under their wings and chaperone her through a night of jazz and gin. Eventually she is found in this most undesirable company by her brother, who is put in the awkward position of being indebted to one of the werewolves’ age old enemies, a vampire.
Matters are further complicated when the vampire’s search for a missing friend, who just happens to be the daughter of a local crime lord, crosses paths with the werewolf’s search for the same woman. The two are thrown together by circumstance and the more the uptight and proper werewolf gets to know the loose-moraled vampire the more he likes her and vice versa.
But their respective races don’t approve of the relationship and they are individually pulled reluctantly into power struggles within their respective clans. Eventually gang war breaks out between the werewolves, vampires and human crime bosses as well as in the ranks of each group. And they are the only two people who can possibly put an end to it.
1920’s America, with prohibition and gang warfare, lends itself beautifully to rival races fighting for supremacy and stories of star crossed lovers. I’m surprised the period has been overlooked in the past and I’m delighted to find it featured here.
This complex plot of shifting allegiances and the clashing belief systems of the eighteenth century and modern times was fast paced and action packed.
My copy of the book was poorly edited or proof read and there are at least three instances where dialogue is attributed to a character not in the scene. I was a little confused by that but not sufficiently frustrated to stop reading. Only at one point was I pulled out of the story and unfortunately it was with quite a forceful yank. When the protagonists enter a blood covered but empty room the author refers to forensics. I’m not sure whether or not forensic science existed then in the form it does now but either way I’m pretty sure it would not have been referred to as simply “forensics”. Apart from this one slip the story was a lot of fun and I was sorry to get to the end of the book.
More time could have been spent establishing the whys and wherefores of vampirism but it was adequately covered-I was just enjoying it so much I would like to have seen more.
An enjoyable read and I look forward to reading more of this author’s work-Lynn
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