Vampires in Saint Louis? Yes, and they need help. Guilty Pleasures is the first of the Laurell K. Hamilton’s wildly popular Vampire Hunter stories. Anita Blake is a necromancer, with an affinity for the dead in all their guises, but that doesn’t mean she wants to work for them. When the Master Vampire of Saint Louis sends sexy Jean Paul to procure Anita’s help her main response is, “I don’t date vampires. I kill them.”
I thoroughly enjoyed meeting Anita Blake. In this narrative told entirely from her point of view, Anita comes across as a sharp, strong woman with a biting sense of humor and a definite, if distinctive, moral code. This first novel (as of this review, there are 23) outlines Hamilton’s alternate Saint Louis. Vampires are alive and legal American citizens. Unused to following any laws but their own, someone needs to keep them in check. Anita is known to the vampire community simply as “The Executioner.”
Though future books in this series rely more on sex than story (not that there’s anything wrong with that), this first novel will appeal to paranormal fans who enjoy a well-paced plot, action, and their vampires with a bit of blood still dripping from the fangs.