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3.0 out of 5 stars
Come to the Cabaret..., Aug 15 2001
How would you feel if your latest in a long string of short term boyfriends reveals he is a vampire? He beds you, bites you, and, without a by or a leave, rides off into the sunset. Leaving you a vampire yourself, sexy, powerful, and totally uninformed about what to do next. Well, that's exactly what happens to Allison Garrett. Clueless and hungry, she wanders through Las Angeles snacking on strangers, until she falls into the hands of Luci, owner of the Fur Pit cabaret, and vampiress extraordinary. Luci and her cohorts are topless fur dancers in Los Angeles only strip joint for furverts. Luci's cohorts are Miriam, who has a gruesome fondness for cats, Gina, a tough, irritable vampire with a yen for Luci, and now, Allison.The human contingent at Luci's consists of Gypsy, a happy go lucky biker type who tends bar and stops fights and Mica, who touts at the entrance. Attracting customers is Mica's night job. During the day He is a bible toting street evangelist, trying to save the souls of the local residents. Needless to say, this is a difficult task in Los Angeles, and Mica frequently comes back from his soul saving stints with as many brochures as he started out with. Mica is a bit young, and alarmingly naïve. He has managed to miss the fact that the Fur Pit is not just your ordinary den of iniquity. Mica's holiness helps by keeping him pretty close to indigestible (he makes Allison sneeze) but Luci's pet project it to lure Mica from his sanctified state. What happens as Allison attempts to adjust to her to role in unlife and Mica finds he has to temper his lust for the sexy new vampire or be bitten out of going to heaven is the true plot of "Night Prayers." Not really a horror story, or a romance, but simply a vampiric comedy of errors with a plot that adds new meaning to the phrase 'willing suspension of disbelief.' All the vampires can read each others minds, which makes it tough for Allison to hide all of her disbelief in Luci's line of gab. Gina is always trying to kill someone, usually Allison. This has something to do with the 'liking' Luci has taken for the newest. Mica is head over bible in love with Allison as well. When he discovers they are all vampires he spends half his time trying to stake her and the other half trying to... Well, we won't go there. "Night Prayers" is almost successful. It teeters between funny and serious until the reader gives up trying to resolve the issue. It actually is pretty plotless, which is a rare complaint for a book that is only 220 pages. But the worst fault in my mind is that every single character is a stereotype. The two that are potentially the most offensive are Gina, the big, bad black woman, and Mica the bible thumping, born-again lay preacher with a heart filled with lust. Gina is almost acceptable, but many fundamentalists might find Mica's character upsetting, and I wouldn't blame them. The story is readable, so it gets its three stars, but I won't be looking out for a sequel.
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