Review: A Shade of Vampire by Bella Forrest

A Shade of Vampire by Bella Forrest
Published: December 14, 2012
Publisher: Self-Published
Pages: 152
Series: A Shade of Vampire #1
Source: Author
My Rating: 2.5 of 5 stars

On the evening of Sofia Claremont's seventeenth birthday, she is sucked into a nightmare from which she cannot wake.

A quiet evening walk along a beach brings her face to face with a dangerous pale creature that craves much more than her blood.

She is kidnapped to an island where the sun is eternally forbidden to shine.
An island uncharted by any map and ruled by the most powerful vampire coven on the planet. She wakes here as a slave, a captive in chains.

Sofia's life takes a thrilling and terrifying turn when she is the one selected out of hundreds of girls to join the harem of Derek Novak, the dark royal Prince.

Despite his addiction to power and obsessive thirst for her blood, Sofia soon realizes that the safest place on the island is within his quarters, and she must do all within her power to win him over if she is to survive even one more night.

Will she succeed? ...or is she destined to the same fate that all other girls have met at the hands of the Novaks?

My Review: It's been a few months since I last read a book about vampires and now I know why. It seems that almost every vampire book I pick up has the same kind of romance. For awhile vampire books were probably one of the most popular books around but now it seems like most vampire books are the same. There's always a forbidden love with the main character and the vampire. The problem? The vampire wants to drink the main characters blood so he's a danger to the main character. Sound familiar?

The concept of the Shade was something that I would have liked to know more about. The only information about it is that it is a sanctuary for vampires. It probably would have added to the story if more vampire politics were involved since Derek was their prince. The entire book was basically Sofia living in the Shade and trying to figure out her feelings for Derek.

The romance actually wasn't too bad but I had a few issues with it. My main problem with the book was the insta love. The moment Derek wakes up he sees Sofia and wants to drink her blood but then he stops himself because she's too beautiful and he doesn't want to hurt her. He thinks she special the moment he sees her. I'm just not a fan of books that have something like that in them.

There was kind of a love triangle in this book too but that didn't really bother me. Sofia is in love with her best friend but she also falls in love with Derek. Not much is known about Ben (her best friend) but from the flashbacks he felt more like her brother than a friend. I got the feeling that Ben wasn't really competition for Derek.

Most of the book was fairly uneventful. The ending was probably the best part of the book because it left me hanging. I think that the book could have been much better if more actually happened throughout the book instead of just near the end.

*I received this book from the author in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!