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Saturday 16 July 2011

Review: DEAD UNTIL DARK

Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris
Read by Johanna Parker
Book 1 of the Sookie Stackhouse series
Format: audiobook

Genre: adult urban fantasy

About Dead Until Dark:
Sookie Stackhouse is a small-time cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana. She's quiet, keeps to herself, and doesn't get out much. Not because she's not pretty. She is. It's just that, well, Sookie has this sort of 'disability'. She can read minds. And that doesn't make her too dateable. And then along comes Bill: he's tall, dark and handsome - and Sookie can't 'hear' a word he's thinking. He's exactly the type of guy she's been waiting for all her life.

But Bill has a disability of his own: he's a vampire. Worse than that, he hangs with a seriously creepy crowd, with a reputation for trouble - of the murderous kind.

And when one of Sookie's colleagues is killed, she begins to fear she'll be next...
Source: Info in the About Dead Until Dark was taken from the back cover of the paperback edition.

My Thoughts:
I've had the paperback version sitting in my shelf for a good few years now and I could never seem to get through it. Since having my iPhone, I thought I'd try a full length audiobook and see if I like it, but somehow never actually gotten around to doing it. Anyway, I finally downloaded Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris (paid by my personal money, just in case FTC or the like is interested) to see if I could finish the book that way. This is the first full length audio book I've tried. And Johanna Parker's voice took a little getting used to on my part. But since the setting is in Louisiana, USA then I guess the southern accent fits. And once I got used to the narrator, it did flow smoothly.

And of course, I just have to share with you my favouritest characters... Tina and Sam. Tina played a very small part but she is feisty and adorable! Sam, well, he is loyal and helpful... and I just love canines!

Now the cover, I don't know why Pam gets to be on the cover and not Sookie... guess it's more dramatic... more marketable... *shrugs shoulders*

When I first listened to this audiobook, I was reminded again why I couldn't quite get into the paperback book. The openning salvo has the heroine rescuing the hero. A vampire is suppose to have uber-superpowers but got captured by a couple of "two-bit cons". Okeyyyy... Then if the "two-bit cons" were powerful enough or clever enough to out-wit or overcome a vampire with uber-superpowers, then... they got beaten by a slip of a girl?? A slip of a girl with no superpowers, no martial-arts training whatsoever and never even been in a fight before... I'm sorry but that scene there just don't add up, it's not very believable to me... I think it needs a lot of editting... it sinks the suspension of disbelief down to the boots so much like a deadweight lead. However, it seems that a lot of people likes this series so much, that there must be something good in this series, so I persevered. Glad I did! Because that "unbelievable scenario" was a one-off thing. Just because it was at the start that I couldn't quite read through the paperback. However, I find that listening to it is easier. At the end of it, I can honestly say that I enjoyed the audiobook! The ending resolved the main dilemma of the story satisfactorily while hinting at more things to come with subsequent books enough to keep a reader hooked to the series. So I'll probably buy another audiobook of this series even though I already have the paperback.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story Telling Quality = 4
World Building = 4.5
Character Development = 4
Plot = 3
Pace = 3.5
Story Itself = 3.5
Ending = 5
Narration = 3.5

Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 cherries


Books In This Series:

Trailer of the HBO adaptation of the Sookie Stackhouse series: TRUE BLOOD Season 4
*Sookie Stackhouse 11 was added on 17/07/2011.

2 comments:

Hannah said...

Ohh I'm trying to read other stuff but now I'm itching to pick up Dead to the World. Club Dead really made me love this series and I can't wait to read the rest! *bounce* Luckily have 1-9 and 11 on my shelf, just need to get book 10 and I'm all good ;)

Cherry said...

Just finished book 2 and will be reading book 3 soon... I think books 1 and 2 are not the best in this series but enough to hook a reader...

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