House of Comarre Series: Blood Rights

Blood Rights is the first book in the House of Comarre series by Kristen Painter and I have to tell you, this book was flat out awesome! I loved it!

The book is set in 2067 in Paradise City, New Florida. In this alternate reality we have a couple of species living among us. There are shifters, vampires, fairies, demons and ghosts running amok. And who can forget the clueless humans stuck in the middle? But there is one branch of humanity who aren't what you would call clueless. They are the Comarre.

The Comarre are described as being the vampire's version of a geisha. They are the creme de la creme of humanity as far as vampires are concerned. What makes the Comarre so very special is the quality of their blood. They're sort of like Lindt chocolate for vampires. The Comarre are bred for the specific purpose of feeding the filthy rich of vampire society.

Chrysabelle is a member of the Comarre and she is in big trouble. She's being accused of killing her owner and is being pursued by both the vampire high council and certified crazy bitch, Tatiana. While on the run, Chrysabelle comes across the vampire Malkolm (who I think I love). Malkolm is an outcast in vampire society and he has the itty-bitty problem of hearing the voices of all the people he has killed in his head. There's not a whole lot of trust going on between these two, but Chrysabelle is forced to work with Malkolm after an unfortunate... incident. 

We get introduced to a few other characters, including Chrysabelle's aunt, Maris, and the mistress of the house of Comarre, Rennata. But my favourite secondary characters were Doc and Fi. Doc is a 6ft5 were-leopard who, thanks to a curse, can only shift into a house cat. I kid you not. Fi is one of the ghosts who haunts Malkolm and who has somehow managed to assume a sort of corporal form. She and Doc are seeing each other and are the cutest couple ever. 

Now let me talk about the main characters.

I'll start with Tatiana because, seriously, who doesn't love a scary ass villain? She sort of reminds me of Devina from J.R Ward's Fallen Angels series. She is ambitious, determined and absolutely ruthless. And, as I mentioned before, she's batshit crazy.

Then we have Chrysabelle. Since she's Comarre, most assume that she's nothing more that this weak, helpless, walking blood bag. We get the first inkling that this isn't actually the case after she stabs Malkolm, thinking that he was sent by the vampire council to bring her in. I really like Chrysabelle. Despite being relatively sheltered, she's also a woman who can handle herself and isn't about to let cranky pants Malkolm boss her around.

Ah, Malkolm. I really liked him. He has that whole "tortured hero" thing down pat. From what we get from Malkolm's past, he was not a very nice man. In fact, during his early years as a vampire, he was a butcher. So he's been living on his own, wrestling with the many voices in his head, until he meets Chrysabelle, who turns his dark broody world upside down.

I totally loved this book, and I highly recommend that you give it a try. It was nice to have a new take on the  whole vampire genre. Although the whole "irresistible blood" thing has been done to death, the story was so good that I stopped rolling my eyes after the first few chapters.

Pretty cover, right?