Tag: m/m supernatural short story

Review: Succulent Dark (Frostbite #3) by D.J. Manly

Rating: 4.25 stars out of 5

Succulent Dark Frostbite coverVampire hedonist Teak has finally gone too far with that last drunken orgy and seduction of that priest.  Now the council has given him two options.  Be entombed in a coffin for over a 100 years or be vanished to the wildnerness of Canada, forbidden to feed on the locals and ordered blend in by resuming his mortal profession, a physician, something he hasn’t done since 1923.

Teak has no intention of following orders in Canada until he meets pharmacist Marcus Kent who confounds him totally.  Attracted to Marcus, Teak tries his tricks but nothing works! Marcus seems immune.  Can a potential seducee become the seducer? Teak is about to find out.

I loved this story.  In Teak, Manly has created the total unrepentant vampire who also happens to be the local vampire bad boy.  Teak loves to party, love to drink blood and have sex and if he can do all three together, than he will do it to the extremes.  Manly’s Teak is over the top outrageous and absolutely charming, even when hanging from silver chains about to the sentenced by the Vampire Council.  Teak is the shameless bad boy of rock, without the band of course and the reader will fall for him immediately.

Banished to Canadian wilderness, Teak is a vampire out of water.  It’s city boy vampire meets Northern Exposure and it works as Teak encounters one unknown after another, from curling to an attractive mortal immune to vampire lures.  The other main character, Marcus Kent, is not as fully fleshed out a character as Teak but still he works as the tasty human morsel who turns into the first real love Teak has ever known.  Their romance was charming and a tad old fashioned, just a lovely change of pace for Teak and the reader.

If I had a quibble about the story, it would be that it (and the character of Teak) turned a little overly gushy towards the end.  With his love for Marcus hanging, Teak turns almost weepy, definitely not in keeping with the characterization Manly has established.  I would also have loved to have seen more of Teak in his doctor’s office interacting with his patients because other important part of the changeover for Teak is the reigniting of his love for his profession.  He loves being a doctor again.  It’s a wonderful element of the story and I would have enjoyed seeing Teak’s reaction to medical advancements.

Succulent Dark is a succulent little piece of supernatural fiction, highly enjoyable and leaving the reader wanting more of this couple and this universe.  I definitely recommend this story, it’s the best of the Frostbite collection.

Collection cover art by Posh Gosh, great cover.

Book Details:

ebook, 1st Edition, 54 pages
Published December 13th 2013 by Totally Bound
ISBN 178184867X (ISBN13: 9781781848678)
edition language English
series Frostbite #3

The Frostbite Collection includes:

Gravedigger (Frostbite #1) by Aurelia T. Evans m/f
Night Fall (Frostbite #2) by Jenna Byrnes  m/m
Succulent Dark (Frostbite #3) by D.J. Manly m/m
The Study of Blood in Winter (Frostbite #4) by Catalina Dudka m/f

Review: Sensei by Karenna Colcroft

Rating: 3 stars

Sensei coverIsao Nakamura is a five hundred years old vampire.  He operates a dojo in a neutral territory surrounded by a vampire clan he is at odds with. Isao feeds only on the criminals he comes into contact with and saved many a innocent from the attacks of the vampires around him.  Now his actions threaten the fragile truce he has lived under and all those he has come to care about, including his new adult student James.  James is unaware that his Sensei that he has come to love is a vampire.  Isao returns James’ affections, a perilous idea at best.  Can the Sensei protect James and his dojo or will he lose everything in a final battle?

This is a short story of 73 pages and unfortunately Sensei reads as though we are given just the first several chapters of a much longer book.  The characters are interesting and in Isao Nakamura’s case, we are given to understand that he was once a ninja and that all the ninjas were turned to increase their warrior skills.  But that is our only glimpse of an intriguing backstory and except for one more throwaway sentence, it is forgotten.  Colcroft gives us a vampire clan and again just a marginal understanding of the universe in which they exist.  The small details the author does give us definitely piques the interest for more of her universe making and vampire history but since an overall picture is lacking, it brings the story up short literally.

James is a human without layers or history and that also brings down the interest in the Isao/James union.  Another vampire and former lover of Isao keeps asking the Sensei why James?  What’s so special about him?  But the author never gives him or us a good answer to that question. Again the short length of the story has also hurt her characterizations.

This is a quick read and ends in a HFN with no expectations of a HEA, at least as far as I can tell,  Perhaps the author has a sequel planned, but to bring me back to the table, she will have to bring more history, a more throughly realized universe and characters to the story before I visit here again.

Cover Art by Deana Jamroz is ok.  The design is just ok, but could have been so much better.