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A review by creepysnowman
Eyes Like Blue Fire by Amanda M. Lyons
1.0
(Full disclosure: I was given a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.)
Eyes Like Blue Fire is a decent idea in need of an editor. It’s a story of love, loss, love again, revenge, demons, zombies, and most of all vampires.
Sounds good, right? Well, maybe.
Synopsis:
Katja is a vampire, whose sire, Anton, leaves her. She wanders aimlessly until she meets Raven Nightshade, who looks almost exactly like Anton, while she looks almost exactly like Raven’s lost love Kathryn.
Meanwhile, Anton made other vampires before he got to Katja, and one of them, is evil, evil, evil. She wants to destroy Anton’s legacy, and ruin all the happiness of his one other surviving fledgling, Katja.
And she also manages to make life awful for several generations of Raven’s family, just because.
All this comes to a head as vampire must battle vampire, and the fate of a whiny poet stands in the balance.
The review part:
I’ve never been comfortable with reviews that are snarky, or attempt to score points at the author’s expense to make the reviewer look clever.
So with that said, this book objectively shouldn’t have been published in its current form. It should have either been given to a professional editor, or to several trusted beta-readers that would be truthful and critical.
If that had happened, then almost every issue I had with the construction of this story might have been addressed. There are point-of-view switches in the middle of paragraphs, the story shifts from past to present-tense at will, and there are numerous grammatical and spelling errors.
Even these technical errors might be forgiven if not for the biggest, most glaring problem - there is no thought at all given to the consistency of the characters, or the plot itself. The plot moves forward, and whatever needs to happen to fulfill whatever is happening in a given moment, or is necessary to feed what happens next - happens. Characters who’ve spent half a chapter brooding over their own inadequacies suddenly become strong and confident. Vampires aren’t affected by crucifixes, unless they are, and then they’re not again. Minor characters are introduced, only to have major significance much later, as the connections get too incestuous and convoluted for their own good. There’s an entire scene with a completely new vampire about two-thirds of the way through, who happens to have summoned a massive snake-woman thing. It’s referred to exactly one time after that. The male lead is the most consistent character in the whole plot, and that’s because he only has four reactions: screaming, fainting, brooding, and gagging.
I wanted to give this story a real chance, and I wanted to like it - and there are several really nicely turned set-pieces, such as a zombie attack, and the first time Raven’s ex turns up in a nightmare (though constant repetition of the same scene dulls its impact), as well as a really, really nasty bit of business that answers the question, “When a previously sexy dead woman feels a certain need in her worm-infested body, what is she to do?" Its yuck, but it’s creative.
Hopefully the author will keep writing, because there is a great creative spark there, but she needs to enlist some help on the proofreading of the next book in this series. (Oh - it’s a series.)
Eyes Like Blue Fire is a decent idea in need of an editor. It’s a story of love, loss, love again, revenge, demons, zombies, and most of all vampires.
Sounds good, right? Well, maybe.
Synopsis:
Katja is a vampire, whose sire, Anton, leaves her. She wanders aimlessly until she meets Raven Nightshade, who looks almost exactly like Anton, while she looks almost exactly like Raven’s lost love Kathryn.
Meanwhile, Anton made other vampires before he got to Katja, and one of them, is evil, evil, evil. She wants to destroy Anton’s legacy, and ruin all the happiness of his one other surviving fledgling, Katja.
And she also manages to make life awful for several generations of Raven’s family, just because.
All this comes to a head as vampire must battle vampire, and the fate of a whiny poet stands in the balance.
The review part:
I’ve never been comfortable with reviews that are snarky, or attempt to score points at the author’s expense to make the reviewer look clever.
So with that said, this book objectively shouldn’t have been published in its current form. It should have either been given to a professional editor, or to several trusted beta-readers that would be truthful and critical.
If that had happened, then almost every issue I had with the construction of this story might have been addressed. There are point-of-view switches in the middle of paragraphs, the story shifts from past to present-tense at will, and there are numerous grammatical and spelling errors.
Even these technical errors might be forgiven if not for the biggest, most glaring problem - there is no thought at all given to the consistency of the characters, or the plot itself. The plot moves forward, and whatever needs to happen to fulfill whatever is happening in a given moment, or is necessary to feed what happens next - happens. Characters who’ve spent half a chapter brooding over their own inadequacies suddenly become strong and confident. Vampires aren’t affected by crucifixes, unless they are, and then they’re not again. Minor characters are introduced, only to have major significance much later, as the connections get too incestuous and convoluted for their own good. There’s an entire scene with a completely new vampire about two-thirds of the way through, who happens to have summoned a massive snake-woman thing. It’s referred to exactly one time after that. The male lead is the most consistent character in the whole plot, and that’s because he only has four reactions: screaming, fainting, brooding, and gagging.
I wanted to give this story a real chance, and I wanted to like it - and there are several really nicely turned set-pieces, such as a zombie attack, and the first time Raven’s ex turns up in a nightmare (though constant repetition of the same scene dulls its impact), as well as a really, really nasty bit of business that answers the question, “When a previously sexy dead woman feels a certain need in her worm-infested body, what is she to do?" Its yuck, but it’s creative.
Hopefully the author will keep writing, because there is a great creative spark there, but she needs to enlist some help on the proofreading of the next book in this series. (Oh - it’s a series.)