Night's Edge: Dancers in the Dark\Her Best Enemy\Someone Else's Shadow [Mass Market Paperback]

This anthology fares better than most in that two of the three stories are worth reading. If I were able to do it all over again I'd skip the Hambly story but since I can't turn back time I've just got to suck it up.

Maggie Shayne used to be my favorite paranormal romance author way back when she was writing for Silhouette Shadows (very sadly defunct) but she lost me when she started writing books with Witchy heroines who annoyed the heck out of me. This time around she tackles a haunted house tale with a hot dog swilling heroine who works as a reporter and has a huge chip on her shoulder. Kiley spends her life debunking the local psychics, all of whom turn out to be crackpots swindling the public. All but Jack McCain, who just happens to be a hunky hunk, that is. Jack and Kiley have a love/hate relationship as he knows she's out to get him next. When Kiley suspects her new home may be haunted who do you think she runs to? None other than the man whose face she deliberately blew smoke in a few days earlier. Jack, being a man, succumbs to her charms (she's gorgeous, wouldn't you know it?) and helps her with her troubles despite his misgivings.

I enjoyed the story for the most part. I was irritated by the heroine many times but eventually she grew on me and loosened up on her stringent beliefs a bit. The haunted house aspects were just creepy enough to hold my attention and have me anxiously turning the pages but the romance was a bit of a flop for me. The pair went from complete dislike, to overwhelming lust, to deep forever love in a blink. I can't see them shacking up together for any longer than a month before boredom sets in, tempers begin to flare and Kylie storms out in a huff. Hmmm, this all sounds mighty negative but, truly, I did enjoy the story and was never bored enough to toss it aside.

The Barbara Hambly story "Someone Else's Shadow" was more problematic when it came to holding my attention. There was too much navel gazing going on and it took forever to get moving. The heroine, Maddie, had too much internal dialogue for my liking and over analyzed everything and everyone near to her. It was also excruciatingly gloomy.

One night Maddie goes out in search of her young roomie, Tessa, who spends long nights alone practicing ballet in a creepy studio. While searching for Tessa a smelly man lurking in the shadows whispers something along the lines of "little sl*ts are all alike" before disappearing. Maddie is justifiably creeped out and when Tessa introduces her to Phil, a nice enough guy who is temporarily homeless and living at the studio, she fears he was the one whispering those not-so-sweet-nothings in her ear. But she's confused because Phil isn't stinky and the erotic dreams she has about Phil after the fact have her hoping he isn't the potty-mouthed, foul-smelling psychopath hanging out in the shadows. Naturally, s he goes over and over (and over) this in her head, does a tarot reading filled with danger signs that add fuel to the fire, then worries about her roomie, her past, her mother and well you can see the pattern here.

The pace eventually picks up but for me it was too little of a pay-off that came far too late. The beginning was too unfocused and meandering and in the end it was only an okay ghost story and a so/so romance.

The Charlaine Harris story "Dancers In The Dark" was the best of the bunch. Rue is a dancer haunted by a tragic past that is only revealed in bits and pieces. She signs on with a company of dubious origins called "Blue Moon" where she is paired up with a sexily accented, very secretive, centuries old vampire named Sean. The pair hit it off as only two kindred and very damaged souls can but trouble surfaces when a nut from Rue's past comes back to haunt her. This story was tender and suspenseful and never made me think "awww, stop feeling sorry for yourselves and get over it already" as so many angsty vampire tales have a tendency to do. I liked both of these characters and their chemistry was a very powerful thing.

The lead story is almost mind-numbingly conventional.

It's not really *bad*, it's just that the only new element it brings to the classic tale of the fake psychic who discovers she isn't is a role-reversal making the guy the "psychic" and the girl the crusading reporter determined to debunk him.

Charlaine Harris's story is set in her "Southern Vampire" universe, though Sookie and Bill (or Eric) don't show up, and involves real human problems (a stalker of proven violent intent) with a supernatural resolution. For me the main character's occasional thoughts of her youth as a child beauty and talent show competitor with a classic stage mama pushing her brought to mind every picture of JonBenet Ramsey i have ever seen -- a beautiful child who would never have had a real childhood even if she had lived and whose eyes seemed to show that even at age six she had already realised it.

In any other company, the Harris would probably have been the standout.

But Barbara Hambley's piece, about the evil that lives on in a former sweatshop that was the site of a disastrous fire reminiscent of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, is the absolute standout for me, not only for its superior handling of the dark elements of the supernatural, but for personal resonances because i recognise some of her sources and was caught up in her resolution of them.

Excellent book overall

I'm with the reviewers below: I love these authors. They have proven time and again that they are top notch and worth every penny. Night's Edge seemed like a hurried effort. I admit, I'm not a big fan of anthologies. I find the stories to be too quick: quick on romance, quick on character development, and quick to tie up all the loose ends created in the plot. The writing in these stories is excellent, but all have the above three problems. I initially bought this book for the Charlaine Harris story. While the concept was excellent, the story seemed to crash and burn at the end. The only thing I can say is if this is the first time you're reading anything by these three authors, be assured that their full-length novels are the real draw and these stories are just to tide us over til the next one comes out.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 24 reviews  3.7 out of 5 stars