Crimson Groves by Ashley Robertson
November 9, 2011 by Author (Indie eBook)
Paperback, 277 Pages
Review Copy

Abby knows what its like to have life turned upside down on her, recently her heart was broken due to the indiscretion of her boyfriend and best friend...who she found in bed together. Depressed, lonely and a very much vulnerable, Abby spends her nights working as a bartender and wallows in the bar community. When a particular night brings the handsome, mysterious Bronx who zeros in on her almost immediately she lets the conversion, the flirting and his distraction carry her away......all the way to his apartment. Not that Abby intended to go with Bronx to his place, but the nice, interesting, handsome guy turns into a major D-bag in the span of two minutes. He seduces her and lures her to his place due to his vampire powers. When he gets Abby there he sexually pounces on her and winds up turning her into a vampire as well. When Abby awakens as one of the undead, she knows life again has turned on her.

Bronx holds Abby captive while he waits for her to submit to the new life as a vampire and the forever psycho love he is offering. As she remains pretty much subdued in her actions, her mind is in overdrive with plots to escape and be free of the lunatic imprisoning her.She waits and abides her time, knowing that she can outsmart Bronx when necessary. When the "couple" does go on their first outing its to a donor club (a place where humans volunteer their blood to vampires) the plot twists and Abby finally gets a chance to escape Bronx with Travis, a donor who helps her get away. Together they try and figure her vampire life out, keep her away from Bronx and try not to fall in love with each other.

Crimson Groves was an interesting take on the much hyped genre of vampires, I loved the originality of the story and the determination and smarts of main character Abby. While I really enjoyed Abby's character,including her whit and dialog, I found her to be way too trusting, most her willing to give the benefit of a doubt obviously got her into the most trouble during the book, for being smart, she lacked commonsense at crucial points in decision making. The book itself in the beginning proved to be challenging for me, it took awhile to get into Robertson's style of writing as I found the sentences very fragmented and a tad choppy, or rather the flow of novel felt stilted. Once Abby escapes Bronx though I got used to the flux of the writing and mostly enjoyed the middle and ending. It was different and certainty a unique offering in the vast world of vampire tales.

I would recommend Crimson Groves to lovers of paranormal, especially the vampire genre.

Rating

Recommended to mature teen readers (17&up) and contains: Violence, language, drinking and sexuality.

3/5- Mature-Ya-Vampires
A Special thanks to Ashley for sending me Crimson Groves