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Cerulean Sins (Library Binding)

by Laurell K. Hamilton (Author) "IT WAS EARLY September, a busy time of year for raising the dead ..." (more)
3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (306 customer reviews)

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Laurell K. Hamilton's legions of eager fans will be pleased to see Cerulean Sins, the eleventh novel in her Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series, which is set on an alternate Earth where magic works and vampires and werewolves are real. When a sinister stranger tries to hire the magically potent Anita Blake to raise the dead, she finds herself embroiled in the search for a vicious, supernatural serial killer, and also in the clandestine international politics of the vampires. And as she becomes more deeply enmeshed in cruel plots and counterplots, her tangled personal life only becomes more demanding, more wrenching, and more erotically fraught.

With ten previous books in the Anita Blake series, Cerulean Sins is not the place to start. Though author Hamilton artfully reveals the backstory in small doses, the numerous returning characters and the complex history will overwhelm most newcomers (and even the most devoted fans may find that the backfilling slows the pace). Also, the characters frequently stand around talking and psychoanalyzing one another, which makes for static stretches unlikely to hold a new reader's attention. Newcomers should start with the first book, Guilty Pleasures. --Cynthia Ward --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Anita Blake is one the more fascinating fictional heroines since Scarlet O'Hara-and a hell of a lot more fun than most. Despite her satin lingerie, short skirts and high heels, she kicks both human and non-human bad-guy butt-hard. Having gained immense supernatural powers and become an important force in the vampiric and lycanthropic communities of St. Louis in the 10 previous books, Anita begins this fantastic dark adventure by raising the dead and ends it by tackling a murderous monster. In between, she wades (literally) into a bloody investigation of a preternatural serial killer and (metaphysically and physically) into dangerous vampire politics. šber-vampiress Belle Morte has sent her dreaded surrogate, Musette, to demand that Anita's paramour, Jean-Claude, Master Vampire of the City, return the vampire Asher to her-a fate worse than a stake through the heart. In order to save Asher, Anita must be both sexually and psychically creative. Anita and the vampires also need head werewolf Richard to help defeat Belle Morte's designs. But can Richard, who recently dumped Anita because she was more "monster" than human, be relied on? Meanwhile, cop Dolph Storr, who's gone violently anti-preternatural, won't let Anita (now a federal marshal) help stop a series of gruesome murders. If this all seems complicated, it's nothing compared to Anita's sex life. There's plenty of the hot stuff, but it's presented with a certain morality and definite hilarity. After unraveling, to the detriment of writing and plot, some character and story line knots in previous bestseller Narcissus in Chains (2001), the author is back on track with the best Blake yet.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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IT WAS EARLY September, a busy time of year for raising the dead. Read the first page
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306 Reviews
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Cerulean sick, July 5 2008
By E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Cerulean Sins (Paperback)
With "Narcissus in Chains," Laurell K. Hamilton switched her format from blood'n'suspense to sex, blood and endless superpowers for her self-insert, Anita Blake.

And sadly "Cerulean Sins" only continues that tradition, couching a meager plot in endless supernatural sex and increasingly purple prose. But even that might be tolerable if Hamilton's idtastic heroine did not waft through the book, expecting all males to put up with her mood-swings, molestation and manipulation. Think the worst fanfiction Mary Sue ever written by a twelve-year-old Hot Topic shopper.

Anita has just finished a zombie raising when Asher arrives with a message: Belle Morte's emissary Musette has arrived unexpectedly. It turns out that she's come there to toy with Jean-Claude and torment Asher -- and even worse, she intends to use the scarred vampire for her sadistic pleasure. If he isn't the sex partner of a more powerful person, she's free to do it.

However will Anita fix this? By stabbing Musette and hopping in the sack with Asher, of course!

While Anita deals with her deteriorating relationship with the police -- it's their fault rather than hers, of course -- she also must deal with a series of murders, and strange men following her. But the main problem is Belle Morte, who has taken a person interest in Anita -- and whose emissary is still able to cause trouble for Anita's "people." And possibly death for Asher.

Some lip service is paid to a serial killer and a gang of secret agents who, of course, want to enlist Anita's oh-so-impressive services. But that's not where Laurell K. Hamilton's interests lie -- it's pretty clear she is focusing on the endless parade of "who's on top?" vampire politics and all its courtly trappings, and in writing maybe/maybe not sex scenes.

Problem is, she's not very good at it. The supposedly courtly etiquette of the vampires is staggeringly dull, with much hilarious talk of "American sex" (your basic sex) versus "European sex" (just about any kind of physical contact). And the sex scenes require endless before-during-after talking and ridiculous angst. At least two pages are required to get Asher out of his underwear. And her attempts at compelling, intense scenes -- such as the were rescue squad or the long-distance prods of Belle Morte -- end up laughably melodramatic.

Worst of all, no sense of humor -- despite Anita's oh-so-witty barbs, the funniest line in the whole book is Asher announcing that he's known saints and priests who did not have the self-control of a nymphomaniacal narcissist. Add Hamilton's endless descriptions of anime-style flowing hair and brightly-colored eyes, and you have a recipe for tedious, slow-moving slogging.

It's pretty evident that Anita is self-absorbed and not very bright, as well as a glaring Mary Sue with contrived angst and unreal sex powers. Everyone (including the villain and the government) wants her, because she's so tough and special, and despite the fact that she's utterly abrasive and a raging narcissist. Hamilton tries to cover this with protestations that she "loves" all the guys around her, but it's never convincing.

But over the course of "Cerulean Sins" she becomes truly loathsome: emotionally manipulating the vulnerable, endlessly sniping at Richard, and refusing to let Asher leave unless he has sex with her. And while she admits that it's massively hypocritical to insist that Jean-Claude be faithful to her alone while she has sex with anything that will hold still, she insists on it anyway.

Poor Asher. He gets put through the wringer in this one. After being stabbed by an old flame, he has to deal with Anita lying and manipulating him so he'll have "European sex" with her, and apparently not caring how distraught it makes him. The poor guy deserves better.

"Cerulean Sins" is a long, tedious slog of painfully boring sex, painfully boring dialogue, and painfully boring vampire politics that exists just to be talked about. A ghastly experience.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Ummm, Rewrite Please!, Sep 18 2003
By F. Demuth "demuthf" (CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Cerulean Sins (Hardcover)
Ok, I love Hamilton's books. Her creativity is boundless, and her characters fly off the pages. But this book was so one-dimentional and I was really dissapointed. I gave it two stars because even though it's kind of a let-down, it still manages to nudge the story along and you should read it if you want to keep up with the series. But it's a total "filler" book. There is tooooo much pointless sex, (most of which is totally pointless to the story). Enough with the ARDEUR crap! If Hamilton wants to write porn, she should just get on with that. And don't get me wrong, I totally love good sex scenes, but in this book they took over to the detriment of a decent story line. Hamilton's signature preternatural crime hook suffered badly here, becoming almost an afterthought to the Anita's being in constant heat. I mean phleaz! Get the woman a vibrator already....
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1.0 out of 5 stars Sinful read, Feb 23 2007
By E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Cerulean Sins (Mass Market Paperback)
Laurell K. Hamilton is aging well, but her Anita Blake series is not. The eleventh volume of the fantasy-horror series is heavy on supernatural sex and light on plot. While Hamilton comes up with a handful of cool ideas for "Cerulean Sin," her book is sunk by an irritating heroine and a plot relegated to subplot status.

St. Louis is swarming with vampires, werecreatures, and who knows what else. And Anita Blake is in the thick of it, enmeshed with all of the above. Now with her personal life in an uproar, she still has to hunt down a very messy serial killer who can change his shape -- and unfortunately, she's not getting a lot of help from the more typical police authorities.

But things get even more difficult when a sadistic vampire, Musette, arrives and demands that the traumatized Asher come back with her to super-vampire Belle Morte. Since Belle Morte once tormented Asher, Anita ain't about to let him go. So now she has a mystery serial killer, and a very angry ancient vampire on her tail -- things are starting to get a lot worse.

Try reading this book while skipping over the erotica, as I did. I guarantee you'll be done in less than half an hour. Sex is the new supernatural in Hamilton's series, and the actual plot starts slipping into the shadows. Where does the plot go? It gets buried in Anita's many vaguely disturbing and very detailed sexual encounters. To thumb her nose at Belle Morte, is it necessary for Anita to bed Asher? Not really. But it still happens.

Hamilton seems to be on strong footing with some of the plot elements. Super-vampire Belle Morte is quite cool, as is the intricate vampire politics. But really, readers can only take so much of Anita's self-adoration before the narrative gets tiresome. The sex scenes -- it's impossible to miss every page -- are clinical and dull, and the climax is more of a sputter.

Anita herself is the biggest problem -- if she doesn't like someone, she offs them. And she apparently will do the wild thing with any guy who says yes. And everyone adores her, and never disagrees with her. Yeah, she's really easy to relate to -- she's more Mary Sue than Dirty Harry. Her new boyfriend Micah has big body parts but no personality. Richard is the only one of Hamilton's characters who acts like a real person. Despite Hamilton's efforts to convince us that he's crazy, it's hard not to sympathize with the poor guy.

"Cerulean Sins" is more of a sickly blue annoyance. Hamilton's eleventh Blake book is a collection of vague narcissism, riddled with weird sex and weirder characters. An exercise in mediocrity.
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 		 Most recent customer reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Absolute amazement
Okay, this is one book that I neglected (by mistake, I add) when I was buying up the rest of the series, so I actually finished the series and then came back to this one - and... Read more
Published on Sep 5 2005 by Steph Perkins

4.0 out of 5 stars A lot Better than the last one
As others have said this is not even close to being the best of the Blake series but it is one heck of a lot better than Chains which was so bad I could barely read... Read more
Published on Sep 18 2004

1.0 out of 5 stars Actively Nauseous
Having begun with Guilty Pleasures and read with constant enjoyment up through the first hundred pages of "Narcissus in Chains", I feel tricked and cheated. Read more
Published on July 15 2004 by Morrighan

3.0 out of 5 stars I hope it does not get any worse then this
Well I have all the books for this series and all I can think of is how far the series has sunk.
From the start the series was excellant with a great storyline but the last 3... Read more
Published on July 9 2004

5.0 out of 5 stars BOOK #11 IS ANOTHER SUCCESS!!!
Laurell K. Hamilton has done it again! This newest book, #11 in her Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series, is a unique look at how the entire world of Anita Blake, necromancer, human... Read more
Published on Jun 28 2004 by ncferrets

1.0 out of 5 stars what happened?
I am a huge fan of LKH but this book was so disapointing. It is the worst book of the entire series-so far anyway. Read more
Published on Jun 25 2004

4.0 out of 5 stars Different Kind of Anita Book
After reading all the negative views I won't rehash the plot. But I will say people fell in love with the prudish Episcopalian Anita Blake who was almost 2 dimensional and flat... Read more
Published on Jun 20 2004 by Mouser

1.0 out of 5 stars Three strikes and you are out
OK, this is book 11 in the series and I am sure its starts to become taxing on the author to grow the story and character. Read more
Published on Jun 16 2004

5.0 out of 5 stars She keeps getting better every time
After reading what other's thought of this book, I will accept their opinions, because they did have some valid thoughts. Read more
Published on Jun 12 2004 by Lauren D. Kunst

4.0 out of 5 stars 4 Stars because I can't give it 4.5
Not my favorite Anita book, but it was still good. The only reason why it didn't get a 5 star is that the editing in the book is weak, and the plot line could have been tighter... Read more
Published on Jun 4 2004

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