It’s exasperating to wade through a sequel with a boring protagonist I really cared about in the first book, because the author hasn’t made the effort to establish that main character with the readership, again. Cherryh and Lois McMaster Bujold are among the honourable exceptions who also successfully employ this strategy). One I wish other multi-book authors would use more often (Jim Butcher, John Scalzi, C.J.
And – even more importantly – Harris ensures right at the start of the book, there is a scene featuring Sookie in trouble to bond her with the readers, either for the first time or reintroduce her to those of us who have read one or three other books since the last time we lost ourselves in a Sookie adventure… It’s a neat trick.
There is the odd explanatory sentence slipped in as to who all the characters are and a quick mention of a previous incident – also very handy for the more forgetful of her fans. For starters, Harris doesn’t assume that everyone who picks up Dead Reckoning has read any or all of the previous books in the series. As the plot drew me in and once more whisked me off into Bon Temps alongside Sookie, I was once more filled with admiration at how adroitly Harris avoids pitfalls other less able writers nosedive into. As you’ll have gathered from the blurb, Harris is still capable of delivering a plot full of narrative tension and adventure as Sookie is plunged once more into the heart of vampire politics.
She can’t sit on the sidelines when both her work and her love life are under threat – but as their plans gradually become clear, Sookie finds the situation is deadlier than she could ever have imagined.Īnd there you have it. Whatever it is, they seem determined to keep Sookie out of it, almost as determined as Sookie is to find out what is going on. Sookie’s lover, Eric Northman and his ‘child’ Pam are plotting something in secret. Sookie suspects otherwise, but before she can investigate something else – something even more dangerous comes up. Since Sam Merlotte is known to be two-natured, suspicion immediately falls on the anti-shifters in the area. But nothing is that simple in Bon Temps! …and Sookie has a knack for being in trouble’s way not least when she witnesses the firebombing of Merlotte’s, the bar where she works. It’s a job that has its own challenges, but now the vampires and the shapeshifters are finally ‘out’, you’d think the supernaturals would get on with each other. Sookie Stackhouse is a cocktail waitress in Bon Temps, Louisiana. So… with the TV adaptation of this series by HBO acclaimed by both critics and fans and as yet another volume hits the bookshelves, the question has to be – has Harris managed to give us yet another slice of Sookie magic? Is she able to still deliver the freshness and appeal of our favourite cocktail waitress after she’s been through more scary adventures than you’d want in a lifetime?
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