|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||
Frequently Bought Together
Product Details
|
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
Rardin fuses spy girl with vampire slayer in this entertaining but derivative debut. Jasmine Jaz Parks, a martial artist turned vampire-hunting government agent, is assigned to protect top-notch operative Vayl, a 300-year-old vampire on the side of the good guys. As Vayl helps Jaz to hone her supernatural abilities and she tries to keep from falling for his Romanian charm, they track down a dirty senator in cahoots with Mohammed Khad Abn-Assan, a terrorist who's making plans for a Red Plague spread through vampire-to-human contact. Rardin delivers all the paranormal touches that fans of Hamilton, Harris and Whedon enjoy, and Jaz's jittery narration amuses, but the fang-filled plot, replete with action licks and paranormal theatrics, will have trouble standing out in this overcrowded field. (Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
Rardin fuses spy girl with vampire slayer in this entertaining [debut] ...delivers all the paranormal touches that fans of Hamilton, Harris and Whedon enjoy Publishers Weekly A heroine whose past is darker than those she hunts, and a storyline that keeps you guessing...sure to be a winner. Keri Arthur, NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Bond meets Dracula - only better than that. Jaz is an awesome, awe-inspiring heroine Patricia Briggs
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
2.0 out of 5 stars
Things you might want to know before you read this book.,
By
This review is from: Once Bitten, Twice Shy (Paperback)
Here's what you need to know.-Good female lead but doesn't really respond to any of the life changing forces. It seemed like Rardin copped out but not letting Jaz think about things. -Want answers about terminology (ie - avhan) used in the book? Apparently, they aren't in this volume. -Rardin's publisher needs a better copyeditor. There are messes with how people are introduced to each other (ie page 103 - Cole should not know Vayl's name). Overall, it was an alright story, but don't expect any answers to your questions or how things worked out, especially in the flashback department. So if you don't want to pay close attention and you don't get hung up on things that aren't explained, it'll be good for you. Otherwise, mildly frustrating.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Fun read,
By Mandy (Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Once Bitten, Twice Shy (Paperback)
I've really enjoyed reading this series! I find Jaz to be funny and quirky and compelling. Lots of neat gadgets and crazy situations. Always lots of fun without being too shallow. And the world the author creates (vampires, werewolves, demons, Jaz's own backstory, etc) is really rich without getting bogged down in excess detail and complexity.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
3.7 out of 5 stars (47 customer reviews) 58 of 70 people found the following review helpful
2.0 out of 5 stars
the title = my feelings about this book,
By mlle. x - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Once Bitten, Twice Shy (Paperback)
Wherever ONCE BITTEN TWICE SHY is shelved (I picked it up in the sci-fi/fantasy section), don't be deceived: it's really chick-lit. And the worst kind of chick-lit, where there's a whole lot of "defining the relationship" and not a lot of action or romance. The book starts six months after protagonist Jaz is partnered with vampire assassin Vayl, and their relationship is already completely unprofessional. We miss out on all the fun, getting-to-know-you, tension-building parts of their relationship and pick up when they start to trudge glumly through the Swamp of Complicated Emotions. Rardin tries to convince us that Vayl is an uber-alpha male, but he spends so much time talking about his feelings it's really hard to buy. He also lets Jaz push him around a lot...and not in that "I'm humoring her" sort of alpha-male way, more in a "I'm totally whipped" sort of way.The fact that one of villains the duo have to face is Vayl's late wife (she's a vampire too) means that even when Jaz and Vayl head out to kick some ass, they always end up right back at that Swamp of Complicated Emotions. The super-villain plot is drenched in Eau de Catfight. The urban fantasy/paranormal elements are poorly realized and confusing. The growth of Jaz's "Gifts" is pretty botched - each new development is greeted with less explanation than the last. I never got a clear handle on what it meant to be a vampire in Rardin's alternate reality. And Rardin was trying to do a techno-mystical fusion with her uber-villain plot, something to do with a cult of demon-worshippers and a biological WMD (these basic elements are revealed early on), but devoted very little time or effort to explaining either. The other main plot point is the slow reveal of Jaz's tortured past to the reader. We are informed a number of times that there is a HUGE TRAUMA in Jaz's past, and then we start to get hints about what it is, and eventually we learn the whole story. This just made me think, again, that this book starts after all the real action is over. I was also kind of annoyed by the way that the story came out - she blabs the whole thing in pieces to totally random people, and actually seems over-eager to talk about it, but when she's not in chatter mode she goes on about how her HUGE TRAUMA is too huge and traumatic to talk about, or even think about. It's exactly the kind of drama queen behavior that makes you wonder how this girl ever got a job in the CIA. 13 of 14 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Not Some Ordinary Spy Novel,
By SciFiChick "The SciFiChick" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Once Bitten, Twice Shy (Paperback)
Jaz Parks is a government agent. Her partner Vayl is a 300-year-old vampire. Their latest assignment is to assassinate a plastic surgeon involved in terrorism. But after one night of investigating Assan, they discover he's into a lot more than just helping to fund terrorism. Assan and his conspirators begin talking about releasing a deadly plague. And a high-ranking senator seems to be pulling the strings.I can't begin to tell you how much I enjoyed this novel. Rardin ads a perfect blend of humor and humility to an otherwise strong female lead character. The story and characters pull you in and don't let go. I'm simply amazed that this is her debut novel. I can't wait to see Rardin's skills develop further in future releases. If I don't receive review copies for the sequels, you can bet I'll be standing in line at the bookstore on the release dates. Once Bitten, Twice Shy is in now in my list of top favorites for the year. With a seemingly over-abundance of vampire novels, Once Bitten, Twice Shy stands out as a fun, light-hearted, supernatural, spy novel. Blending some of my favorite elements: fantasy, espionage, mystery, action, and just a touch of romance, makes a recipe for one extremely entertaining story. 27 of 33 people found the following review helpful
2.0 out of 5 stars
Vaccum the Rug, Do the Dishes, Read Jaz Parks,
By L. J Lewis "Miss Amii" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Once Bitten, Twice Shy (Paperback)
Meet Jaz Parks. She's a flippant, barely competent CIA-trained vampire hunter easily distracted by a pretty male face. She has a strained relationship with her family. She has a tentative vampire love interest. And she's a special snow flake with a power so unique that no one else has it. In essence, she's just like every most other urban fantasy heroines that have been cluttering up the landscape as of late. To make matters worse for Jaz, she's trapped in a derivative shoe-string plot padded with heaping helpings of filler and the story still manages not to clear three hundred pages.Seriously, when reviewers are almost unanimously commenting on how unoriginal the plot is they should not be awarding the darn thing five stars like Halloween candy. This book was an utter chore to read. It seems like whenever someone attempts the vampires turned secret agent plot it turns out badly. See the horrible, stinky, braindead mess that is the Darkwing Chronicles. Jaz and her vampire partner Vayl are deep undercover so they can rub out a plastic surgeon with ties to the Raptor, a vampire terrorist. Strike one against Jaz is when she's a party staking out the bad guy's mansion and she runs into a man in the lady's room and promptly blows her cover. Strike two against Jaz occurs when you realize that she only has one mood and that's snarky. She yammers on like she doesn't take anything seriously and her humor falls flat. Authors need to realize that while the wise-cracking heroine is a genre staple, you parcel out the wit. If the characters do it at inappropriate times, they just end up sounding stupid rather than tough. The plot involves Jaz and Vayl unraveling a vampire bioterrorism conspiracy that involves one of their CIA handlers. Unfortunately, most of the sluthing takes place off-screen by other characters. However, the story continuously throws minor obstacles at Jaz and Vayl, and they are so easily overcome that it all feels utter pointless. It's like Rardin was desperate to have some action, but kept throwing on the brakes so it was over before it began. I was so terribly bored by the end that I just skimmed the last fifty pages. This seems to be Rardin's first book and it has all the hallmarks of one. It relies too much on paint-by-numbers genre conventions. It's unadventurous and it relies too much on filler sections to pad it out rather than come up with something more complex. Considering that she will have cranked out four novels in this series in the span of two years, I doubt she's had time to hone her craft. For that reason I won't be checking out any of the Jaz Parks books in the future. |
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
