REVIEW: Queen of Shadows

Dianne Sylvan
Queen of Shadows (Shadow World #1)
ACE
ISBN-10: 0439899281
ISBN-13: 978-0439899284
Urban fantasy/Paranormal romance
August 31, 2010

*Book provided by publisher, review contains spoilers as they have to do with a hot button of mine…

Blurb via Goodreads:

Spread throughout the dark corners of our world lies the Shadow World, a society of vampires that feeds off the living. In Austin, Texas, one woman’s madness will drive her into a world that few people ever see–or even know exists…

Shortly after she picked up a guitar, Miranda Grey conquered the Austin music scene with a newfound ability to psychically manipulate her audience’s emotions. But as her powers outgrow her control, her mind is increasingly invaded by haunting secrets and overwhelming sadness. Unable to look anyone in the eye, Miranda is fast approaching the edge of insanity–with no one to catch her fall…

When he outlawed killing humans, David Solomon ignited a civil war among Austin’s vampires. As Prime of the South, his sympathy for mortals angered the old guard who refuse to control their violent urges. David has his hands full with the growing insurgency, but he takes in a broken-down woman, a musician in need of supernatural guidance. Little does he know that Miranda Grey has the power to change his world as well…

This is one of those up-and-comers that I had my eye on somewhat. So I was quite stoked to get it in the mail to review. I really loved the atmosphere of the book right off. The tone is pretty grim, as the heroine is dealing with a spiraling-out-of-control paranormal ability. While I definitely got the feeling something truly bad was going to happen, I still didn’t realize quite how bad it would be.As folks might know, I’ve spoken about my thoughts on rape in fiction before and recently as well. It’s not normally something I’ll read past in a book. It’s just not a tactic I usually find that “well done” in a book and frankly, it’s infuriated me more than once with how it seems to be a shortcut to either manipulating emotions, “rewarding” the victim later with sooper speshul powers or as a catalyst to realizing how spiffy they are as a person later, or for “coming into” their powers.

So, I was disappointed that here came another book, essentially, about a raped heroine. As this disappointment also stemmed from already encountering rapes in two other books that same week, I almost chucked this one against the wall. But I decided to see if I could push through and find anything enjoyable, after an ordeal that usually leaves me feeling pretty depressed the rest of the book.

Miranda Grey suffers from an almost debilitating mental illness that enables her to feel the emotions of others. Through her music, she can control the crowd’s emotions, and even as she’s spiraling into despair, she’s an immensely popular and regular performer at a club in Austin, Texas. One night, she makes her way home on the dark streets, and she’s sexually assaulted by a group of men. When she comes to, and discovers they’re not done with her, she somehow channels their own hatred and hers and manages to kill her attackers using her empathic gift. This is a first for her, using her gift as a weapon, so right there is a familiar trope involving rape in paranormal fiction: accosted heroine comes into her powers or realizes the greatness of said powers because of severe trauma. Admittedly, not a favorite of mine. Severely injured, she wouldn’t have survived without the help of strangers that find her in the alley she was accosted in.

Surviving rape has brought Miranda into the home of David Soloman, ruling Prime of the Southern U.S. for the vampires, in what is known as their “Shadow World”. Intending to put a stop to the damage inflicted on mortals by the previous Prime, David’s work is threatened by those vampires who would rather see and use humans as cattle. Drawn to the fragile Miranda, he’s torn between giving her the space she needs and maintaining his role as Prime. His people are on the verge of war, and despite every precaution, Miranda could still be in danger.

I did have a hard time getting past the rape in this book. It happens very early in, and this is what shapes the dynamics between Miranda and David, as well as her personal character development, for the entire novel. I mean, it makes complete sense that it would – there is no shying away from it here. Miranda has flashbacks. She grieves, both alone, and in David’s arms. She goes through a long depressed stage, after which she thankfully wakes up and takes interest in life again. Meanwhile, she’s skeptical of David and his merry band of lethal killers, and I thought she was a little too accepting that -hey! – the world IS a vampire! As a character it’s actually fairly easy to sympathize with her, for obvious reasons. Even before she was raped, Miranda’s dilemma with the emotions constantly barraging her, and slowly driving her mad, was plenty enough for me to prepare for a thoroughly dark, entertaining urban fantasy.

David was an OK hero. While I loved how he handles Miranda’s ordeal and gives her time to adjust in the relative safety of his home, he wasn’t a very consistent character. I dunno, he was really all over the place to me. Sensitive, caring man with Miranda, lethal and uncompromising vampire Prime with his people. While he claims to sympathize with the humans who are killed, I got the impression more than once that he’s merely in it for the thrill of killing evil vampires. That he enjoyed it. There was  scene where he was glad – and admits it – that the human victim had died, because that gives him a reason to in turn kill the vampire responsible. I suppose this could’ve been an entirely necessary evil on his part, to show his enemies he means business and will show no mercy. Still, he is without remorse for the human and glad they died. He’s also supposed to be incredibly powerful and knowledgeable as the Prime, yet there was the matter of Miranda obviously being his queen, which he pushes away from the entire book through. And then there was a matter that arose when they finally became intimate, and dang it all, David ought to have known better, that their being together would possibly alter Miranda, yet it never crosses his mind.

He’s also a typical lady’s man, a player, and we’re treated to a few instances of him romancing other women. I found his logic at times like these to be a little problematic. In one case, he pretty much alludes to the girl he rescues from a potentially disastrous night with some men, as being responsible for her situation, that of possibly being attacked. He muses that he cannot understand why women of this century haven’t managed to “jettison patriarchal masochism” yet. That sounded as if it was laying fault a the feet of femininity that there are still rapes and other such female-demeaning instances in society.

The main reason I felt that way is because this revelation comes to him after he himself glamors/manipulates the girl and others so that his own feeding experiences are easier and more pleasurable, including having sex with some of them. And the idea of glamoring in order to feed and have sex could itself be a form of forced intimacy. But he justifies it as him being so much better a choice for his female “meal” than ending up, basically, as Miranda did at the beginning of the book. A different woman at another point was certainly not pleased to be presented to him like a piece of meat after he chose her in one of his bars. She’s clearly irritated as she’s escorted to his table but is also soon under his glamor spell. I found this to be extremely hypocritical of a vampire that claims to be going to war in part to protect humanity, and fighting against other vampires that see people like you and me as cattle. David’s ideas of what the average human is good for weren’t too altogether different.  He’s also pretty smug about his powers and purpose in life, none of these being things that made him particularly great in my eyes.

The final reason this side of him is perplexing to me is that it’s never treated as something that ought to be addressed, not that I saw anyway.  Perhaps it is an actual issue of his character, and maybe it’ll be addressed in a later book. Who knows.

For all that, though, David does have good qualities, which made ones like the above all the more huh?-inducing. His obvious, unfulfilled adoration for Miranda is one, and his knowledge of all things tech is another. Yes, the Prime for the Southern U.S. is a techno geek, and he loves being one. Tack on that he’s a totally, physically hot techno-geek vampire, and there are at least some things to like if one can get past his views on women. And I think Miranda pretty much challenges his ideas about jettisoning patriarchal masochism by the very end of the book. Hopefully she jettisoned it right out of him as well.

Personally? If you’re the type that dislikes rape,I say skip it when you get to about page 18, and just read on from there. You’ll get the gist, and you might actually like the book still. Considering all that happens to her at the beginning of the book, I did come to feel that the aftermath of her situation happened in a way that made sense and was organic to everything that happens after.

I found as I kept reading that the book really came off more as a paranormal romance. Even with the heroine’s trauma, Miranda and David are the main focus of the book, as is their budding romance. The plot itself, while interesting when seen through David’s eyes, or that of his second-in-command, a female vampire named Eve, wasn’t nearly as interesting overall. Nor were the efforts at worldbuilding. The book isn’t offering anything new in terms of vampire lore. I think pretty much every single detail given about the vamps in this book rang a bell about some prior vampire book and lore. One example is David’s role as Prime, which sounded a lot like the vampire kings or queens in charge of various territories in Charlaine Harris’ Southern Vampire series. There’s the typical can’t see them in mirrors deal, as well as several other details of that variety. The only real difference for me personally was a signet jewel-like necklace that the Primes wear, which acts as a status symbol as well as uses a mysterious, unexplained magic to choose the mate of the Prime that wears it. Yes, a jewel chooses a vampire ruler’s mate. Even David alludes to it all only as being mysterious.

So with a lackluster plot that we’ve seen before – warring vampire factions, basically, one pro-human, one anti-human, and not much in the way of new vampire lore, the romance between Miranda and David was at least sweet, believable and tinged with hope. Even if David took on the typical paranormal romance role of pushing Miranda away, for her own safety of course. No matter that their meant-to-be-together-ness rest beneath his damn nose. In this way, the book so obviously works better as a paranormal romance, than as urban fantasy. Urban fantasy romance, maybe?

One thing in this book’s favor – Miranda not only kills her attackers in the beginning of the book, but she goes on to become a seriously kick butt woman. I won’t say how she’s able to get past David’s refusal to really, truly be with her for the danger it puts her in, just suffice to say, even this rape-jaded reader couldn’t help but give up a holla when Miranda finally comes into her own. And she does it without David (who at that point I wanted to just throttle, he acts like a real dumbass a time or two), and in spite of his refusal to see the obvious – that she’s meant to be his queen.

The writing and pace and all those kinds of accouterments were pretty good, with thankfully few cheese-o-licious lines to detract from pretty good, gritty writing. (One instance that’s never left me was David’s teeth “sparkling” in the starlight – starlight! I had to pause for a few to wonder how in the hell teeth would even be remotely visible via starlight. Woe is the line ‘o cheese!). Readers of urban fantasy and paranormal romance that like these kinds of reads dark and gritty and relentlessly violent should get a kick out of the author’s style. I did think the story lagged when it was all about the vampire war plot. Given we’ve seen so much of this kind of thing already, I really wasn’t interested in much except the romance. Given what happened to Miranda,  I’m not surprised it was so central and focused a plot in this book. That being said, I still wish things like the vamp war and vamp lore had been a little more original. As is, they merely serve as a backdrop for Miranda’s recovery from rape. Even the “bad guys” are rather blah.

If you enjoy heroines that are sunken low, and then cast even lower than low, and left to climb their way out and triumph in the end, I think you’ll like this one. If you enjoy those kinds of things, but could do without detailed rape scenes, like I said before, skip that part and read the rest. After all, plenty of paranormal romances have been as dark as this book. I daresay the genre could do with one like this in it, as I’ve found myself growing a bit weary of the lighter paranormal romance style.

Overall, this book was OK for me. I’m just not a huge fan of reading, essentially, a book meant to show the recovery of a rape victim. While at the same contrary time, I did enjoy the book when it focused on her recovery, and David’s role in it even if he made some colossal mistakes with her toward the end of the book that, IMO, venture into TSTL moments. There were a few scenes that I didn’t understand why they were necessary, when until and after them, the book remained strong with no silly moments. One such scene was the proverbial need for Miranda to go into the woods, and of course, the suddenly silly woman is attacked. Because that’s all going in the woods at night when folks warn you against it is good for! I didn’t get why the book needed moments like this because the rest of it is actually pretty smart and shows Miranda to be developing sensibly up till that point.I’d say it had a lot to do with some need to put her in similar enough danger to her rape, merely so that readers and Miranda get that, that sort of thing could easily happen again. Still, felt like a forced instance of this kind of lesson, and Miranda certainly knew better given dangers that had passed prior, and also because there’d already been instances of the house and grounds maybe not being as safe as they’d like. Instead, her stupidity gets a perfectly good individual killed, which isn’t ever addressed.

I’m glad I pushed through and read the book, but I can’t say that it works overall. Parts of it worked for me. The romance is good. The fight scenes are very decent and Miranda’s development into a confident, butt-kicking woman felt empowering as a reader for the most part. The book could’ve done without David’s odd and dumb logic on the state of the world’s attitude toward women, the TSTL moments that showed Miranda and David as a bit idiotic at different times, and a stronger plot was needed. I loved the end of the book and felt that it enables this one to stand very well on its own. By the very end, I was smiling, so happy for Miranda, and I prefer, given what she went through to get there, to remember her as she ended up. I don’t feel a need to go on past this installment, and probably won’t be doing so.

Rating: Two and a Half Scoops