Descended by Blood

Descended by Blood by Angeline Kace
Release Date: August 26, 2011
Accendo Press

3.5/5 Stars

Goodreads Synopsis:
Brooke Keller is a high school junior who has never spent much time living in one place. She is finally in a town long enough to almost snag the boy of her dreams, until her life is threatened after killing a fanged man in his attempt to kidnap her. Brooke begins a dangerous journey in an effort to find out who is after her and how to stop them. In a world with powerful and prejudiced vampires, Brooke must tap into the side of her that she never knew existed at the risk of losing her life in order to save it.

Descended by Blood kind of gave me a Twilight love triangle vibe, but without the werewolves. That's just to say that this is a book with a lot of focus on the romance department, and if you enjoy that then this is an interesting, fun read.

Brooke was a great character, and Angeline Kace did a wonderful job peeling back the different layers of her. One of my favourite things about Brooke was that she didn't spend all of her time brooding, and wasn't the typical emo teenage girl. She's bubbly and she's fun! She gets together with her best friend, and they cry and giggle and make you feel all nostalgic for some of your own girl time. But there's some real pain stemming from some very real issues there as well.

In particular, Brooke's relationship with her father was done very well. I like reading about dysfunctional families when they're dealt with properly and given the type of attention they deserve.

Now, I really hated her relationship with Jaren. He really, totally, completely SUCKS. I felt constantly annoyed by him; somehow he's okay with her freakishly killing someone in his house, but as soon as she turns out to be a vampire he bails? Um, no. Killing is (or should be) fairly traumatic. The transitions in atmosphere also weren't really there. One minute every thing would be fine then -BAM- there would be a near death occurence and then they'd just go right back to normal. And reading the action scenes felt a bit lacking for more action described through the writing.

I really like the story behind the book, especially all the vampire politics. The fantasy in it is intriguing too, but I really hope that in the future books the characters will be a bit more serious about the events going on. Mirko is a perfect example of what I would like to see: he's fun and plays around a lot, but he's serious when he needs to be. (Pssst... he's so much better than Jaren!) I didn't see that coming from the other characters too much, which detracted from the story a bit for me. But it's still a good debut from Kace, and for those who enjoy the vampire trend going on right now this one is worth picking up to read.

ARC e-book received from author for me to read and write an honest review on it. Thank you, Angeline!

She also sent me the book trailer, which I'm embedding below for your viewing pleasure! Enjoy! :)