Living Dead In Dallas - Charlaine Harris

In Living Dead In Dallas, we, through the eyes of Sookie, learn more about the vampire world. And thanks to her involvement with a vampire called Bill Compton, she gets pulled farther into the supernatural world. We alongside Sookie learned about the existence of vampires and shape-shifters, and werewolves in the first novel, and now in the second instalment of the Sookie Stackhouse Series Charlaine brings another mythical creature into the mix, a  Maenad.

I'm glad to see that Sookie does not just live with vampires, that her world contains even more than vampires and werewolves. The vast world Harris had created comes even more to life with the introduction of a Maenad. It truly shows how greatly Charlaine can pull all of these mythical aspects into a world of their own.

I've seen movies and even television shows that primarily focus on the mythical creatures we know as vampires or some that show the rivalry between vampires and werewolves but to see yet another mythical party added into this mix is refreshing to me.

Word of Sookies telepathy has spread to some of the Louisiana vampires (to whom she owes a favour after early happening in the book), Sookie with Bill as her body guard (at night of course), are being loaned out to the vampires in Dallas to read the minds of their humans to find a missing vampire who is a brother to the Louisiana's vampires.

As always it doesn't go so smoothly because lets face it, something always has to go wrong. Since the vampires revealed their existence, the years that followed not everything had gone smoothly and Sookie trips over a group in Dallas who have formed a backlash against the undead. We learn of a ancient vampire called Godric, who had a brief appearance but has a somewhat emotional impact on both Sookie and definitely me as a reader.

With Sookie having faith in others and her lack of experience, and her determination to do the right thing, are both loveable and frustrating to me. I have to admit when Sookie responds to the obvious manipulations of the vampires I find myself lousily face palming as I read. As a small town girl she has never looked for trouble, her reactions to me do make a lot of sense but that did frustrate me at times.

I am the type of mystery reader who tries to figure out who's done it, I can see plot holes and I can honestly say that everything here hangs together well, there is no plot hole that I could notice and when I got to the end of the book I could only sit there and mumble 'well I wasn't expecting that.' because there is no obvious signs of what's going to happen and that just added to the intensity of the atmosphere.

The story ends with Sookie happy with her choice of choosing Bill as her lover. His mind is closed to her and she finds him a extraordinary lover and despite all she has endured since being associated with the vampires she decides her life is good. It’s nicely wrapped up as far as the story goes and with a good amount of elements introduced here that lead me to the next book, keeping me interested I can say I'm thoroughly interested in what else is in store for Sookie.

Club Dead is the third instalment of the Sookie Stackhouse series and I cannot wait to finish it and review it for you guys. Living Dead In Dallas has earned its 5 out of 5 rating like the first instalment and I do recommend it to anyone who loves mysteries.